A year of calm study
Year 5 can be a calm and studious year; a year to embed all of the knowledge learnt in lower Key Stage 2; a year to start the preparations for transition to secondary school.
This is often a year when children grow in maturity – sometimes even more so than in their final year in primary. They gain greater independence and confidence from being given more responsibility in their learning.
Children in Year 5 are increasingly encouraged to take responsibility for their own learning: to do their homework, to pack their school bag, to remember the days for PE and come to school in their sportswear. And they develop and grow as a result. It is about encouraging independence in preparation for bigger things to come.
What will my child do in Year 5?
As with every other year groups, Year 5 follow statutory schemes of National curriculum and Cambridge curriculum. There is an expected standard to reach by the end of the year, and most teachers will make assessments throughout the year to judge if your child is on track to achieve the expected curriculum standard.
- Maths
Children in Year 5 will be expected to be confident enough with addition, subtraction, multiplication and division to know which one to use in what situation. They need to be confident in their methods for using all four operations with larger numbers (three digits and then four digits). They should also be able to see how Maths fits into everyday life, and other areas of study.
Children will be learning about fractions, decimals and percentages. They will need to calculate the area and perimeter of different shapes. Children will need to solve measurement problems that involve converting between units of measurement. They will learn to draw and measure angles and also calculate the size of missing angles. They will need to interpret information in line graphs and tables.
- English
For English, children in Year 5 will read a range of different genres. continue to read an increasingly wide range of fiction, poetry, plays and non-fiction texts. They will continue to use their skills of inference of characters’ motives and feelings and will start to think about figurative language and how it is used. They will learn to spell a variety of more sophisticated words with different prefixes and suffixes, homophones, root words, word origins, synonyms and antonyms.
When writing a text, they will carefully select vocabulary (including adverbs) and use a variety of presentational devices to structure text (including time connectives). They will use adverbs and adverbials to explain how something is being done. They will use a range of punctuation correctly, including brackets, dashes and commas. They will use a dictionary and a thesaurus as they write with neat, legible cursive handwriting; write with increasing speed
- New topics
A favourite science topic in Year 5 is often space as the children find it so engaging as the explore earth and space, looking at the movement of the sun, earth and moon. They will investigate living things and their habitats, including lifecycles of a mammal, amphibian, insect and bird.
They will consider plants including seeds, focusing on changes from seed germination to death. They will experiment on properties and changes of materials, including dissolving, separating and reversible changes
How can I help my child in Year 5?
Obviously, keep doing all of the usual things that schools say. Continue to hear them read, practise times tables, ensure they do their homework, talk to them about their day, and encourage them to read.
