Snails, exploring Snake Wood and learning about fish

Year 2 have had an exciting week finding out about snails! They began the week by exploring the woods to find snails in their local environment and then set up a ‘snailery’ in the classroom. George also brought in his African snails. The children then began to gather information about a snail’s anatomy, habitats, food and movement, studying them at first hand. The class held snail races on Thursday!

The children have also had great fun painting the clay faces, hands and feet of their string puppets and are now creating their bodies, using their own ideas and designs and a wide variety of materials. Finally the class eagerly took part in a ‘continents and countries’ quiz, using maps and globes to find the answers to 20 questions.

Year 1 explored the deepest part of Snake Wood this week to discover a variety of minibeasts and toads. They used bug magnifiers to view creatures up close and held interesting discussions with their peers as to the particular species found. They even discovered an orange ladybird! The children have also been very busy creating pictures inspired by the works of Monet. These now make a superb display in the Pre-Prep.

This week Reception children have been learning about fish, through stories and art work. They have enjoyed listening to the ‘Rainbow Fish’ and this has resulted in some lovely stories and pictures. The children have also had a lot of fun making papier-mâché fish; these are now drying and awaiting painting.

Taverham Hall School – Independent Schools Norfolk

Posted in 41-May 2012, Forest School, Pre-Prep on May 9th, 2012

Looking for Mini-Beasts and Creepy Crawlies

Nursery 1 children have been looking at mini-beasts and spring animals this week, spending the fine, dry days, exploring the woods for bugs and creepy crawlies, armed with pots and magnifying glasses. There has been lots of excitement, as the children dig and turn over logs, looking for the mini-beasts that live in the woods.

They have also been looking at and making bumble bees, ladybirds, butterflies and lambs, which have been turned into a colourful display, filling the room with lots of colour, together with the flowers they made in the previous week.

Taverham Hall School – Independent Schools Norfolk

Posted in 41-May 2012, Forest School, Nursery on May 9th, 2012

Tadpoles

After collecting tadpoles from our pond, the Nursery children have been learning all about frogs and their life cycles.  They have been caring for the tadpoles and catching them in magnifying cups to study them up close.   We have been acting out the song “5 speckled frogs” and explored some very yucky, messy green gloop.  We had great fun in making some lovely frog shaped biscuits.  To practice our numbers and maths the children joined in with a throwing and counting activity, throwing the correct number of frogs into the correct numbered bucket.
 
The children have demonstrated some excellent ICT skills, by drawing their own favourite bugs on the computer, worms and ladybirds where the favourites.  After a lovely walk through the woods the children created their own bluebell pictures.

 

Taverham Hall School – Independent Schools Norfolk

 

Posted in 41-May 2012, Forest School, Nursery on May 9th, 2012

Willow-planting Forest School lessons

Year 7′s attempt to reach our Riverside area were made altogether more interesting than usual this week due to an accumulation of flood water after the recent rain.

Our usually dry path was accessible on Wednesday, but on Thursday the water had risen a further 14 centimetres. The relationship between the depth of the flood and the height of our rubber boots made for a wetter experience for some people than for others. However, some successful willow-planting did take place!

 

Taverham Hall School – Independent Schools Norfolk

 

Posted in 27-March-2011, Forest School on April 2nd, 2012

Exploring Art and Music

Over the last couple of weeks our Year 3 children have been using the natural resources from our grounds to ‘get creative’. The children worked together and individually to design and make artwork of their choice using objects collected in the woodlands. The following week we developed this idea further, this time making musical instruments from our woodland findings. Some children added elastic bands to form string instuments and some children fashioned percussion instruments from their findings. The two sessions provided the children an opportunity to explore and create using ideas of their own, adapting and changing their creations to improve them. The children came up with some fantastically unique and fun ideas!

 

Taverham Hall School – Independent Schools Norfolk

 

Posted in 39-March 2012, Forest School on March 15th, 2012

SOS & HELP!

In Forest School, Year 5 pupils were presented with the scenario of being marooned in a remote location and having to attract the attention of those searching for them, using only available resources. 

A number attempted to write a distress message on the ground, others made proposals such as “soggy” fires with wet leaves to produce smoke, whilst the remainder simply looked after their comfort requirements and made shelters:

 

Posted in 39-March 2012, Forest School on March 6th, 2012

Dew Angel and Woodpecker Nest

During a recent early-morning Forest School session the group became aware of the tracks that we were making in the dew covered grass which inspired one of the pupils to invent the concept of a “dew angel” which he happily demonstrated for us:

   

Our Year 8 group was most concerned that the birch tree that has had a woodpecker’s nest inside for a number of years was felled recently due to advanced heart-rot. The section containing the nest was removed and transported back to our DT building. It is their intention to cut out a section of the tree to make an access door; so that we can make a visual display item enabling people to see inside a woodpecker’s nest:

  

Taverham Hall School – Independent Schools Norfolk

Posted in 39-March 2012, Forest School on March 5th, 2012

A busy Spring Term!

