In literacy, Year 5 have been writing setting descriptions from the perspective of the main character of our topic book: Curiosity the Mars Rover.

We focused on using the 5 senses, alliteration, onomatopoeias, personifications, similes and metaphors in our writing to help create vivid descriptions for our readers.

This half-term Year 5 are reading the text ‘Journey to the Rivet Sea’ following the Journey and adventures of Maia.

Sent in 1910 to live with distant relatives who own a rubber plantation along the Amazon River, English orphan Maia is excited. She believes she is in for brightly coloured macaws, enormous butterflies, and “curtains of sweetly scented orchids trailing from the trees.” Her British classmates warn her of man-eating alligators and wild, murderous Indians. Unfortunately, no one cautions Maia about her nasty, xenophobic cousins, who douse the house in bug spray and forbid her from venturing beyond their coiffed compound. Maia, however, is resourceful enough to find herself smack in the middle of more excitement than she ever imagined, from a mysterious “Indian” with an inheritance, to an itinerant actor dreading his impending adolescence, to a remarkable journey down the Amazon in search of the legendary giant sloth.

Listen to chapters 1 and 2 here:

This week in Year 5 we completed our final character descriptions and moved onto writing diary entries based on our class novel Journey to Jo’burg. We have worked hard to include a range of features in our character descriptions. Including the use of: sentence openers, interesting adjectives, similes and metaphors. Our final pieces of work have been excellent!

This half term, Year 5 will be reading ‘Journey to Jo’burg’ by Beverley Naidoo, which tells the story of South African siblings Naledi and Tiro and their fight to save their baby sister. Bravely, alone, they set off on a journey to find their mother, who they hope will be able to help. It isn’t until they reach her in the city of Johannesburg that they come to understand the dangers of their country, and the painful struggle for freedom and dignity that is taking place all around them.

While reading this book, children will be completing a number of independent writing pieces. To begin with, children will write a character description about one of the book’s main characters. They will then take upon the role of Naledi and will write a letter to Mma (Naledi’s mother) before finishing the half term by writing a diary entry based upon the events of Naledi and Tiro’s journey across South Africa.

Listen to Chapter 1 of Journey to Jo’burg below:

https://youtu.be/5P6tm5EYmwE