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Last Wednesday after school, 11 upper school children took part in an athletics competition at Carlton Le Willows Academy. Organised by the Gedling School Games coordinator, the event included a number of field and track events. It quickly became apparent that the triple jump was not a favourite so we had a good practise at that one before the competition began! The other field events were speed bounce, long jump, chest push and javelin. In teams, the athletes also took part in several relay races. I have never seen more determined running faces! The children all performed brilliantly, but what was most impressive was the way they represented Porchester. Every single one of them was polite and respectful and the team spirit was outstanding. Well done all. Continue reading

Our recent topic question in lower school has been ‘What’s beneath our feet?’ and today the children considered how fossils are formed whilst making their own out of salt dough! We mixed two cups of flour, one cup of salt and half a cup of coffee grounds with cold coffee to make a rock-like dough. The children then pressed a shell into their ‘rocks’ leaving an imprint. We have left the fossils to set and will explore the fossilisation process further next week. Continue reading

On Monday, a group of lower school children took part in a dodgeball festival at Arnold Hill Academy. They had to do warm-up drills and exercises to help develop skills useful in the game and then they got to have a go at playing. They all tried really hard and represented Porchester brilliantly. Continue reading

What a fantastic start to the new school year! Porchester was transformed into Hogwarts over the summer and the children have really embraced our love of all things magical. There have been Harry Potter themed lessons all week and the children were even sorted into the four different houses of the first four headteachers of our school. Having the children from both lower and upper school work together to decorate their house shield was really lovely to see and our current value of unity was very evident. Have a lovely weekend with your muggles and we'll see you on Monday. Continue reading

This morning, the children in lower school put on a talent show. There was no pressure to perform, it was just an opportunity for those who wanted to, to showcase their unique skills in front of each other. We were so impressed by the range of talent! Continue reading

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This afternoon, 12 children from year 3 went to Harvey Haddon Sports Village to take part in a Flying High Trust athletics event. Every single one of the children put 100% effort into each event and we were so proud! The relay races were especially exciting (a certain lower school teacher lost her voice cheering them on!) and all 12 children participated in the races. All the children represented Porchester beautifully and impressed us with their ability and talent. One child was awarded with a trophy from each team and for Porchester this went to Noah. Noah was the most springy and balanced member of the team for sure! Well done Team Porchester! Photos to follow Continue reading

After half term, the lower school children will be learning all about plants. This week the children were all given a Wildlife Trust 30 days wild sheet to take home. We thought it would be a fun activity, as well as support our topic work, to see how many 'wild activities' the children can complete in the month of June. If the children complete an activity they can come and tell the class about it and we can put it on our class charts. Some of the activities suggested in the 30 days wild pack include the following: Go on a bug hunt Sketch a garden/landscape/animal/flower picture Count the number of insects/animals you see Look at the clouds and see what shapes they make Make something out of sticks and twigs - a den would be great fun! Collect leaves that have fallen and make a collage with them Write a wild poem Find out what the flowers are called in the garden/park What ever you do this half term, have lots of fun! The Lower School Team Continue reading

Yesterday in lower school, the children were learning all about air raid shelters used during WW2. We were exploring different shapes and testing their strength. The children decided that the curved shape was the strongest because when they dropped a weight on the structure it maintained its shape better that the triangle and the rectangle. Continue reading

Today in lower school, we had our evacuation morning! The children learned all about how and why young ones were evacuated from cities during WW2. We even set off with our partners around the school, cheerily singing 'Run rabbit run', with our gas mask boxes and labels. We thought it would be fun to re-create class photos from the 1940s - no smiling allowed of course! Thank you for your amazing efforts with the very authentic looking costumes! The Lower School Team Continue reading

Inspired by our work on Native Americans, in lower school we have been creating our own 'dream catchers.' No bad dreams for class 6... Continue reading