Our Pre Prep children have been busy from the start this Spring Term.

All groups have been exploring our grounds and the changes within it in their Forest School sessions with their magnifiers to see these changes up close. Some have also been busy making dens in the woods using branches, logs and natural resources fastened with string.

Reception children have worked on their topic ‘Food’ by making pasta faces and learning about the use of potatoes.  They have also been tasting fruit and juices to see which they preferred. During their Chines New Year celebrations they tried various kinds of Chinese food using their chopsticks as well as trying on traditional Chinese clothes. As it is the year of the dragon each class made a large dragon head which became the focal point for their dragon dance, which they performed in the Pre-Prep Hall.

  

  

At the moment our Reception children are very excited as we have started incubating our hens’ eggs which have been kindly given to us by Cecily Rainey who is a past pupil of Taverham Hall School. The children now have to be very patient for the next 21 days, when hopefully the egss will hatch!

Year 1 children have been learning all about their topic ‘The Weather’. The girls and boys have been recording the weather using symbols and enjoyed exploring the recent snow! They also celebrated Chinese New Year by sampling prawn crackers and opening fortune cookies and wrote their names using Chinese letters as well as decorating Year of the Dragon posters. Recently our Year 1 pupils took part in the Young Writers’ Poetry competition and everyone wrote a poem using their senses to describe how they felt about the seasons. The recent onset of the warmer weather has encouraged our Year 1 children to begin planting vegetable seeds. Broad beans and carrots have been sown along with tomatoes, which at present are inside.

Year 2 children started the term with work on two major projects in Geography and Science. In Geography they are learning about life on Struay, a small island in Scotland, and have created their own maps of this island using their own keys to accompany their maps.

 

In Science they are learning all about electricity. They have created some excellent safety posters which are on display in the Pre Prep together with their wonderful clocks and amazing lighthouses. They really enjoyed their work on electrical circuits and have made bulbs light up, buzzers buzz and spinners spin! They will now start their new topic which is about forces.

  

  

  

  

  

In History they have started on their project about Florence Nightingale and are discovering a lot of information about the sorry state of hospitals at the time of the Crimean War.

In Art the pupils are going to create a selection of different puppets having finished their self portrait project where they learned about artists such as Pablo Picasso.

   

Taverham Hall School – Independent Schools Norfolk

Posted in 39-March 2012, Forest School, Pre-Prep on March 2nd, 2012

BBC Bird Watch and Building Snow Men

The children in Nursery two have been taking part in the BBC Bird Watch.  They have all made binoculars and have been learning about the different birds, their calls and habits before we ventured out into the grounds to spot them.  We even heard the sound of the local woodpecker and a buzzard, as well as finding the hundreds of nesting crows by the tennis courts and owl boxes along the woodland trail. The girls and boys explored the grounds and collected natural materials to take back to the classroom and create their own birds nest with. 

  

   
 
We have all been taking full advantage of the snow this month, enjoying building snowmen and throwing snowballs, we even built an igloo (or attempted to).  We walked through the woods where we followed animal tracks of deer, rabbits and birds, we found a quiet space where we all sat and listened to the snow dripping off the trees.  The children all had great fun making their own snow angel and comparing sizes with their friends.  They all enjoyed the snow but when back in the classroom we all warmed up with a cup of hot chocolate -all choosing their favourite story books and reading them to their friends!

  

  

  

 

Taverham Hall School – Independent Schools Norfolk

Posted in 38-February 2012, Forest School, Nursery on March 2nd, 2012

Exploring the change in seasons……

The children all love to be a part of Forest School, as a group we went exploring in the woods in search of animals and insects. 
 
They all enjoyed laying back, watching the clouds go by and using their imagination to discover shapes, objects and patterns.
 
They examined the change in seasons, with the different colours of leaves, conkers and acorns.  They have also been looking at the trees and measuring them; then having collected lots of natural items they compared sizes back inside. The girls and boys enjoyed looking for hedgehogs whilst they were outside and have made their own from clay.

Our younger Nursery 1 children have continued their theme of “Colours” by exploring the woods, taking some bark rubbings and making Autumn pictures. They even made the most of the windy weather by taking streamers out into the playground to explore!
 
We also went down to the river to spot dragonflies and other insects and observed how fast the river was flowing.
 
The girls and boys have been talking about different emotions and decided to make pizza faces, all of which where extremely happy ones!
 
In the sports hall the children learned about group games and activities such as tennis and football.
 
Their first dancing lesson this term with Mrs Chamberlain went very well and everyone had a fantastic time!

Taverham Hall School – Independent Schools Norfolk

Posted in 34-October 2011, Forest School, Nursery on October 9th, 2011

« Older Entries