School Blog

Roboteers in Action!

 in Scafell / Whole School by

Today everyone in Scafell has been developing the key skills we’ll need to become the next generation of roboteers, designing programs to make our robots do exactly what we wanted (well, sometimes!)

Fran from C-Stem came in with a set of Lego Mindstorm robots, and we’ve spent the day learning how to program them. We saw how robots are being used today in more and more applications – from the simple – hoovering the lounge – to the complex – building houses, making deliveries and driving our cars. In the future, using and programming robotic machines is likely to form a key part of most jobs, and so embedding key programming skills now is incredibly important!

It turns out it’s really hard to program a robot. Especially when the instructions aren’t clear and the robot won’t behave. Our problem solving was turned up to the maximum as we applied the simple things we learned at the beginning of the day and built them up into something much more complicated.

We started with maths – how many rotations of the wheel are needed for a set distance? Then, we moved on to moving forwards, backwards and making a turn. Eventually, we ended up making a shape with our robots, following the full process of being given a brief, designing our algorithm and debugging the program.

We had a great day and, even though it was hard work, we all felt very proud when our hard work paid off and we were able to solve complex problems by collaborating and thinking things through carefully.

A big thanks to Fran from C-Stem and to FOLS for funding the day!

Table Top Geometry

 in Scafell / Whole School by

This week, Year six have been revising and extending their skills in all areas of the NC programme of study for Geometry.  They can calculate missing angles in quadrilaterals, triangles and at a point of intersecting lines.  They are also pretty amazing at identifying parts of a circle; calculating the area and perimeter of parallelograms, triangles and rectangles; and estimating and measuring angles using a protractor.  All completed before 9am on Monday morning – there’s no stopping them!

Here they are in action:

New Playground Equipment

 in Bowfell / Scafell / Skiddaw / Whole School by

This week, The School Council have been distributing the new playtime equipment that they have purchased on behalf of their friends so that we can be more active and have more fun at playtimes.

The items have been bought using funds raised by the School Council at events like our disco and our Afternoon Tea during the spring term.

The School Council worked together as a team carefully selecting equipment that they thought everyone would enjoy.

Thank you to everyone that has supported our fundraising events and well done School Council.

Wild Wednesday shelter building

 in Bowfell / Whole School by

Bowfell spent yesterday afternoon completing a set of challenges as part of their ‘Wild Wednesday’ learning. They worked in teams and were provided with a description of an animal. Each animal was hidden outside in different places for the children to find. The next task was to build a shelter for their animal. The children spent a long time engrossed in the activity, communicating their ideas, evaluating and changing their approaches as necessary, problem-solving and working as a team! They also spent time preparing our entry for the scarecrow competition we are entering at Countryfest in a few weeks time.

The Book Bus visits Levens

 in Bowfell / Scafell / Skiddaw / Whole School by

The Book Bus visited us today and the younger pupils had a lovely time, hearing the librarian read us a story and we all choose a book to borrow. This is a fantastic way of sourcing new reading material for school and the selection of new books is second to none! Thank you to the wonderful Library Service for all you offer to us.

Are we faster than Usain Bolt?

 in Skiddaw by

In maths today we were learning about measuring in metres. We found out that the great Usain Bolt could run 100m in just under 10 seconds.

This was a challenge we couldn’t resist – we have been exploring how far we can run in 10 seconds. When we first tried it took us only 8 seconds to run all the way across the longest side of the playground – this was a problem! So we decided to measure how far we could run in 5 seconds and then double our measurements to tell us how far in we might be able to run in 10.

Here are the measurements for 5 seconds we recorded in the playground. Can you see any that are the same? Can you see any longer distances or shorter distances? Next, we will be doubling these to find out our distances.

Levens Pop-up Restaurant Returns

 in Scafell / Whole School by

This week, our year five pupils have been enjoying their first opportunity to prepare and serve a delicious two course meal for their parents and families in our brand-new dining facilities.  We are looking forward to inviting more diners to our special restaurant throughout the rest of the summer term.

Pancake Day

 in Bowfell by

Here are lots of Bowfell class enjoying pancakes.

Y2 Violin Concert

 in Skiddaw by

During last term, year 2 pupils have been learning to play the violin with the wonderful Mrs Hurley. They performed for the first time this morning to parents and lots of their friends. Well done all!

If you are interested in continuing to learn, please see the letter in book bags for details or ask Mrs Wadey. Here are some photos of them showing how to hold the instrument in rest position and in playing position and a short video of them in action!

Legotastic!

 in Skiddaw by

We have started our Lego Space Challenge and really got stuck into our first building task today. See us in action here, working together, sharing the constructing, encouraging each other and delighting in our success!