Year 5 had an egg-citing time in maths this week.

All week we have been learning about volume, we begun the week by making cubes and cuboids out of cubes and calculating the volume of our shapes. By the end of the week we were eggs-tremely confident in how to calculate the volume of a cuboid by multiplying three measurements together.

On Thursday we were given an eggs-tremely difficult maths problem.

Mrs Hall gave us an egg, some scales, two beakers, some water, a ruler, a protractor and a piece of string.

We had to calculate the volume of the egg. Some of us tried to measure the surface with the string as we thought it was the same as calculating the area of a cuboid.  Yet, that did not work.

We thought we could weigh the egg but that did not work.

Egg-ventually (and with a lot of help and support from Mrs Hall) we solved the problem. Mrs Hall showed us to put the small beaker inside the big beaker and filled it with water. We realised that if we  dropped the egg (carefully) into the water it would displace some of the water. The water displaced would be the volume the egg took up.

It was definitely an egg-citing lesson!

As the start of our new topic ‘Flow’, Year 3 visited Beacon Park, Lichfield. We had a great day with Ruth the Ranger observing, sampling and measuring Lemonsley Brook.  After meeting Ruth, we split into three groups and started our activities.  Those of us with wellies on were allowed into the brook to help Miss Groom measure the width and depth of the brook. We then had to measure the temperature of the water and the last part was the most fun.  To measure how fast the brook was flowing we played the traditional game of Pooh Sticks with dog biscuits because they float and are also kind to the environment. Those without wellies timed them to see how fast the dog biscuits took to travel down river.  We also measured how clean the water was, as this would tell us how well the plant would grow.  The more circles we could see at the bottom of the container, the cleaner the water was.

Next, we went pond dipping with Ruth to take samples of the different creatures living in the brook.  We managed to catch and observe a few creatures. Basil even caught a fish! This proves how clean the water is in Lemonsley Brook. We dragged a net in the water and then emptied our nets into a tray, we then used an identification chart to help us identify the things we had caught.  It was great fun and really interested to see what lives below the surface of the water.

Miss Akers and her group looked at the trees along the river bank and identified them from our key.  There were eight different trees alongside the river. Why not ask Year 3 to see if they can name them?