Happy weekend.
We have had a productive week in which we have become quite fluent in calculating area and perimeter. Today we have investigated that the area of a right angled triangle is actually just half of a rectangle and we already know how to calculate the area of a rectangle so that was some extra knowledge for free.
Next week we shall be moving onto the calculation of volume and then revising different types of measures and how we convert from one unit of measure to another. It would be a help if their attention could be drawn towards the units of measure used for everyday things such as car journeys, cooking, liquids, a packet of crisps compared with a sack of potatoes etc.
In English we have been investigating formal vocabulary in readiness for writing a police report based on the crime at the beginning of our novel ‘Smith’. Before that though, the children are going to have to improve a report that I wrote regarding a threat to a pair of eagles – they didn’t seem to think that I had done a very good job of it!
History this last week had us learning a bit about the Ottoman Empire, where it was located and when it existed. We began to discuss the achievements of the empire and will be debating which were most notable.
Finally, I have included a few photos of the gnome villages that they created during our Woodland School session this week. There are some lucky gnomes in Chagford!

Happy Chinese New Year everyone!
After my late start to the term, we now seem to be back into full swing and forging ahead with our learning.
The ‘Snow Leopard’ stories are now mostly ready for display. I have been really touched by the effort put into the descriptions in the children’s stories and also to the detailed editing that was done prior to the write-up. I can really see now that the rules of punctuation are being absorbed and demonstrated and that spelling is improving which makes the beautiful content of the stories even more pleasurable to read.
In maths, we have made a new best friend this week … 10%! Our friend has helped us be able to calculate any other fraction of an amount and we are feeling more confident. We shall be moving on to area and perimeter next.
On a lighter note, I promised the children a taste of haggis, neeps and tatties for Burns’ night next week. I shall be getting an ‘original’ and a vegetarian haggis and the tasting (on Tuesday) will not be compulsory but do drop me a line if your child has a related food allergy (I shall also check the school system for details but I thought I’d mention it anyway)
We have reached the time of year when progress really starts to become evident and I am pleased to say that everyone is taking huge strides in their learning. Well done everyone, keep up the good work and keep reading!

It has been hard work all the way this week, trying to finish units of work but everyone should be incredibly proud of what they have achieved. The stories that have been written using ‘The Snow Leopard’ by Jackie Morris are really wonderful and fully show off the fantastic imaginations that the children have.
Next term our English is going to be centred around the novel ‘Smith’ by Leon Garfield. There is a cliff hanger at the end of every chapter so I really hope that you all enjoy the novel. The writing foci will be a news report, an advertisement and an information text (all regarding some unusual events and characters). I shall say no more so as to avoid spoilers.
In Maths, we shall be following on from our work on fractions to link to decimals and percentages. This shall be followed by a unit on perimeter, area and volume.
Science is moving on to a unit on magnetism.
I have copied some photos below of the lovely candle dipping and wreath making that we have done this past week. It has definitely produced some treasures to bring out each Christmas.
Do try to keep the reading and times tables practice going over the holidays but Happy Christmas to you all.

Happy December everyone!
I hope that you have been told about our trip to the Energy from Waste plant as it was very interesting as well as completely shocking to see how much waste is generated each day and has to be dealt with. By far the highlight of the trip was being on the overhanging gallery (behind smellproof glass!) above the waste hall, watching the giant grabbers move it around from delivery pit to the incineration hopper and also being able to look through special viewing windows into the furnace itself – it was absolutely like looking into a volcano. I have attached some photos of us.
In English, our ‘Snow Leopard’ stories are coming on a treat. There is some wonderful description going on. Ask your child what techniques they are using within the story and why they are useful – I hope that they are able to tell you!
In Maths, everyone completed their end of unit test magnificently with vastly improved performances so a huge ‘Well done’ is deserved. We are now moving onto adding, subtracting, multiplying and dividing with fractions. KFC is going to feature in class : this has cause some delight and some disgust amongst the children. They’ll soon find out if they are fans or not.
Next Wednesday, we have another extension to our thinking about waste management when we have Proper Job coming to work with us on sustainable wreath making. Maple Class is such a creative group that I’m really looking forward to seeing their creations and they’ll be bringing home lots of ideas for reducing or avoiding waste at Christmas time.
Can I just remind you to complete the parent questionnaire for the France trip and to get passport applications under way preferably before Christmas. As previously mentioned, if there are financial barriers to you doing so, please approach the school as this is a tricky year and the project has a fund to be able to help out.
Happy weekend!

