Throughout school this week, we have been thinking about the experiences of refugees, with a particular focus on ensuring their rights are upheld. In Year 5, we focused on the specific work of UNICEF, and how this work upholds the rights of refugee children around the world. We started the week by holding a 'Rights Auction' to consider what it must be like for some countries where particular rights are not upheld. We then moved onto researching the work of UNICEF which culminated in using the 'I Can Animate' app on the iPads to create a whiteboard stop-motion animation which spreads the message of the great work that UNICEF do for the corridor display. We were also very fortunate to be visited by an Asylum Seeker who shared his experiences - this really emphasised the importance the work of organisations like UNICEF. Year 5 worked very maturely, passionately and thoughtfully this week when discussing these issues - well done, Year 5!

How many two-scoop ice-cream combinations can you make using two flavours? This is what Year 5 investigated for this half-term's Thinking Maths challenge. After using cones to find all of the possible solutions, we then tried 3, 4, and 5 scoops! Some pairs quickly spotted a pattern and determined the number of different combinations for up to 20 scoops of ice-cream with two flavours. Unfortunately, we didn't have real ice-cream to use, so we had to settle for using coloured cones and dots to record our results!

As part of our Science topic 'Properties and Changes of Materials', Year 5 have been investigating the many different properties of materials, classifying them and considering what the uses of different materials are based on these properties. Today was the turn of 'hardness' which called upon a variety of different materials such as brick, stone, rubber, wood and even an aluminium Coke can to be scratched with a nail as part of the 'scratch test'. After carrying out the test, some groups had different results, so we concluded that this method of testing hardness is perhaps not the most consistent as it is based on our own judgement about the deepness of the scratch - therefore thinking like true scientists!

Year 5 were tasked with measuring the perimeter of the school yard using the somewhat underwhelming tools of a metre stick and a whiteboard. This challenged not only our understanding of perimeter, but our problem solving skills also. Interestingly, there were two common distances found by the ten groups - with half of the class sharing the exact same measurement. This led us to discussing the inadequacies of using a metre stick for measuring something the size of the yard, and also the way we record our results in a clear, organised and efficient way!