Children Today, Citizens Tomorrow

Class 1 have been doing lots of work on looking at different playground equipment and designing their own. This is helping us to decide what equipment we would like when we get our new outdoor area at school.

Ryton park has just had lots of new equipment so we went to see what things we really liked.

We walked there and thankfully did not get wet today. Take a look at the pictures to see us playing on the new equipment.

James has really big muscles. He used the lever to pump water down the hill.

It was so much fun digging in the sand. It was just like being at the beach. We would love to have sand like this at school.

How brave are we sliding down the firemans pole?

Miss Brown loved playing on the swing.

And by the looks of it, so did Mrs Kappen.

Before we walked back home, Mrs Grant bought us cookies from the shop. They were delicious. I think some of us were wearing more cookie than we ate.

Class 1 set off to the coast today so play on the beach, get some sun, build sand castles and plodge in the sea. However, the sun went in, the sand castles got wet and our plodge in the sea turned into a full swim for some of our children.

Some of us had great fun digging holes in the sand.

And some of us got a bit carried away and fell into holes. Zoe had great fun burying Ellie.

We had a picnic on the beach in true seaside style and had sand sandwiches.

This was when the fun really started. The clouds got grey and the heavens opened. We would have been drier if we had gone for a swim in the sea.

Our trip ended early because we were so wet. We missed out on going to the Blue Reef Aquarium.

BUT .... We are booked to go again next Tuesday morning. Lets hope it doesn't rain!!!!

Our art topic this term is weaving. We have looked at differnt kind of weaving and made some lovely patterns of our own. Last week we made small scales weaves but they weren't big enough for us. We went to the cimbing frame and thought we could make the fence look prettier by weaving different materials through the bars. I think it's going to take us a very long time. We had so much fun we didn't want to stop.

This week in art club we have been weaving coloured paper to make interesting pictures and patterns. We put our patterns into a frame to finish them off. We decorated our frames. Take a look at our fab designs!

As part of our Design Technology topic, we have been researching what makes a great piece of playground equipment. As a result of the things we have investigated, we decided to design a piece of playground equipment that we think would be great in our school.

We made models of our equipment, based on our designs, with some fabulous results.

Have a look at our designers in action!!        

 As all great designers do, we shall be evaluating our designs and seeing if we can think of ways to make them strong, safe and even more fun!

For the next few weeks Class 1 are going to be lokoing at different materials. Today we have been exploring magnetic and non-magnetic materials.

We looked inside and outside the classroom to see what we thought would be magnetic and then used magnets to test out our theories.

No! The glass was not magnetic.

Nope! The wood isn't magnetic either.

Yes we finally found something magnetic!

Today class 1 went on a trip to the City Learning Centre. We were learning how to use a program called 2 Create. We had a laptop each and explored making our own alien story books. They look fantastic.

2 Create is a very clever program because we could add sound effects and movements to our alien pictures. Our favourite is the one where our alien splits in half. 

We also got to play on the movement mats. We found some fun ways of moving across them. 

We also got to play with the bee-bots. We had a jam packed morning and we can't wait to go back again.  

Today Class 1 have been feeling the heat so Rachel made fruit kebabs and fresh fruit jelly with the children. We worked very hard to make sure the pieces of fruit were all the same size.

We made sure we washed our hands before we touched any of the food.

The kebabs were really tasty. We have put our jelly in the fridge to set so we can try it tomorrow.

Today Class 1 went to Bill Quay Farm. Our topic this term has been looking at different animals and how we look after them. We went to the farm to see how they look after the animals there. We saw lots of different animals. Suzanne showed us around the farm and told us about the rare animals they have there like the rare type of hen and goat.

We went to see Bella the pig and we got to feed her. She was very hungry and wanted to eat lots and lots of food.

We were so pleased that the sun shone all day and the rain stayed away. Have a look in the gallery for the rest of our photos. Make sure to take a look at the videos of our trip too. You'll find them in the multimedia section of the website.

What a magical morning we have had today! 4 musical wizards appeared in our community room today and we helped them make lots of musical, magical spells. We found lots of ingredients to put into the magic pot. Some of us were a little bit frightened of the spider.

We sang lots of magical songs and learned how to cast spells with our invisible magic wands. Have a look in the gallery to see us having lots of fun.

Some of our KS1 children have been taking a French club after school. We have looked at where France is and one of it's most famous landmarks. We have built our very own Eiffel Towers using multi-coloured artstraws. We think they look great.

Some of the girls though that they looked like hats.

What do you think?

When we had finished we tried some delicious pain du chocolat - Chocolate croissants. Yum.

Class 1 have been practicing their listening skills for our science topic. We have been learning about sounds around us and how we hear them.

Today we made 'telephones' using cups and string. We used different lengths of string to see if the length of the string made any difference. We decorated our cups with different pictures and patterns.

We took our telephones outside and tested them in pairs. We had lots of fun.

Class 1 had a lovely surprise this afternoon. Some little bunny in class 1 had hidden 52 chocolate eggs all over the quiet area. Mrs Adams took us all outside to see if we could find them all. Do you think we managed?

Of course we did! And Jake found the last egg. I think he was a little bit excited.

Yesterday Class 1 had a second visit from Mrs Hart and Billy Bear - The road safety team. We learned even more about how to stay safe than the last time they came. This time we learned how we should always be on a booster seat when we are in a car and how we should always wear our seatbelts. Billy Bear told us how we should behave when we are on a bus so we now know that we should always stay sitting down until the bus has completely stopped no matter how excited we are to get off.