Maple Class Blog Friday 25th November
It was lovely to see the vast majority of you at parents’ evening this week. If you have not managed to make an appointment, please get in touch and I shall be happy to have a phone conversation or even just send you some current progress notes.
We have had our second Woodland School session today and once again, they did not disappoint with their foraging skills and teamwork. We were challenged to make a map of our woodland area from natural materials that would guide someone around the area if it were their first visit. All of the maps were incredibly clear with very well placed landmarks – well done year 6.
Our persuasive leaflets are published and on display. I think that any one of them makes a well-reasoned argument and would stand up against any that may fall out of our magazines or appear in the mail. We have begun to craft ideas about our rainforest ‘animal protector’. Please ask your child which creature they have chosen and see how many ways you can reframe how you refer to it. E.g. Black Panther – obsidian prowler – night cat – slinking night spirit
Or – Toucan – Beady-eyed warrior – dagger-billed glider – jewelled sky shadow How expressive can you get?
In maths we have just about come to the end of our unit on all the basic calculation methods. It would be a great bonus if you could encourage your child to practise one each of an addition, subtraction, multiplication by 2 digits and division each day to stay on top of methods and increase speed of fluency.
Lastly, just a reminder about the trip next Tuesday (29th) to the Plymouth recycling centre. IT IS AN 8.30 DEPARTURE so please can children assemble outside the front door of school at 8.20.
And for a final lastly…. You should have all received paperwork for the France trip this week. The main action is to ensure that you have a passport or apply for one asap as we shall be needing them in January to copy for our own documentation. If you have any issues with applying for a passport, please get in touch sooner rather than later and we shall of course give our support.
Happy weekend!

Hello all,
Another week has flown past and I had forgotten to tell you how we did with the Halloween cake sale. Thank you all very much for the fantastic contributions. Between the sale itself and a break time sale the next day, we completely sold out and made a magnificent £100 for the PTFA. The children helped set up and run the stalls and I quickly found out how brilliant they were at pulling together as a team.
On Tuesday 29th November we have a visit to Plymouth ‘Energy from waste’ site (organised originally by Mr Finch to support past work on sustainability). I have sent a letter home with the children and would be grateful if you could return the reply slip. There is a cost of £6.71 for the trip and Mrs Lawson will let you know as soon as the School Gateway payment system has gone live.
We are in the midst of our work on writing a poetic narrative in the style of The Snow Leopard – I think that we shall see some beautiful stories emerge.
In maths, having covered all the methods for addition, subtraction, multiplication and division, we shall next week be looking at BIDMAS(Brackets, Indices, Division/Multiplication, Addition/Subtraction) to help us understand which order to perform the operations in when faced with a mixed calculation.
Our Geography work is on informal settlements which has linked beautifully with our recent learning on the migration of people to cities during the Industrial Revolution.
Have a great weekend.

Maple Class Blog Friday 11th November
We have had a super start to the day today with our Woodland School session. I was amazed at the expertise in Bushcraft that certain members of our class had and we all learnt a lot – I certainly will be going home knowing many more ways to get a fire started. They also had the opportunity to examine a badger skull and pelt and were challenged to make a waterproof gnome shelter. The Chagford gnomes are in good hands and you will be glad to know that they will remain warm and dry throughout the torrential downpours that we keep having!
In English, we have finished writing our persuasive leaflets which will be published on Chromebook over the coming weeks as and when we are able to use the devices.
In the meantime, we are starting a piece of narrative based on The Snow Leopard by Jackie Morris. If you have or are able to borrow from the library any other Jackie Morris stories, they all use similar very poetic language and will delight with their wonderful illustrations. The more that we can read, the more we shall absorb her style.
The aim of the English unit is to write a similar story ( it is in fact a modern creation myth) but with a different central character in a different setting (the rainforest) so please start researching rainforest animals that would make good protectors of a realm and noting their features (how they look, move and sound)
In Maths, we have been learning about factors and are beginning to use them for division but we shall also be grappling with division by a 2-digit number (long division). We have had a couple of visits from other Trust staff observing Maths and I would like to congratulate the children on the confident way in which they were able to talk about their maths learning.
In Geography we are about to start a unit on informal settlements and how they come about.
I hope you all have a lovely weekend. I have included a few pictures of our Woodland School session.

