There was a theme of frogs and ponds today across parts of the school as the children got in touch with nature! the children from Year One ventured off site to enjoy a trip to Wat Tyler. First they heard all about pond wildlife- newts, dragonfly’s,  water boatman, water spiders. Then they had the opportunity to take part in some pond dipping themselves. One at a time they dipped the nets to catch the wildlife then they brought their catches back to the groups table where they identified and sorted them. They dipped in different parts of the pond- the pond marging, surface and bottom. The children found newts, pond louse, water beetles, boatman, snails and lots more. They looked at them in greater detail using a magnifying glass. In the afternoon they went for a mini beast hunt in different habitats. They went to the woodland area and then a meadow. They played a quiz on minibeasts and talked about them being in vertebrates. A full write up of the fantastic day out will be included in this weeks newsletter.

Willows also had a ‘frogtastic’ time as they continued to investigate creatures life cycles, today focusing on the life cycle of frogs. they created their own moving frogs and then, hearing that Hedgehogs currently had a tank of tadpoles in their classroom, sent a group of children downstairs to investigate. The children asked Miss O’Rourke about the changes the children had observed in the tadpoles so far and then, as they had been so well behaved and polite, the generous teacher agreed that some of the tadpoles could be transferred into tanks in the Year Five classrooms. As a school we follow strict guidelines in order to keep tadpoles in school.

The frog theme continued in Robins where Mr B joined the children for a sing song session with his guitar. the children sang ‘Five Little Speckled Frogs’, taking turns to jump off the logs into the pool of water.

Lunchtime saw the children enjoy a tasty treat as they were served Mrs Hardy’s ‘Oriental Noodles’. The meal has quickly become a firm favourite in school and received a strong thumbs up today in both halls!

The afternoon was full of activity. Badgers enjoyed a calm and relaxing library session where they browsed through hundreds of titles before relaxing and reading their choices as individuals and in pairs. Owls had a creative afternoon where they worked together to create 3D landscapes which included both human and physical features. The children proudly showed off their collage skills to everyone who entered their classroom!

In the early Years Garden the children role played cooking on a BBQ whilst their friends inside made their own pretend lollies whilst on the field Kites worked with Mr Smith to develop their standing long jump skills. From a standing start the children used their momentum to jump as far as they could and then measure the distance they had achieved.

Finally, in the upstairs hall, 6C worked with Mrs Thompson to investigate the blues! The children played a series of notes on the xylophones to create their own blues rifts in unison, following notations in pairs.

Today also saw the completion and first day of use of our new lift! The lift allows equal access for all to all levels of the building from the staffroom and both the downstairs and upstairs corridors.

.