Goodbye Mrs Rolfe!

The children in Cassatt said goodbye to Mrs Rolfe today. 

Here are a couple of things that they said about her...

Mrs Rolfe helps me learn

  

She is Agent Caring

She helps me grow my brain

I smile when I see her and now I will miss her

Mrs Rolfe will help other children too...

...and she certainly will! We wish her all the best in her new adventures! 

Enterprise Day

 ‘Sugar Snatcher’

Last week the whole school were involved in a day of investigations as part of enterprise week. Please see the link below for a write up of the day:

http://enablingenterprise.org/archives/19619

Investigating finger prints

Last week, Cassatt class were invited to take a closer look at their finger prints. Using ink, they stamped their finger on to a balloon before blowing it up to enlarge the print.

The children observed "so many lines" in each individual print, and commented on how it looked "much bigger"! This activity was enjoyed as a part of Enterprise Day.

Interfaith week (13/03/2017)

 Last week the internationalism team held an interfaith week which was launched with Key stage 2 assembly on Monday and KS1 on Tuesday.   The focus for this week was to reflect as a community on what it means to “belong” and explore ideas of being included or excluded because of what we look like or what we believe or think. Our inspiration for this came from this thought provoking phrase:

“We are all different fish swimming in the same ocean”

The week included workshops for each class from Nursery to Year 6, using P4C stimuli (see video clip above) and questions to encourage pupils and staff to reflect on the things that make us different but also to recognise and consider the deeper values that we share and join us together. At the end of the workshops pupils were set a challenge to decorate their own fish (in a unique, special way) and write values that were important to them.

 

 

 

During the week pupils were the given the opportunity to take part in “reflection stations” in the learning zone at lunchtimes. These will be in the learning zone for parents and children to use during parent consultations on Wednesday and Thursday.  

 

 

 

 

Morphing Images - Silent Movies - Episode 2

Morphing Images - Silent Movies

In Year 5 we have been learning about the era of the 1920's and 1930's as our topic.

To complement this, in Computing we have created our own black-and-white silent movies.

• first, we planned our storyboards on A3 sheets
• next, we filmed four scenes using the iPads
• finally, we used Movie Maker on the Computing Suite PC's to remove all sound, make the clips black and white, add captions and some suitable music

Here are some of the results from Banksy class, we hope you enjoy them.

The Lost Glasses

Late for School

Starring Francisca, Diana, Reuben and Dillon

Lazy Lilly

Starring Finn, Fiza, Elizabeth, Aidan, Michael and Lily-Rose

Birthday Disaster

Starring Adrian, Dylan, Catie and Jacqueline

The Ruined Experiment

Starring Sophia, Rafaela, Dominik, Tom and Jarrell

Is jelly always wobbly?

"Is Jelly always wobbly?"

After reading "Red Rockets and Rainbow Jelly" by Nick Sharratt, this question really got us thinking in Cassatt class!

Initially, everyone answered with a certain yes. We then looked at the two ingredients we were using, jelly cubes and water. Children agreed that these two things, when put together, would always make wobbly jelly, "especially when you poked it!"

Miss Lawrence then asked:

"What if you put too much water in?"

Children spoke with their partners about how the jelly would "fall off the plate" and be "like a puddle" and concluded that it would be "watery, not wobbly". Children then explored the idea of there being not enough water. It was suggested that the "jelly cubes would just stay too hard" and that "they wouldn't wobble much" either.

Children then hypothesised about the effect of hot water on the jelly cubes:

"Its needs to be hot to melt it!"

"If it wasn't hot the jelly cube would be still in a cube."

"If the water was really cold the jelly cube would freeze!"

So as a class, we came to the conclusion that our jelly would be wobbly if we followed the instructions and put the correct amount of each ingredient in! Lots of children still had ideas to share in choosing time, so they wrote their thoughts down on a question board. Some children still answered with a 'yes' because jelly is the product of two specific ingredients, so anything other that something that is wobbly, isn't actually jelly!

After all this talk about jelly, we made some of our own!

The Fish Who Could Wish

In KS1 P4C club, the children were presented with the story "The Fish Who Could Wish" by John Bush. 

Our initial discussions following the story centred around the best wishes that the fish made, with the most popular wish being when he turned himself into a shark to get his own back! Discussion then turned to the fish's wish to be like the other fish, and the idea that it was the worst wish because then he couldn't wish anymore:

"I disagree, because he just wanted to be himself and that's ok to just be yourself, you don't have to be magic, you just can be yourself" Nicky thought.

Many children agreed with this sentiment, and Charlotte bravely shared with the group that Nicky had really changed her mind.

Megan added "I think it would be ok to have wishes, but not it they were like 'I wish I was the king or queen for a day' or ' I wish I had loads of chocolate' but like caring wishes, like if someone wasn't very well you might wish they were better"

Children then got thinking about what they might wish for, if they had one wish. Lots of us thought very deeply about this wish, focusing on the love for our family, bringing them together and caring for them. Some of us chose wishes to make others smile, like being Captain Underpants for the day! Fenton was very certain that he would "definitely use the wish to grow gills and flippers" so he could breathe and swim underwater!

What would you wish for?

