Willow Class are story writers! We’ve written three stories already this term: about a house living happily in the countryside, a man who wear’s a bearskin and can’t wash for seven years, and a fisherman’s wife who always wants more. Wow! You may even hear about some Maths Stories, too. We’ve met Tommy Times recently who is a magician and multiplies. Soon, we will meet Davina Divide who is quite the opposite of Tommy Times!

Birch Class continue to focus on Scotland. We have written diary entries about finding the Loch Ness monster and, after drawing Ben Nevis, we are now writing about climbing it.

Chestnut and Oak Classes took part in an innovative workshop staff from 8billion Ideas, who came in to introduce the “Green My City” challenge last week. This made for an interesting and enjoyable workshop morning as our children made initial low-fi drawings for a sustainable city of the future. Our student design team will have the opportunity to bring their ideas to a Chatsworth Schools wide forum in Summer Term, but first we need to build a model. Thanks to all families who provided recycle materials – were going to need them as this is going to be quite a big prototype!

Oak Class had a great time at the Merton Junior Citizens event last Thursday. They learned about bikes and bike safety, the Police, First Aid, the Fire Service, how to keep safe on Transport for London and Neighbourhood Watch. For every service they took part in a session with practical hints and tips. A thoroughly enjoyable and interesting morning!

The week began with storms big enough to keep us in the meadow.

Willow Class

Inspired by The Lorax, and maybe seeing our use of twigs as tent pegs, several children made a vertical 3-D model of the woodland: ‘these are the tall trees’, ‘those are the stumps.’ This was bizarre as I’d planned to teach them woodland structure further down the line – and here they were doing it already!  Mallet-skills improved, including finding and using a natural one. Elsewhere, a team set up the Sami ‘lavvu’ type of tipi, the poles and wrapping for which were carried from and back to school by four happy boys. Other projects included making a fish, a dragon’s toothbrush, a twig microphone, and cloud-spotting. We practised birdsong ID and stopped to reflect on the session by the stream in the Rose Garden.

Birch Class

We showed the visiting student teacher our usual beautiful spot, but the treetops swayed alarmingly and went straight out to the meadow where we put up three cosy pop-up tents for comfort, and began using our birch brash for spring broom-making. One child’s paper butterfly flew so strongly from its string that I wished we had kites. Everyone prepared their Imbolc ice sculptures, excited for next week. One child wove a ‘super-comfortable’  twig cushion, and the broom-making was appreciated for its knotting needs as much as anything.

Oak and Chestnut Class

A perfect sunny, cool late winter’s day. Aswell as making their own ice – sculptures in rubber gloves, students practised the Candlemas song and their performance of the story of Brigid in preparation for the whole school celebration of Imbolc on Wednesday 31^st January.