communication

Year 5 Ocean Maths Project

Last Monday, a combined group of 28 students from year 5 had a visit by Mr. Murphy from Belfairs Academy.

Mr. Murphy ran a workshop which combined maths and environmental awareness of plastic pollution. After a brief introduction, the children jumped straight into the lesson that used a variety of maths skills such as fractions, calculators, percentages, pie charts, angles and protractors. The group listened and responded well to the various tasks and questions set by Mr. Murphy. Once the children had drawn their own pie charts, they then went outside to create a physical pie chart on the playground floor with some of the items mentioned from the data set.

The year 5 children rose to the challenge and produced some excellent work. Well done year 5!

MoneySense workshop

This week, the children in Year 5 really enjoyed engaging in a Money Sense workshop, learning all about how they could ‘Save pennies to Save the planet’. Andy and Mrs Forbes kindly helped the classes understand how much energy is used during our daily activities, from having a shower and drying hair to watching TV and popping wet clothes into a tumble dryer. Firstly, the children identified 10 things that use energy. These were then ranked according to what they thought used the most energy and hence cost the most, to the items that used little energy and cost less. Pupils were surprised to discover that the cost per hour to keep a light on was less than the cost of putting the heating on! The children explored how they could help a family of four make changes to their lifestyle to keep costs down and use less energy. These were some of their ideas:

“Put a jumper on if its cold or use a hot water bottle”

“Dry clothes outside or on a rack instead of using the tumble dryer”

“Wash clothes on a quick wash cycle and use less energy”

“Play outside or a board game instead of watching TV!”

“Have a one-minute shower!”

“Use energy saving lightbulbs”

The lesson formed part of our Connected Curriculum with this term’s focus on Global Dimension. Pupils made connections with humans needs and wants and the increased impact this is having on climate change. As well as recycling and reusing items, children said they would try and not be so wasteful. Andy and Mrs Forbes then presented the children with a certificate and goody bag which contained a piggy bank keyring and some pencils made from recycled money!

General Election

In light of the general election this week, classes discussed and watched videos about the general election and our democracy system. This linked nicely to our British Values of Democracy and the Rule of Law. The children were keen to learn how the process works and noted that our school is a Polling Station. Year 4 even had their own mini vote after learning about the 4 major political parties to decide on who they would vote for if they had the choice!

A message from the PTA

Year 6 Residential

The Class of 2024

On the 26th June, our year 6 children and staff set off on the annual residential and had a wonderful three days at PGL, Marchants Hill.

How lucky they were with the weather! After unpacking and applying their suncream, the children were raring to go! Throughout their stay they challenged themselves trying the many adventurous activities on offer including abseiling, archery and raft building.

They also had great fun dancing the night away at the disco, some children really entertained the staff with their flamboyant outfits and dance moves – we loved the banana and alien!

Much to the children’s (and Mr Blewett’s) delight, we were lucky enough to be able to watch the England v Slovenia match on the Tuesday evening. Our children loved cheering for England as they qualified for the next round of the Euro’s.

Many children were impressed by the quality and variety of food on offer and many sampled different foods that they hadn’t tried before.

Sleeping on the first night was challenging for some due to the heat and being away from home, but by day 2 they all slept like babies.

The children were an absolute credit to the school, and they loved spending time with their friends. We are proud of all of them, they have played together, supported each other and met some personal challenges with success.

Well done PGL’ers!!

What the children said .......

“I really liked the activities such as the giant swing, abseiling and raft building. The food was absolutely amazing and the menu was really good. I didn’t really like the room choices because somebody was keeping us awake and hogging the bathroom. Someone from upstairs was ding-dong ditching us which was really annoying.’ - Jacob

“I really enjoyed it and didn’t want to leave!” - Cadence

“I enjoyed all of the activities, especially the giant swing and abseiling.” - Amelia G

“All the instructors were really kind and I loved the coca-cola song and sang it all the time.” - Dillie

“By sharing a room with different people, I made new friends.” - Thea

For those children that stayed at home, they had an action packed three days planned.

Their first day was a trip to Roots Hall, the home of Southend United, where they learned about the club's history, toured the stadium and grounds and finished with a training session at Priory Park.

Day two was a home day at school. Children looked forward to a day of developing their team building skills to help them with their transition to secondary school. Building dens, towers and marble runs, playing cricket and having time to relax and spend time with their friends.

Team building skills continued as they ventured off to Nuclear Races in Brentwood for day three! They braved the mud and navigated tricky tasks, ending their adventure on the ‘Deathslide.’

The children showed incredible bravery and confidence and we were extremely proud of them, as many of them took on personal challenges. Thank you to the parents that offered their time to help, we hope you enjoyed it as much as the children.