Class 4 have been getting stuck into their science topic this term by constructing electrical circuits! We’ve learned what a circuit needs in order to function, we’ve built a range of different circuits and we’ve also tested the impact of making changes to our circuits.
Once we’ve learned all we can, we will be using our Design and Technology skills to then build a “Steady Hand” game to take home. Take a look at the gallery below for a sneak-peek into our process!
Class 3 have been exploring forces and magnets in science throughout the spring term. They explored when magnets repel and attract and how they worked through different materials, even through the table! They investigated to see if different magnets were different strengths. Here they are at work…
What a brilliant day we have had on our school trip!
The first part of the day was spent at Beatrix Potter World where we met Tim the Gardener and even Beatrix Potter herself. We learnt lots about her life, the inspirations behind her books and the characters featured in them. We also had fun completing an activity trail and loved exploring Mr. McGregor’s garden.
Then we hopped back onto the bus and made our way to Brockhole. We enjoyed our picnic lunch (indoors) and then learnt about some of the animals and their habitats featured in Beatrix Potter’s books through the centre’s new exhibition. Despite the weather we braved the outdoors and had a great time exploring the grounds. We identified physical and human features and completed the Beatrix Potter trail to find out more about the animals in her books.
EYFS are coming to the end of their super space topic for this half term. We started with the famous story “Whatever Next!” and enjoyed role-playing a journey to space and having a picnic on the moon. Learning about some of the planets was top of Reception’s ‘What I want to learn’ list and after finding out some interesting facts, they then designed their own using a ‘wash’ effect with felt tips and paintbrushes dipped in water. We thought carefully about the colour of our planets and what they were made from – gas, rock or ice. Constellations were also a big hit; we found out that some constellations can only be seen in certain parts of the world and then recreated some famous ones on black card using chalk. We spent two weeks in total creating our own model of the solar system using papier mache and adding details to each planet; lots of sticky fun! We learnt about gravity and watched videos of astronauts on board the International Space Station, finding out that the further away from earth you get, the less gravity there is. We have enjoyed lots of child-led opportunities in provision including puffy moon painting, making craters in moon dough, designing aliens on the light panel and baking cake pops. We definitely have some budding astronauts in the making!
Class 3 have had a wonderful morning exploring and being engineers!
They came up with lots of ideas about what engineering was. This included engineers make complicated things, they build robots, they help other people, they build and fix things.
Our first challenge was cutting an A4 piece of paper so you can fit your entire body through it. Lots of perseverance and experimenting but no luck. We thought a partner might be useful, so we paired up and hey presto – lots of success! Engineers often work in teams to help solve problems just like this.
We then were set off to build a waterproof and windproof house for one of the three little pigs. Each group had a bucket with a range of materials and, despite a bit of trepidation, all our finished products stood up to their final wind and rain shower test and the pig stayed dry!
Nursery and Reception have been observing the signs that winter is on its way! After noticing the frost last week, we decided to make some of our own ice decorations using natural materials. We collected leaves, conkers and twigs to create them and then hung them on our apple tree to watch what happened as they began to melt. The results were beautiful!
This week in Class 2 we started our new Science Topic: Animals including Humans. We worked in teams to find clues that Miss Robinson had hidden in the playground. Then we figured out that we were naming parts of the body! We came back into the classroom and worked co-operatively to draw a human and label lots of parts of the body, using the clues we had found outside to help us.
In Science, Class 3 are learning all about light. This week we explored mirror images and how changing the shape of a mirror changes the image in very funny ways! We experimented with mirror writing too and finding ways to send messages to a friend.
You might be surprised to discover just how many mirrors (or surfaces that act like mirrors and reflect your image) that you have in your house. You may well have more than 30 especially if you include those in a car too!
Skiddaw class have been learning all about rocks in Science recently. There is nothing better than chocolate to show the ways of making different types of rocks! The Rock Cycle goes round and round and rocks are changed into other types over millions of years. We started with layers of grated milk and white chocolate to represent the sedimentary rocks like limestone and chalk. We pressed these little bits down just like the sea presses the layers down to make these rocks.
We then applied a bit of heat from our hands and twisted the chocolate sediment to form metamorphic rocks like marble and slate.
Then we put some of the chocolate into a cup of hot water and melted it and cooled it, like the igneous rocks that are formed underground and then erupted out of a volcano like granite and basalt. We know that rocks are weathered and eroded into little bits that flow into rivers and into the sea and the whole cycle starts again!
Of course, we stopped and ate our chocolate which tasted pretty good even though we had changed it to much!
Our science work on fair testing and materials over the last two weeks has been linked to the story of Goldilocks and the Three Bears! Which spoon would be best for Father Bear to stir the hot porridge with so he didn’t burn his hand?
In the first week, Mrs Wadey demonstrated it all wrong and didn’t make it a fair test at all – she had different sized pots, different sized spoons and put the spoons in all at different times. We were challenged to do better!
We had to choose our equipment from a vast selection to carry out a fair test to see which spoon conducted heat the least and would keep Father Bear’s hand cool whilst he stirred and made the porridge for breakfast – wood, plastic or metal?
Many of Y3 and Y4 devised ways of recording their own results and others worked together to create a table. Most children found out, concluded, that metal would get warm quite quickly and so wouldn’t be a good choice for Father Bear. Our discussion about why metal spoons were OK for eating but NOT good for cooking were interesting too and included thinking about how long the spoon was in contact with the hot food! Great scientific thinking and recording on this by all.
