Class Four

Elleray Cross Country Event

 in Class Four / Class Three / Sport / Whole School by

What an absolutely brilliant afternoon we all had at Elleray last week, participating in their terrific, challenging and rewarding cross country competition, running against 564 of the best runners that the county has to offer!

As totally expected, our team of 18 did not disappoint, everyone finishing the hilly, stream-ridden course with great personal gratification to be rewarded with a special medal and a burger/hotdog!

For a small school, we provide a terrific punch in cross country running, our Under 10 girls finishing second in the team competition, many children running against much older competitors. The day might have been incredibly cold, but staff and parents were warmed through with pride, appreciating every single effort, they could not have given more or tried harder.

Running Club concludes for the season this week with a celebration run through Levens Park and warming homemade refreshments served at Mrs Mason’s farm. We cannot wait to start again in September already…..

Class 4 Bridges

 in Class Four / Design and Technology by

For our D&T project this term, Class 4 are building bridges. We’ve been exploring different ways to stiffen and reinforce cardboard. A simple flat “beam” of paper can’t support much weight on its own, but add a curved “arch” underneath and suddenly things are much stronger! We’ve also been exploring corrugation and lamination techniques to further reinforce the structures we have been building. Check out some of our prototypes below!

Edinburgh Highlights

 in Class Four / Whole School by

This week, Class 4 enjoyed three amazing days in the incredible city of Edinburgh.

Our trip began bright and early on Monday morning with a meet up at Oxenholme Station for our train journey North.  On arrival, we dropped our bags at the hostel, then set off up Calton Hill for views of the city and the surrounding hills on such a clear, bright day.  In the afternoon, we enjoyed a tour around the Scottish Parliament – an incredible modern building located opposite the historic palace of Holyrood.

Tuesday started with a good breakfast and a walk up the Royal Mile to the Castle and then to Camera Obscura – a fascinating museum and definitely a popular highlight of the entire trip with all our pupils.  We then headed out of town on a local bus to Edinburgh Zoo where we saw koalas, penguins, pandas, sun bears and much much more!

Our final day involved exploring the exhibits at the National Museum of Scotland which included stepping back in time to Ancient Egypt and lots of interactive scientific displays too!

We all enjoyed such a wonderful time and, as always, the children were incredible ambassadors for our school!

Take a look at some of the highlights here:

South Lakes District Cross Country Trials

 in Class Four / Class Three / PE / Sport / Whole School by

What a terrific and successful afternoon was had at the district trails this week and what a muddy delight to be there!

It was ‘touch and go’ for this event to even take place on Wednesday, following torrential rain for several days in the lead up. The ‘go ahead’ was finally given on the morning and our team of 9, excited and full of confidence travelled to the challenging and muddy course at Casterton to compete.

What effort, what support, and what an achievement by everyone, who excelled to run their best, in races against at least 80 of the best district runners.

I am delighted to report that everyone finished in the top 50%, and that 6 pupils qualified for the Cumbria finals on Tuesday 17th January.

We are so very proud!

The fun that is Running Club continues each Friday until the end of March when all runners will compete at the season finale at Elleray, what a team they all are!

The Lord’s Prayer

 in Class Four / Class Two / RE by

The Lord’s Prayer is common to many Christian’s across the globe so we have been thinking more about it including where it came from and what it means.

Class 2 thought praying was talking to God and that people who believed in God might do it. They explained a few varied ways people stand, sit or kneel to pray. We ordered the Lord’s Prayer and discussed what some unusual words like hallowed  and daily bread mean. Here we are drawing pictures around the phrases so show what we understood by them.

Class 4 explored the Lord’s Prayer differently – finding where it comes from and comparing references to the prayer in the Good News Bible in the books of Matthew and Luke. We looked at the 4 types of prayer that Christians might use – Praising, Asking, Saying Sorry and Thanking.

We then considered some deeper questions linked to phrases in the prayer with many thoughtful and honest responses that are recorded in the class reflection book.

 

Elleray Orienteering 2022

 in Class Four / PE / Sport / Whole School by

Getting out of bed this morning, Mr Dean shuddered at the thought of spending all day outside. The rain was beating against the windows as the wind howled down the street. Miraculously though, by the time Class 4 arrived at Windermere School there was nothing but blue sky!

Today we took part in the Windermere School Open Orienteering event! Tooled up with maps, punch-cards and dibbers we raced off into the forest on the hunt for the elusive red and white control squares. A huge well done to all Class 4 students who took part – excellent behaviour, sportsmanship and effort when slogging through the muddy fields. You worked as a team, kept each other safe and gave all of your effort to doing your best.

Thanks also to Mr Reedy and all the team from Windermere school for organising the day!

 

Design And Technology Week

 in Class Four / Class One / Class Three / Class Two / Design and Technology / Whole School by

What an amazing and busy time we had last week! The whole school took part in different Design and Technology projects. Class 1 were developing their cutting skills and exploring a range of different junk modelling materials. Class 2 were learning about fruit and vegetables, using their senses to explore them and then creating their own smoothies. Class 3 explored how to use a simple pneumatic system to make box monsters. Class 4 were learning about different ways to join fabric including different stictches, before designing and making their own soft toys. Each class enjoyed learning new skills, acquiring new knowledge and had opportunities to design, make and evaluate their work.

Class 4’s Soft Toys

Class 3’s Monster Boxes

Class 2’s Smoothies

Class 1’s Junk Modelling

Salty Science

 in Class Four / Science by

Before the break, Scafell began an experiment to see if they could grow Salt crystals in the classroom. We explored substances which dissolve, and then asked the question “how can we get it back?”

Dissolving salt into water, we then watched and waited as, over time, the water slowly evaporated. As it did so, the salt we dissolved in was left behind!

We did have some unexpected results as the salt crystals formed on the outside of the glass instead of the string as we’d expected, but we certainly got a lot of crystals forming!

The Human Network

 in Class Four / Computing by

In their computing lessons, class 4 have been studying how computers can link together. We use computers in this way more and more in our interconnected world as the internet forms a larger part of our daily lives. Here’s what we’ve learned so far:

Computers on the internet all have their own IP address. This stands for internet protocol which is a set of rules for how computers should communicate. Computers work best with numbers, so this looks like a long string of numbers. For example, the IP address of the computer which stores our school website is 5.61.120.34. That’s kind of difficult for humans to remember though, so we also give websites names in words which get translated to an IP address later.

 

Once you know which computer in the network you want to talk to, the message you want to send is given an “envelope” with the information needed to get it to the destination. This is called a header. Messages on the internet are usually broken up into lots of very small pieces (called packets), so it’s important to make a note of what order they should go in and how many are being sent!

Finally your message is ready to send. All of the packets of information are sent, one by one, towards their destination. This usually starts over WiFi, through a router or server and along telephone lines. Messages often make several stops along the way to their destination, being sent on by other computers in the network. In class we acted out a very simplified version, with each child standing in for a computer. It took a while for us to remember that computers cannot move, and so must send their messages by passing them through the network!

A Collaborative Classroom

 in Class Four / PE / SCARF by

It has been lovely to welcome Class 4 back to Levens! This term, much of our curriculum has a focus on collaboration and working together. It’s the theme for our SCARF unit of work, the purpose of our PE lessons and even comes up in Computing as we explore how computers connect and work together.

To kick us off, we have completed two teamwork challenges and thought about how well we worked as a team and how what sorts of things make working in a team more effective and more fun.