Highlights
It has been another exciting and memorable term for UKS2. A particular highlight was the Year 6 production of Night of Musicals. After many weeks of rehearsals and practice, the children put on a fantastic performance that showcased their confidence, teamwork and talent. A huge thank you goes to all our parents and carers for helping children learn their lines and for providing such wonderful costumes – your support helped make the production such a success.
Year 6 also completed their Bikeability cycling course, where they demonstrated excellent behaviour and enthusiasm while developing their independence and road safety skills.
The Pioneer Day at Gillotts School gave the Year 6 children a taste of the lessons and canteen food to come in September and everyone seemed to enjoy the sessions with the javelins! On the same day, Year 5 spent the morning in their new classes, preparing them for the start of Year 6.
The whole phase has visited Trinity Church this term, where Rev. Sam Brewster has taught the children about Baptism, linking closely to their RE learning with Mrs Chilvers.
Year 5 also enjoyed another visit to the Acacia Lodge care home, continuing to build relationships with members of our local community.
English and Maths
In English, both Year 5 and Year 6 explored the short film Broken, using it as inspiration for their writing while focusing on writing dialogue for character and to advance action, as well as accurate speech punctuation. The children produced some thoughtful and engaging pieces of writing. Year 5 also completed a writing unit based on The Titanic, learning about the famous voyage before writing their own newspaper reports about the disaster.
In Maths, the children have continued to develop their fluency and confidence through a range of reasoning challenges, arithmetic practice and problem-solving activities, encouraging them to explain their thinking and apply their learning in different contexts. Year 6 have also investigated some ‘real-world finance’ such as wages & salaries, bills, mortgages and income tax.
Relationships and Sex Education
As part of our Relationships and Sex Education (RSE) curriculum, the children have covered a number of important topics including puberty, healthy relationships and gender identity. There were some excellent questions and they approached the subject with great respect and maturity.
Learning Means the World
This term, the children have been learning about global warming, pollution and caring for our environment. They explored the dangers of plastic pollution, including the impact of nurdles on our oceans and wildlife, and investigated the causes and effects of air pollution before delivering their own planned lessons and activities to the rest of the class. The children also learned about the importance of recycling, discovering which materials belong in each recycling bin and locating their nearest recycling centres. It has been wonderful to see the children develop such a strong understanding of how small actions can make a positive difference to our planet.
PE
After a successful sports day in the sunshine, where the children showed fantastic team spirit, athleticism, skills and energy, Mr Baker has been teaching Quidditch to the phase in our PE lessons. Even without the flying broomsticks, this has been a really fun and energetic game of skill to learn and play. All children also took part in the Ekiden event again this year. Mr Brown has also delivered a variety of lessons teaching different bat, wall and ball skills; including tennis, volleyball and badminton.
We have also enjoyed learning the rules and positions of rounders, and taking part in mini tournaments in the sunshine.
Year 6 have enjoyed their swimming lessons at Gillotts, developing their abilities and technique in the water while continuing to build important water safety skills. Thank you to the parents who have supported us with this.
Enrichment opportunities
The Trinity Talent Show returned once again, providing children with the opportunity to showcase their amazing talents whilst raising money for our partnership school in Uganda, New Brainstorm School. Congratulations to everyone who took part, and special mentions go to Stan, James and Thea for their outstanding performances.
Many of the children have been busy with their 100 Things activities and their Mayor of Henley awards this term, with several achieving their gold and silver awards - the level of commitment and range of skills and activities that have been undertaken is very impressive indeed. We also have some very keen choristers and musicians in the phase, the choir and orchestra have both taken part in a number of performances in school and the wider Henley community - well done to all.
Final message
As another successful year comes to an end, we would like to thank all our families for their continued support throughout the year.
At the leavers’ assembly on Thursday 16th July we will celebrate all of the Year 6 children' s progress and achievements and wish them every success and happiness as they begin the next exciting chapter of their education at their secondary schools - they have been a real credit to Trinity School and we know they will achieve great things.
To our Year 5 children, we hope they have a wonderful, restful summer break and we look forward to welcoming them back in September as the new leaders of Upper Key Stage 2.
With very best wishes for the Summer break. Miss Galton, Miss Kirton and Mrs Aiken & all the UKS2 team.