Today, in lower school, we started to explore the question of 'How did the United States grow?' In class 6, we decided a bit of drama was necessary so we had our 13 original colonies squeezed into one corner of the classroom. They were fed up of taxation without representation so they gained independence and became the USA. Next, one representative had to go and shake hands with Napoleon and complete the Louisiana purchase which doubled the size of the country. The children highlighted the original 13 states on their maps and labelled the other states with the dates they joined the USA. Also, check out these examples of the fantastic art work that the children completed last week... Continue reading

This week in lower school we have been learning all about the innovative inventions of the Victorian period. As well as the children considering how important they believe the inventions to be (one of them was ice cream so that was very interesting) and carrying out presentations about specific inventors, they also wrote a newspaper report about Thomas Edison. In class 6 we had a go at looking at our work by candle light and considered how amazing it must have been to see an electric light for the very first time. The effort the children are putting into their topic work is outstanding, they clearly have a passion for it. Keep up the good work! Remember spelling homework and spelling shed for next week. Also, keep up the reading at home. I want to see lots more reading raffle tokens in the jar before the end of the term! Have a lovely, albeit frosty, weekend. Mrs Sawyer Continue reading

We really have been delving back into the times of Oliver Twist again this week in lower school. Following on from our awesome trip to Perlethorpe last week, we have been exploring the daily life of Victorian children. We discussed jobs the children might want to do if they weren't at school and had responses such as vet, police officer, dancer, football player, teacher (of course) and lawyer. These suggestions were far from the reality for many children during the Victorian period. Chimney sweep, mine worker, scarecrow, factory worker or street child were some of the options in the 19th century. Also, we have been exploring the work of Victorian artist, William Morris. Thanks to Morris's work, we now have wallpaper!. We had a go in class at carving patterns into polystyrene tiles and then printing them to design our own wallpaper... Continue reading

Thank you to class 6 children for bringing in donations for our class reverse advent. These donations will go to the Friary charity who support homeless people. This crazy lot have been a pleasure to teach this term and I wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year... Mrs Sawyer Continue reading

Today, lower school children were learning about Alberto Giacometti and his famous sculptures. We designed and made our own versions using pipe cleaners and foil. Class 6 had a little bit too much fun... Continue reading

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Hello, It has been another busy week in class 6. The children have been creating their own 'perfect future' by designing inventions to carry out tasks that they don't like doing! We had an interesting range of machines invented, from a litter picking bot and a machine that cleans the cat litter tray to a 'snack-o-matic!' This week we had a chat in class about how important it is, especially now the weather is turning colder, to think about people that aren't as lucky as we are and that might be homeless. We have decided to do a reverse advent calendar this December, which involves us bringing items in that can be donated to a charity that supports homeless people. It would be amazing if the children of class 6 could bring in one donation each during December, which we can put in our box to be handed over to the charity at the end of term. I have given the children a list of suitable donations and have also put the link below. http://the-friary.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/Donations-leaflet.pdf Have a lovely weekend and enjoy the first window of the advent calendars tomorrow! Mrs Sawyer Continue reading

'Robots are good for us because they help us with jobs.' 'Robots can be good for us because they can help disabled people with tasks.' 'Robots can be used to detect danger.' 'Robots are not good for us because we need to learn to do things for ourselves.' Robots are bad for us because we wouldn't do any exercise if robots did everything for us.' 'Robots could be faulty!' These are just some of the arguments that the children came up with in class 6 this week when we were debating the question; 'are robots good for us?' We were also debating what is a robot and what isn't. Traffic lights certainly got the children thinking! We have been fascinated by the different roles robots can carry out. The link below is to a website we looked at in class showing some amazing robots. https://www.bostondynamics.com/ In English we have been focusing on direct speech and how to punctuate it correctly. This is very tricky and I'm very impressed with how the children have persevered. Remember you need to have read at least three times at home and have an adult record this in your planner to get a reading raffle ticket on Monday. Have a lovely weekend everyone. Oh and here are a few examples of the wonderful robot posters that were designed this week: Continue reading

