From the "Remote Classroom"

Once a week our Year 5 and 6 students complete a Maths investigation task to practice the skills they have been taught in a fun and meaningful way. Since remote learning 2.0 began, our topic has been fractions. 'How can learning about fractions be fun?'

 Well, it's fun if you can roll up little pieces of paper into balls and then shoot them into an empty cup! Take a look at our 'Fractions Basketball' activity which was also a screen free task. The first picture explains the task, the second and third pictures are photos submitted by Luke 6DF demonstrating his set up at home and how he has recorded the results in his Maths book. 

This activity can be played over and over again, where the total number of shots at goal (denominator) can be modified whilst the amount scored (numerator) depends on how many goals were scored in the cup! The results are left up to chance making connections between Algebra and Statistics & Probability within our curriculum. You can also increase the challenge using Measurement, asking the player to shoot goals from various distances or locations around your home!

“Maths is sometimes hard, but this task made it fun, easy and enjoyable” Luke 6DF

Mrs Draper

(Year 6 Teacher)

Push ...Pull...Gravity...Torque...Friction...Magnetism

What a treat it was for all Year 3 and 4 students to sign into Zoom for an incursion on Wednesday 12th August to learn more about ‘The powers that rule the world’ – FORCES!! 

In Integrated Studies this term, students are learning about science and how physics works in the world. This involves how forces can be and are exerted as well as whether a force is a contact force or an action-at-a-distance force. 

The incursion was provided by PrimeSCI (a part of Swinburne University of Technology) and was called – Forces in Motion! 

Through the hour, students watched the presenters, Sandra and Chris, demonstrate how FORCES work with each other and against each other.

As students had prepared themselves for the incursion with the required materials, they could also join in on some of the experiments and discover how long a ‘spinning top’ can spin for example and how to create a hovercraft with an old CD, lid of a pop top drink bottle, a balloon and some blu-tak! Amazing!

We learned a lot about the forces involved in allowing a spinning top to spin. Did you know that a spinning-top requires the forces of friction, gravity, torque as well as push and pull to spin?

Also, did you know that there is a speed of gravity and that the speed of gravity on Earth is 9.8 metres per second?

Additionally we learnt that the only reason a feather and ball fall at different speeds when dropped is because of another force – Air resistance! This is an example where, the forces work against each other.

To finish the incursion we watched an amazing clip where a vault was vacuum sealed so that it had no air and we watched a bowling ball and feather fall to earth at the same time. Here is the link and it is presented by the BBC, Human Universe https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E43-CfukEgs

The students really enjoyed the experience and it was a great way to bring the forces to life, learning how the everyday items around us, like our toys, use ‘The powers that rule the world’ every day!

Julie Tainsh 

(Year 3 Teacher)