WW2 inspired cooking session 15.2.22

On today’s menu...

Spam Fritters followed by ‘War time’ cake. 🍽🍰🫔

Our chefs were amazing and we’ve all enjoyed preparing, cooking and tasting the WW2 inspired dishes. 

The Wirework has Started 28.01.22

Something a little different...we are going to create a bouquet of flowers...from wire, wood, fabric and paper! These flowers won't wilt and die.

Mary Price...finished pieces 21.01.22

Remember our mark-making art project? Well, it's complete and it looks just as fabulous as we thought it would!!! We just need to decide where to display it now.

Tidy Up Time 14.01.22

We've been weeding the plants in the football-post fence. The strawberry plants are still going strong and should give us another crop this summer. Another team made the bird bath using 4 old tyres and an upturned recycling bin lid! Nothing gets thrown out if we can reuse it!

Fences....fences....fences! 14.01.22

We've been working on the willow fence around the mini meadow. The fence here, means that the football won't damage the flowers when they have bloomed later in the year. Doesn't it look brilliant?

You can also see the more informal habitat fence - this is added to as we find suitable sticks from around the school site.

We're out and about...again 13.01.22

The wild area in the junior playground needs attention after the winter months. Year 6 have been out litter-picking. They have also collected more natural materials to create a sensory experience using the tyres. Each tyre is filled with a different material, such as, stone, pine cones, wood or conkers.

Environment Tidy Up 07.01.22

Today, Year 6 have taken care of the sandpit that's in their play space. After the winter, it needed a spring-clean so now everyone can enjoy it again. The mud kitchen was also given a makeover.

Taking Care of Our Environment 06.01.22

Year 6 have been busy! Tulip, daffodil and crocus bulbs are planted around school so watch out for the spring flowers to appear.

Twinkle Twinkle Little Willow Ball 03.12.21

Year 6 have made their own Christmas light decorations for the Mill. We used lengths of willow from our willow den to create the spherical frame and then additional willow lengths were woven through and around the frame to create a web-like sculpture. When the fairy lights had been draped across, the willow balls looked magical when lit.

9.12.21 - Critical Skills and Self - Rescue Swimming Sessions

These photos are part of Critical skills – self-rescue that Year 6 has been learning in their Thursday swim sessions.

'We talk about being knocked into the canal and cold water shock. The skill that can save your life is floating. You will see them floating with clothes on. Hopefully, this will give them an idea of how difficult swimming and floating in clothes can be. They all seem to have mastered the floating! I do drill it into them every lesson: FLOATING COULD SAVE YOUR LIFE!' Mrs. Anderson

If you are ‘injured’, ‘tired’, ‘have cramp’ or ‘need a rest’ FLOAT!

10.11.21 - A visit from a Rockstar 

Today, we were lucky enough to get a visit from rockstar Jeff Rich, who was formerly a drummer in the band Status Quo. We learnt all about the history of drums and even got to try out some of the different types of drums he introduced us to. Listening to the famous drummer, telling us all about his journey into stardom has made us feel really inspired and we enjoyed his music too. At the end of the session, we even got to perform with Jeff and ask him some questions. 

What a great morning!

4.11.21 The RHS Big Soup Share

The Big Soup Share began in 2017 and invited schools to celebrate 10 years of the Campaign for School Gardening and cooking their harvested veg into a tasty soup. Although we didn’t grow our veg this year, gardening and the outdoors is a huge part of our curriculum so we thought we’d join in the fun. 
 

The Big Soup Share is the perfect chance to celebrate all the kindness that has been shown through this unprecedented time or another way to support those in the community who need it the most. For the second year in a row, we decided to share the soup we made with our friends - the residents of Knaves Court. We had a great time chopping, peeling and preparing our veggies for our two tasty soups (leek & potato and carrot & coriander). The best part of all was getting to eat them both at end. We enjoyed them almost as much as everyone at Knaves Court. 

Start of our new art project 22.10.21

Taking our inspiration from Mary Price (a.k.a Artist in the Shed) we have started our next art project. Each child has a small canvas to fill with colour and shape and marks. When all of the canvases are complete we will present them as one large piece of art. From the photos below, you will see that, so far, we have applied the background using acrylic paint and have practised mark-marking using cocktail sticks and lollipop sticks. Watch this space and watch the project grow. 

20.10.21 - Storytelling for Black History Month

This morning we have joined professional storyteller and educator Usifu Jalloh on an imaginative journey around Africa to celebrate Black History Month.

Black History Month UK is a celebration of Black history, arts and culture that takes place throughout October every year. The event provides an important opportunity to highlight and learn about Black history and heritage, and the way that people of African and Caribbean descent have shaped our nation’s story.

Reading Buddies with Year 2 15.10.21

We spent time with the children in Year 2 today. We read to them and they read to us!

12.10.21 Reading Buddies

We have started our weekly ‘Reading Buddies’ session with Year 1 and had a great time sharing stories with our new buddies. There were lots of smiles all round from everyone. 

Canal Adoption Programme and a busy day 08.10.21

The first group have visited the canal tow path to look after the environment that Millfield have adopted. At the same time, the Blue Jays and Red Kites were playing their first game and the mountain bikers were working towards their biking award.

Harvesting Seeds 07.10.21

The flowers in our school grounds were beginning to fade, this usually means the seeds from the flowers are ripe and ready for picking. It was a dry and sunny afternoon so we went out, carefully feeling each flower with our hands to see if the seeds easily fell away. We collected all the seeds we could, putting them into different containers ready to store over the winter. Next year we will sow the seeds in our grounds, hoping they grow into more beautiful flowers for us all to enjoy! 

Science Free Flow 04.10.21

This afternoon, we introduced free-flow style learning to our Science afternoon. Every week, the children will be able to explore a range of different and challenging activities linked to the Year 5/6 Science curriculum objectives. Feedback from the children has been positive and they have even suggested some other activities they would like to try this half-term. 

Silver Birches 01.10.21

This has to be one of my favourite and also one of the simplest pieces of art. It's also the one piece of art where you get that overwhelmingly satisfying feeling of pulling off the masking tape to reveal the crisp contrast between the watercolour and the paper beneath. You can't help but say, "Wow!"

Pulling a credit card with black acrylic paint on over the white area makes the bark of the Silver Birch tree. I hope you agree that they all look stunning whether the children have chosen a natural blue or green background or a more jazzy multicoloured one.

Look out for them to be made into Christmas Cards later in the year.

In the Style of Mary Price 17.09.21

I couldn't resist starting our art off with a piece that is going to make the front cover of our Personal Portfolios. Mary Price lives in Bristol and is known as the Artist in the Shed; she is most well-known for her 'Happy Trees'. Click here if you would like to see more of her work. Mary's work is mostly created by mark-making and so we used credit cards, lollipop sticks, cocktail sticks, Q-tips, cardboard and pegs to make our own colourful 'Happy Shapes' that we will see each time we add a piece of work to our portfolio. Hope you like them too.

Bumper Crop 09.09.21

Considering that we only started with 3 strawberry plants, the crop this year has been the biggest and best yet! We now need to pot up the strawberry runners so that we can have even more strawberries this time next year. If you would like to start a strawberry bed at home, please ask for some young plants.

We also had sunflowers of all sizes in the quad - the tallest measuring over 2 metres.