Garden Blog

Hello,    
I’m Nathan Smith, the Assistant Gardener at Windhill21! I am an ex-pupil and attended Windhill from 2006 until 2010 and am currently studying horticulture at Writtle University College in Chelmsford. I will be looking after and maintaining the school garden.
 
Since September I have been weeding and tidying up the school garden, improving the quality of the soil and planning exciting new projects. After the Easter break I will be sowing some seeds and planting with some of the pupils. Here are some of the things that I have been doing over the last couple of months. 

• Weeding
• Hedge and shrub pruning
• Soil cultivation / ground preparation
• Preparing the shed
• Leaf clearing
• Potting on the strawberry runners (stolons) 

 Box Heart
 Here is a shrub called Box that I have shaped into a heart
 

Before
 

 After

 Windhill21 School Garden Visitor

Every week since I started in September there has been a little visitor, meet Mr Robin!

 5 Quick Robin Facts

Robins can be seen across the UK in woodland, hedgerows, parks and gardens.

Robins can be seen all year round.

Robins eat Worms, seeds, fruits and insects.

Robins are from the Chats and thrushes family.

Robins live on average only for a couple of years, but a few reach quite an advanced age. The oldest known wild individual was 11 years 5 months.

Find out more about Robins and watch a video and hear a robin song on the RSPB website below:
https://www.rspb.org.uk/birds-and-wildlife/bird-and-wildlife-guides/bird-a-z/r/robin/

Thanks for reading and I hope you enjoyed the first garden blog.

Nathan Smith

Assistant Gardener

Windhill21

 

    

Signs of Spring

In Degas class yesterday we were extremely excited that the sun had decided to shine for us!

In the afternoon we went on a walk and looked for signs of spring.

We were really excited that we could start to see lots of signs that spring was here!

The children had iPads to take photos of what they had found and our resident photograph Natalie took these fantastic shots:

When we returned back to the classroom we made handprint flowers with paint and paper and created a list of the signs of spring we witnessed in our walk.

This is Adam's writing:

Morphing Images - Silent Movies

In Year 5 we have been learning about the era of the 1920's and 1930's as our topic.

To complement this, in Computing we have created our own black-and-white silent movies.

• first, we planned our storyboards on A3 sheets
• next, we filmed four scenes using the iPads
• finally, we used Movie Maker on the Computing Suite PC's to remove all sound, make the clips black and white, add captions and some suitable music

Here are some of the results from Harrison class, we hope you enjoy them.

Sneaky Surprise

starring Medina, Leah, Sai, Hannah and Cody

Now You See Me, Now You Don't

starring Angel, Elizabeth, Grace, Kaylee and Lucy

I Just Give Up

starring Frank, Liam, Ben, Charlie and Jack

Ice Cream Capers

starring Rita, Erika, Dolly, Lilly and Leland

The Drink

starring Michael, Daniel, Ismael, Alvaro and Kaiden

Heavy or light?

Baby bear is on his way to the moon! 

However, his rocket can't hold anything too heavy otherwise it might not be able to launch. 

Children worked together to sort out objects into two groups, heavy or light.

Luckily, baby bear was able to take his favourite food with him, but he had to leave his toy digger behind because it was too heavy. Children worked together to use the language of weight and comparison with this activity, which required them to be excellent Agent Communicators!

What does it mean to be brave?

Children in KS1 P4C club were thinking about bravery today, specifically brave animals. They had to decide which animals they thought might be brave and which they thought were more cowardly. Children decided that lions, elephants and whales (amongst other large or fearsome creatures) were brave, and smaller creatures such as mice, frogs and tortoises weren't brave at all.

We then watched a video depicting a story called "The Lion Inside"

Children then discussed the story and many changed their minds! They decided that maybe mice were quite brave as they have to do things that might be scary. Perhaps elephants weren't quite so brave after all, as they might run away from a mouse. 

Children thought carefully about what it meant to be brave:

"doing something that might be scary like getting a blood test"

Children also questioned whether you can 'look' brave, or be brave all the time:

"I don't think bravery looks like anything, I think it's inside you"

"I think I can be brave sometimes, and not brave sometimes"

Children then drew pictures of animals that were brave, in their opinion. There were some made up creatures, some creatures that were half of one animal and half another, and some creatures that were brave only in specific situations (like a fish facing up to a shark!)

I wonder what bravery looks like to you?

Alien invasion!

Aliens invaded Degas class yesterday!

The children came in from lunchtime to find pants all around the classroom and a very special box waiting for them. The children thought it could be from the aliens who love underpants.

Inside the box was a note from the aliens:

The children were very excited and thought about what they could teach the aliens for living on planet earth. The children came up with some brilliant ideas:

• How to stop putting alien gloop everywhere
• How to teach leapfrog
• How to ride a scooter
• How to have dinner
• How to cook food

To name a few!

Outstanding EYFS!

Following on from our visit from Jim Alexander we are pleased to share with you the positive things he had to say about the Early Years at Windhill21.

"All staff contribute to the high achievement children make."

"Children are able to sustain interest in the well-planned activities. As a result, all groups of children develop positive attitudes to their learning."

"The well-planned outdoor provision offers children very good opportunities for physical development of their gross motor skills."

"The children’s social skills are well developed. This is reflected in the emerging strong relationships children forge with each other and with staff."

Hepworth: World Book Day

Hepworth class enjoyed sharing their favourite picture books with each other for World Book Day!