Dressing as our heroes today was a great chance to hear all about the people the children admire. In class 6 we had mums, dads, siblings, grandparents, dance teachers, music teachers, footballers, rugby players and boxers to name some! Our topic work this week has focused on magnetic force. We were exploring the question; can magnets float? We discovered that yes they certainly can! We had lots of fun with our 'scrapyard challenge,' sorting materials into magnetic and non-magnetic. We were also fascinated by the fact that the earth is one big magnet! In English this week we have been learning about diary writing and the features that can make our diaries more interesting and exciting. The children started writing a diary entry from the point of view of Hogarth when he is quietly fishing and then all of a sudden sees the Iron Man at the top of the cliff! Don't forget to have a go on Spelling Shed over the weekend if you get chance! There is also Purple Mash and Times Tables Rock Stars if you are looking for activities. Remember school planners on Monday so I can give out the raffle tickets to our star readers. Have a chillaxing* weekend Mrs Sawyer *Made-up word alert Continue reading

Our topic question for this week has been 'is the force strong in you?' We have been exploring forces and how friction affects movement. The children conducted an experiment where they tested the affect of friction on how far a toy car would travel on a variety of different surfaces. The results were fairly unanimous; the hall floor and table tops created the least friction when the car was travelling and the grass created the most! In English this week we have been learning about poetry and how figurative language such as simile and personification can enhance our creative writing. Today the children started writing their own version of The Coming of the Iron Man by Brenda Williams. This link is to a video all about similes and metaphors which the children might enjoy watching at home... https://www.bbc.com/bitesize/articles/z9tkxfr We didn't have as many star reader raffle tickets going in the jar this week so if we could have more next week that would be awesome! Remember you just need to read 3 times a week or more and ask an adult to record this in your school planner. Class 6 are working their way up the Spelling Shed leader board so keep up the good work everyone! Have a lovely weekend with friends and family as we remember those who lost their lives in the line of duty and commemorate the end of World War I. Mrs Sawyer Continue reading

This half term has been jam packed full of exciting Egyptian related activities in lower school and this week was no exception! In class 6 this week we have made our own canopic jars, complete with clay head and exquisite metallic paints. We have completed our guided reading book; Marcy and the Riddle of the Sphinx and have written job adverts for a pharaoh. We were so pleased to see so many family members at the reflection this morning and we hope you enjoyed seeing how much the children have learned this half term and how enthusiastic they have been about the topic. Have a wonderful half term, enjoy some spooky fun if Halloween is your thing and stay safe around the fireworks! Mrs Sawyer Continue reading

This week in lower school the children have become authors and have completed their very own version of Cinderella...set in Ancient Egypt! It was wonderful to see the children let their imagination take over in class 6, whilst putting some of their developing literacy skills into use. Miss Mintey in class 3 even received a tweet from our author in focus, Emma Carroll, with some tips on how the children could edit their own work. Imaginations in class 6 were also allowed to run wild earlier in the week when we donned the pink headphones and were taken back to Ancient Egypt by Now Press Play. We went on a spooky journey complete with tombs and Egyptian gods! The children thought it was hilarious that their teacher was wearing pink headphones with them - there was no way I was missing out! We have also been putting our artistic skills into practise this week, designing and creating our very own versions of Tutankhamun's death mask. They look amazing and we can't wait to share them at the reflection next Friday. Remember to get on Spelling Shed over the weekend if you get chance - let's move up that leader board! Planners and spelling homework in Monday please. Enjoy the autumn sunshine this weekend. Mrs Sawyer Continue reading

We’ve had another lovely week in class 6. Meeting grandparents yesterday was a fantastic way for the children to show how proud they are of what they are achieving at school. Our focus in English this week has been writing a recount of when Howard Carter discovered the tomb of Tutankhamun in 1922. We had some examples read out in class yesterday and I think it is fair to say that I, our visitors and Mr Cullen were very impressed with what we heard. Great work everyone! Spelling homework went out a little later this week so is not due in until Thursday next week. Remember to bring school planners in on Monday so I can give out those reading raffle tokens. Enjoy the lovely the weather this weekend. Mrs Sawyer Continue reading