Another week has flown by and what an exciting week it has been!
On Wednesday, Thursday and Friday across the school we have been celebrating all things Science!

We kicked off Science week on Wednesday morning where we watched a really interesting video where we looked at lots of different forms of Science in action, which you can find here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qybUFnY7Y8w

In the video we spotted Gravity, where a piano fell to the ground (Sonny). We watched marbles roll downwards towards the ground because the surface was tilted (Hollie). We saw a drum making sound through vibration when it was hit (Arya) and glasses making different sounds when hit with a spoon. We saw the weight of objects causing other objects to break (James) as well as electricity making light and wind (Alex).

We then talked about innovations in our world, such as the fridge to keep things cold (Kyan), helmets and protective pads to keep us safe when riding a bike (Omar), Car seats and airbags in case we crash (Hollie), and thought up our very own sustainable innovation to help look after the planet!

Thunberg class had some amazing ideas, and in the end we decided to create a solar powered, litter picking robot that could drive around using a camera and extendable arms to locate and pick up litter, before crushing it and storing it inside the vehicle! The children drew their own version of the robot and annotated to show how it worked.

We then looked at plants, one of our topics in Science and talked about plants that grow from seeds and plants that grow from bulbs. The children could recall that sunflowers grow from seeds (Jasper), and runner beans grow from bulbs (Charlotte). Bulbs are different from seeds because they have a food store inside them to self-feed the growing plant.

We then used different materials and manipulated them in different ways such as folding, bending, twisting and sticking them down to make a 3D collage of a marigold plant, which we will be putting on display to celebrate the fantastic work!

On Thursday we took part in a whole school investigation to find out whether the size of a windmills sails would affect how fast the windmill spins. We conducted an experiment to compare two windmills, one bigger and one smaller – which we made ourselves – and we tested how many times the windmill span in 1 minute.

We found that the smaller the windmill sail, the faster the windmill span (the more times the windmill turned a complete turn in a minute). James’ big windmill took us all by surprise and span the most, but this was an outlying result and we were very shocked!

In the afternoon we did some Explorify activities, where we zoomed in on an image and had to use our reasoning skills to try and work out what the objects were. The children guessed some correctly (a snail, a tree) but some completely stumped us! What we thought was a squid’s tentacle, was actually a cat’s tongue up close! The children had a good giggle at some of the final pictures, which we thought were something completely different!

On Friday we finished our 3D collages and then took part in a seed/bulb quiz where we tested the children’s knowledge of our plant topic from last term! We then went outside and did a measuring scavenger hunt where we had to measure the length of sticks, the width of leaves, the height of flowers and our challenge was to find a tree with a circumference of 40cm! The children remembered all of their measuring skills which we were proud to watch!

On Friday afternoon we completed some STEM activities which involved lots of science discussion, including talking about forces, gravity and movement energy. We made a marble maze out of recyclable materials and enjoyed tilting and turning the maze to get the marble from the start to the finish, using forces to make the marble move such as pushing, pulling, twisting and turning. We also relied on gravity to make the marble move from top to bottom!

Madeline enjoyed our windmill experiment and watching the Super Science video! Carys enjoyed making her own litter picking robot. Alex enjoyed getting crafty and making our 3D Marigolds. Sonny made a super litter picking robot! Omar liked windmill experiment. James enjoyed everything about Science week and being super crafty. Hollie enjoyed making the windmills and the collages. Sophie enjoyed experimenting with the windmills. Jasper enjoyed learning about gravity and space in our class discussions, as well as designing his robot. Kyan enjoyed making the windmill and finding out which would spin the most! Charlotte enjoyed watching our introductory video and making her windmill. Darin enjoyed everything this week! Emily-Rose enjoyed making our 3D Marigold collage. Ellie-Louise has enjoyed everything this week too!

Next week on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday we will be having our Transition days, where the children will spend this time with their new class teacher and their new classmates.

The children will be coming into school as normal through the Year 2 gate and registered in their current class before meeting their new classes. Please continue to drop off and pick up your children at the same time and the same place as usual.

Have a lovely weekend and we look forward to catching up properly with you all again on Thursday.