Maple class blog wk beginning 17th Oct
As we approach the half term break, I wanted to say how proud I am of the children for their hard work. All have at least doubled their times tables facts recall speed and performed really well in the end of unit test for our maths Place Value unit.
This week in Maths we shall be consolidating our knowledge of tests of divisibility – please ask your child how to test whether a number can be divided by 3 !! This enables us to quickly identify prime numbers. We shall also be securing our understanding of multiplication and its associated written methods which we shall use to solve multi-step multiplication problems.
Our unit on persuasive writing continues and we should all now be able to talk confidently about techniques that are commonly used in persuasive texts. We shall be jointly composing a class leaflet based on the flooding in Pakistan.
Home reading is also going well and we have begun to fly into space as our astronauts have taken to the skies on our rocket reads wall. Keep it up everyone and remember that we’re aiming for 5 home reads (at least) of about 20 mins per week. I cannot impress enough that it is through reading that we acquire most of our language for writing.
You will have noticed that the children have come home with spelling lists this week. The columns for them to focus on have been highlighted. We shall be addressing the spelling pattern from the centre column during class as well as looking at ways to remember the tricky words. Some of the words will be included in our end-of-week spelling dictation. Please encourage your child to practise the words using Look-Cover-Write-Check until they are able to write them confidently.
Have a good week everyone.

What a great day we've had (in the sun!). The child labour must have worn them out because it was a sleepy journey home.
I hope that they have lots to tell you about the mining at Morwellham because the trip certainly reinforced lots of what we had covered in class last Tuesday.

We have come to the end of our topic on Place Value in Maths and are moving on to arithmetic. After reinforcing our addition and subtraction written methods we shall spend time becoming fluent in multiplying by 2 digit numbers and in division. I shall send a sheet home next week outlining our methods to you as we have all learnt in different ways.
Times tables score are going up! We have focused on the 7s, 3s and 8s so please do some quizzing at home.

Our writing is focused around persuasion. If your child has a particular cause that they are passionate about persuading support for then it would be really useful if they could research and have to hand some facts and figures to support their presentation of the problem and the solutions that your organisation provides.

Have a super weekend and enjoy the photos.

​Dear everyone,
What a super week we have had. Our poems are finished and ready for display (and very thoughtful and beautifully presented they are too).
Everyone has made a concerted effort with home reading this week and it is lovely to hear about books other than school books that you are sharing at home.
Today we have enjoyed the mummers play which I’m sure there is more about in the newsletter but we felt quite inspired to give one a go ourselves – maybe later in the term!
Junior life skills was a valuable experience. Unfortunately for us, some of the presenters weren’t able to attend which resulted in a rather truncated afternoon but I was delighted with the way that the year 6s conducted themselves and the sensible and thoughtful questions that they had to ask and the mature way in which they were able to contribute to the sessions – thank you year 6, you were a credit to our school.
Our times tables recall is getting much quicker too. Next week we need to work on our 8 times table so any preparation would be great.
Last but my no means least, we are a week away from our trip to Morwellham. The following link gives some child-friendly information about mining in Devon and Cornwall for those of you who would like to explore the topic at home.  Please can you return the reply slip and arrange for the financial contribution via the School Gateway if still outstanding –
Cornwall and West Devon Mining Landscape Facts for Kids (kiddle.co)
Let’s hope that next Friday’s weather will be kinder to us than today.
Have a lovely weekend.