The children learned so much from their visit to Susan’s Farm today. We began by looking at the types of food the Romans would have had access to while living and guarding Hadrian’s Wall. The children worked with locally grown produce to make ; Roman vegetable and lentil soup,honey omelette,Roman army buns, Roman cabbage salad and a compote of early fruit. Whilst our soup was cooking we walked over the fields learning about crop rotation, the animals that the Romans would have kept as well as how they foraged in the hedgerows for any types of eggs to sustain them on their marches. At the site of the original part of Hadrian’s Wall, the children had a go at creating a small archeological dig to see what they could find. Some children did find fragments of bullets and casings from when an army base were camped there before World War II but sadly no Roman finds. Luckily we were able to look at and handle a Roman coin which had been discovered just last week on that part of the wall. Thank you to everyone on Susan’s Farm who made today so interesting, really helping us to appreciate the life, and the diet, of a Roman.

During our Welly Wednesday session we constructed our own Make Do and Mend toys. The toys made ranged from ;hedgehogs, snails, snakes, spinning tops to bows and arrows. The children found resources from the forest floor and then used their skills to saw, drill, whittle, screw, nail and sand the wood to make their own toy.

Working with local clay artist, Roma Short, the children applied their knowledge of Greek myths into their own designs. The children used the Ancient Greek method of sgraffito to etch in their final designs.

Here is an example of writing that a Year 5 child wrote when asked to think of how to create your own Cyclops.

To make a Cyclops.

If I was asked to construct a Cyclops,

I would take-

For skin-

the leathery hide of a rhinoceros,

the rough scrape of granite

and the bristles from a witch's broom.

For bones-

the bark of a gnarled oak tree,

chalk from the Seven Sisters

and the tough shell of a diamond.

For the body-

the kick of a ringmaster’s whip,

the ship’s mast bending in the wind

and the stride of an Africa elephant.

For the muscles-

the strength of a dragon’s jaw,

the punch of a hurricane’s blast

and the force as a tsunami strikes.

For the eyes-

the power of Medusa’s stare,

coals from the centre of the Earth

and the vision of an eagle.

For the heart-

the beat of Big Ben’s pulse,

the ruthless courage of the Minotaur

and the cruelty of a thousand wars wrapped into one.

Freya

The children in KS2 welcomed Mrs Willis's class this afternoon to share their 'Space Science EXBO'. The KS2 children were fantastic in how they shared their wealth of knowledge in a variety of ways from; discussing black holes, explaining how a rocket is propelled into space to demonstrating how the planets orbit the Sun and even modelling rocket launches. The children were all so impressive with their language and explanations - we are all very proud of them and all their hard work! The smiles on the children's faces say it all.

We have really enjoyed learning about the incredible solar system that we live in from understanding the phases of the moon to life on other planets.

Our intrepid space students had a very busy day exploring what makes effective rockets as well as bringing to life their own alien life force. The children in Key Stage Two looked at different rocket designs which had reached the Moon and then designed a paper prototype as well as building a model replica. Some were very succesfully launched using compressed air. We also welcomed artist, Kate Durdy, who worked with the children to help them bring to life their own alien life force. We are looking forward to writing our own science-fiction stories where our aliens will take a starring role.

Our 'Wild Challenge' afternoon began with the children creating their own biodiversity plan to assess what homes for nature we currently have on our school site as well as deciding what homes/ habitats the children would like to provide.Ideas ranged from building a bat box to making bird houses. We then created our own bee houses (which can also be used as a ladybird hotel. The children are looking forward to next Wednesday when we can put our biodiversity plans into action!

A busy afternoon caring for the birds in our local environment. The children discussed how we can care for the birds during the nest-building season and made a selection of treats. We also created small rockpiles - a habitat designed to encourage insects and spiders to live there, this also enables the birds to forage for their own food- we will watch and see if birds explore these areas. Following this we walked through the village to see how we could improve our local area,and protect other local wildlife, by picking up litter.

Despite the snow, the children in KS2 began their 'Wild Challenge' science adventure by exploring the castle grounds. We began by creating journey sticks so the children will be able to retell the story of their journey. After that we explored different areas using our detective skills to hunt for signs that wildlife had been there (spider's webs, footprints, bird feathers). Finally we used a moment to sit still,using all of our senses to experience the wonder of nature all around us. One little girl said,"It was lovely to feel the snow kiss my cheek."