The wonderful winter weather proved the perfect opportunity for the Reception children to embrace the new season on their return to school after the Christmas break. The eager young learners enjoyed sharing their ideas and listening to others while discussing the effects of changing seasons on the natural world around them. They experimented with ice at forest school; watching it melt in their warm hands, stamping on it and dropping it from height to see how it reacted. They also observed the plethora of bare trees and shared their knowledge on how animals behave during winter. It has been such a pleasure to have these young conservationists back in school!

Rosie Snagge, Reception Class Teacher

In science this week, Year 1 have been busy making sense of… senses! They were tasked with identifying the five senses and finding out more about which parts of the body they relate to. Working as a team and sharing their thoughts and ideas, the children discovered exactly how they had the ability to see, hear, smell, taste and feel. As well as the joy of discovering the different sensations affecting their hands, feet, ears, eyes, mouths and noses, the children demonstrated wonderful listening skills as they worked with their talk partners during their lessons.

Rebecca Lane, Year 1 Class Teacher

Year 2 this week had their balance, co-ordination, creativity and agility tested as they took to the gymnastic mats in PE. There was no shortage of ingenuity and imagination on show as the children, having listened carefully to instructions, cleverly created poses using one, two or three points of contact with the floor – which, the children discovered, related to the number of body parts in contact with the mat at any one time. This was a wonderful introduction to gymnastics for many but their attitude and aptitude showed that they are more than ready to take the next steps.

Rob Dilworth, Year 2 PE Coach

Year 3’s first lesson of 2024 was an introduction to their new topic, Instruments of the Orchestra. The children listened to Benjamin Britten’s iconic Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra, with the first objective being to learn the names of the four families – strings, percussion, woodwind and brass. Strong listening skills will be paramount in succeeding in this topic, so we worked on listening-based games. The children enjoyed a circle game which involved trying to remember the four orchestral family names that relied upon them listening to their peers’ answers, as well as a percussion game based on Mozart’s Eine Kleine Nacht Musik.

Jess Harman, Y3 Music Teacher

In English, Year 5 were given a taste of what life was like for children in a Victorian school, which was an introductory lesson to our new class text, Street Child by Berlie Doherty. The children had to focus hard on listening as instructions had to be followed very closely to avoid punishments such as standing against the wall, wearing the dunce’s hat or getting the cane (not really!). The children were immediately captivated by the new topic for the term and had a good understanding of the conditions faced by the lead character in the class text.

Ed Elgood, Year 5 English Teacher

Mindful Year 6 combined a wellbeing walk through the wintry woods with an outdoor geography lesson as they were tasked with probing the difference between weather and climate and learning to interpret data. The children looked at climate graphs from different climate zones around the world and matched the correct climate graph to the correct climate zone. And the frozen ground and puddles in the woods led to a fascinating discussion about tundra, with the children demonstrating excellent geographical knowledge by explaining where in the world tundra – or frigid landscapes with sparse growth – can largely be found. Year 6 revelled in their outdoor-learning session which was beneficial for mind and body.

Emma Dunn, Year 6 Geography Teacher

Year 7 have just started their ‘Calculations’ topic where they have been using and manipulating the speed, distance and time equation. To help with their understanding, the children went outside and timed how long it took them to run different distances. This meant they could then work out their individual speeds and discuss what might affect their results. This was done in pairs or small groups to help encourage teamwork, especially with peers they don’t often work with. They will be using the skills learnt when they look at pressure and density in the coming weeks.

Oli Backhouse, Y7 Science Teacher

In art, Year 8 got to grips with figure proportion before tackling gesture drawings – a type of drawing that prioritizes flowing movement, resulting in sketchy, fluid lines with less defined shapes than contour drawing. The pupils were incredibly engaged in the task as they combined their problem-solving skills with creativity, aiming high and the ability to stay positive when their figures didn’t quite match up to their expectations first time around. They loved learning about the various proportions needed to make a human sketch lifelike but the undoubted highlight was learning about gestural drawing and capturing their artistic figure – with the children taking turns striking different poses – under timed conditions featuring only the barest details.

Olga Houghton, Head of Art