5Tanoak 2025-26

Tanoak, Notholithocarpus densiflorus

Ms Thornham Mrs Robinson Mrs Thomas Miss Thomas Mrs Jarman Mrs Pullinger

Class Teacher Teaching Assistant Teaching Assistant Teaching Assistant HLTA Music teacher

Please contact me using the following email address if you have any questions or queries bthornham@ashdown.e-sussex.sch.uk

Current Learning

A lively and engaging term is ahead, filled with rich learning across every subject. In English, children will explore classic poetry, beginning with The Spider and the Fly before diving into Alfred Noyes’ dramatic narrative poem The Highwayman. They will use the Writing Rainbow to support their writing, selecting ambitious vocabulary and crafting accurate, effective sentences. In Maths, the focus will move from strengthening multiplication and division to applying written methods, followed by multiplying fractions and finding fractions of amounts.

Our science topic, Materials and Their Properties, will give children the chance to investigate insulation, conduction and how materials change state. In RE, we will explore the question Why do Christians believe Jesus was the Messiah? and consider how beliefs about the Incarnation influence Christian life today.

PSHE/RSE this term will cover healthy lifestyles, the changes of puberty (including menstruation), and how a baby develops, alongside the biological process of reproduction.

In computing, children will examine how technology shapes our lives, tracing the evolution of computers and researching key figures such as Charles Babbage, Ada Lovelace, Alan Turing, Bill Gates and Steve Jobs. They will design and refine their own interactive games by writing algorithms, testing and evaluating them. Art and design will focus on 3D modelling, beginning with drawing illusions and culminating in sculpting a self-supporting figure.

In music, children will continue developing their recorder skills, learning to play short pieces and expanding their repertoire with new notes C and D.

A wonderfully varied and inspiring term of learning awaits.

PE will be on Monday this term and Swimming on Friday.

Home Learning

READING, READING, READING

We would really like EVERYONE to focus on finding books that they love, getting lost in great stories, and sharing those fantastic stories with us all at school.

We are asking all children to read for pleasure at least 4 times a week and using Timestables Rockstars at least three times a week.