All the Year 1 children have taken part in a reading scheme. The children had to read a new book to the teachers and their parents every single day. All the children have done exceptionally well and all made really good progress over the 6 weeks. We had a celebration in class 1 today where the parents were invited to share in their children's success. Miss McCormack presented all the children with a certificate.  

Class 1 have turned into Easter bunnies. We made made bunny ears and hopped around all afternoon. We went to the music room and made some delicious Easter nests. They were yummy.

We also had a competition. All the children designed an Easter egg. The prize was a yummy cream egg. Well done Adele - you won 1st prize.

Class 1 have been learning about stories from other cultures. We specifically looked at Pocahontas and how the Indians lived. We had an amazing tepee and made costumes to look like the Indians. Don't we look great in our feather head bands?

We made little tepees, long boats and totem poles. We had lots of fun learning about how they live.

On Thursday we were really lucky because we had a music workshop at school. We were singing songs about pirates and parrots. It was great fun and we all got to join in. Have a look at our photos below.

Last Tuesday was Shrove Tuesday and we celebrated by making and eating lots of pancakes. We learned about why we eat pancakes on Shrove Tuesday. We know it is because traditionally at Lent Christians used to give up fats and eggs and making pancakes is a yummy way to use up those foods.

We were great at flipping them over. Have a look at the gallery to see the rest of our photos.

What an eventful afternoon. After our detour on the bus (we went to the wrong place) we finally got to Safety works. Our topic for PSE has been health and safety and taking care of ourselves.

On this trip we looked at lots of different dangers around us and how we can all keep safe in the home and outside.

We got to have a try at dressing up as a fire fighter again which is always fun.

Class 1 had a great afternoon outside with our trainee teachers Miss Kay and Mr Abdul. We played lots of parachute games and thought it was great when we got stuck underneath.

Miss Brown thought we had all vanished because she couldn't see us. Can you find us??? 

Class 1 have been learning about places of worship and the features of those places. Today we went for a visit to Holy Cross Church.

Tracey showed us around the church and gave us lots of things to look for. There was lots of activities that we could do when we got there. We coloured in pictures to make our stained glass windows.

The best bit was trying on the special clothes. Have a look at the photos in the gallery to see all of us dressed up.

Here is Michelle (Alans Mum) dressed up. Doesn't she look good???

Take a look in the gallery for the rest of the photos!!!

How exciting? Crookhill has snow and Class 1 took advantage of it since we couldn't go on our trip to the Rising Sun Country Park.

We built a huge snowman by rolling the snow down the hill. We got the sledges out and had races down the hill. It was so much fun when it went fast. Even Mrs Grant and Mrs Kappen had a race. Mrs Grant won!!!

See our photo gallery to see the rest of the photos from our fun afternoon.

Class 1 havd a visit from Tyne and Wear Fire service today. We learned about the dangers of fire and how to keep our selves safe. We were allowed to try on the firemans special clothes that they wear to keep them safe when they are poutting out fires.

We had a lovely surprise when the fire engine turned up. The fireman helped us to hose the wall down using the small pipe. It was hard work pulling the lever back.

We got to sit in the fire engine and had our photo taken outside the engine. The fireman put the flashing lights on and turned the sirens on. They were very loud.

See our photo gallery to see the rest of our pics.

Today Reception and Class 1 have been making cakes. Half of us made cakes today and the rest of us are going to make cakes tomorrow. It was so much fun. We put all the ingredients in the bowl and mixed it all together. It was great when we got to crack the eggs. Our hands got all sticky.

Reception and Year 1 have had a fun filled afternoon making crisps.  We watched Come Outside first which told us how to make crisps.  We have had to cut and flavour our own potatoes and them bake them in the oven until they were crisp!  They were delicious.  We made cheese, salt and vinegar, ready salted and paprika flavours. 

Reception and Class 1 have had a busy afternoon. First, Morris, our community policeman came into talk to us about looking after environment. He told us lots of interesting things.

Reception and Year 1 are learning about our environment and where we live. We went for a walk upto the park and looked at our surroundings. We found lots of mess and graffiti and took photos of what we found.

Class 1 went on a trip to Newcastle University and the Hatton Art Gallery. We went to look patterns that are all around us. We searched high and low to find as many different patterns as we could. After looking at one artist's paintings we made our own version of the painting using different shapes. We added mountains, trees and snowflakes. We had lots of fun.

Take a look in our Gallery pages to see more photos from our trip.

Earlier on in the year Class 1 and 2 had to come to school dressed as their favourite book character for a trip to Saltwell Park. While we were there we saw lots of different book characters and some of them read stories to us. We even had a story in French. As well as listening to some great stories we had the opportunity to practice our circus skills. We even saw one of the men fire eating. Something not to try at home!!! We had a fabulous afternoon out.

KS1 had a lady from Beamish come to talk about things from the past. We looked at how people used to live and compared it with how we live today. We really enjoyed getting in the tin bath. It is very small.

We got to play with all the old toys that children used to play with both inside and out.

Reception and Year 1 took advantage of the snow. We all got wrapped up warm and headed for the field where there was lots of snow. We rolled the snow into large balls and made snowmen. We all had lots of fun. We can't wait for it to snow again.

On Monday, Key Stage 1 and Reception went to 'Down on the Farm' to visit Santa and see the animals.