This week, Class 2 have been on so many learning adventures that we are absolutely exhausted and ready for the weekend!
 

We have finally come to the end of our unit on measurement in Maths. We have measured and compared length, heights, mass, volume, capacities and temperatures. There has really been an awful lot of stretching, walking, weighing, teeming and ladling in the classroom!!! Hopefully we have learned enough about measurement so that we can apply it to well in our portions masterclass later this term. On the other hand, Literacy lesson has been calmer as we have been writing the neat copies of our explanation text.

In Science, we looked at the life cycle of a butterfly in detail and learned some Tier 3 words associated with it - metamorphosis, chrysalis, pupa and larva. In DT, we been working with Miss Walker to design and plan our pouches. This week we have begun sewing them using simple running stitch. In Geography, we explored aerial photos of Harrowbarrow and used Google maps to zoom in on our school. We looked at OS maps of the village and identified key symbols used. We then used our learning to draw our own sketch map of the school grounds, identifying 6 key areas a visitor might want to find and adding them to the map. We also created our own keys to represent these key areas. In between all this, we also managed to learn about another Patron Saint - St Patrick. 

However, the highlight of the week has to be our second visit to Haye farm. It was a gloriously sunny day and we had oodles of fun exploring the farm again and meeting some of the new additions to the farmyard since our last visit. Please look below for some photos from the day.

A very well done to:
> Jane for getting the Ready Award for her hard work and amazing progress in Maths.
> Roux for getting the Respectful Award for his exemplary behaviour during our trip on Wednesday.
> Roma for being nominated by the Positive Potato Police for the Safe Award for checking on her friends during playtime. 

Thanks to Nick Hart and Luke Wallace, a world renowned musician who came to join us all he way from Canada, who ran the music event at Liskeard Church this week.  It was quite terrifying to be performing in front of everyone but Year 6 were great and it was brilliant to join in all the singing activities with the other schools.  Music really does bring people together. 

This week we have also been starting to write up our non-chronological texts about the mighty Thanator from Pandora.  There have been some great opening sentences.  More of this will be shared next week when we completed our first piece with our partners.  We have also been looking at energy sources for a proposed new town and deciding whether it should have solar or wind power.  We wrote some powerful letters putting forward our points of view about the benefits of wind power and why a new town should build wind turbines.  

Tree Planting
To celebrate the opening of the Community Pantry, our Year 6 pupils helped plant a special apple tree next to the new shop. Hopefully, we can all look forward to scrumping a few apples in the years ahead!




Litter Warriors
A group of children from across the school have volunteered to be our first Litter Warriors. The Litter Warriors will use their litter pickers to tidy up of our school site every Friday. The school council came up with this suggestion when asked to think about ways our school could be improved. They also suggested we improve our recycling, so Class 4 children made some signs to ensure children use the correct bins for their rubbish.



Community Litter Pick
Following on from our own litter pickers, we have been asked to share details of a community litter pick:

Callington Lions Club are spearheading a series of community litter picks as part of Lions Environment Week (18-26 April), celebrating World Earth Day on 22 April.

All relevant insurance, risk assessments, and volunteers are in place, and members of the local community are warmly invited to join them on Sunday 19th April at 11am to litter pick at Harrowbarrow Village Hall and the surrounding green areas. They would love to see as many people as possible helping to keep our local environment clean and cared for. 

This week we congratulate our First Lego League competitors from Year 6. On  Wednesday, the team of Talan, Jayden, Josh V, Cadan, Josh M, Belle, Arabella, Jack, Eli and Rioch joined hundreds of children from schools across Cornwall for a day of Lego robotics competition at RNAS Culdrose. There were many ways in which teams could excel and be recognised for their achievements. Although the team were unable to secure the most points and progress to the national finals, they received the judges award for engineering excellence for their robot design (below). We are very proud of the team for their efforts and the work they have done over the last two terms in preparation for this event. As well as building the robot to complete different missions, the group had to come up with a presentation which they delivered to judges on the day. They also built a model drone in support of their presentation. Thank you to volunteer Karen Brinson for her work supporting Sam Watts and the team over the last few months.




Year 3/4 football match

Only one competitive match this week, which saw the team lose narrowly to South Petherwin. They will have one more opportunity to secure a win on Tuesday as the competition draws to a close. Whatever the outcome, we are proud of their efforts and know they will have learnt lots of lessons from being involved in competitive sport. 

Cross-country round-up
The league season came to a close with the final race at Lanhydrock. Abi Flashman thinks that almost every runner finished with a personal best in this race, which is brilliant. A special mention goes to Jacob Bloye, which secured enough points to be invited to the county finals. Thank you to all the parents who supported their children with races, whatever the weather!

End of term
As we enter the last few weeks of term, a reminder that our last day is Thursday 2nd April and pupils will need collecting at 1.30pm on this day.

What a glorious week we have had this week! The sun brough a lot of excitement and much needed outdoor sessions. 

The highlight of the week has to be World Book Day on Thursday when we all came in dressed as our favourite book characters. We all shared our books and played some book-related games before we had a go at redesigning our books. Just look at some of the amazing rebranded covers of our favourite titles that our class created!

In Maths, we continue our exploration of measurement by measuring mass in grams and kilograms. We even got to take some of our Maths lesson outdoors when we used the forest school to help us measure natural found materials in grams. In Literacy, we learned all about adverbials this week. We learned to write more exciting sentences by adding adverbials of reason and time.

In Science, we build on our learning from last week to look at the different stages of the human life cycle in detail. In Geography, we looked at the 7 continents and located some amazing physical and human features around the world using Google Maps.

In RE, we learned the Easter Story and retold it in our own words before beginning to explore the idea of salvation and how it relates to the stories of the Holy Week. In Computing, we recapped our understanding of algorithms and debugging before exploring programming in games.

In Music, we are exploring Musical Moods. This week has all about rhythm and tempo. We have also begun learning songs that link to our Science lessons. The song of the week is "The Life-Cycle Song." Sing along with us by clicking the link below:
https://app.sparkyard.com/shared/song/2390/1d49f370-e1cd-49b8-bcb5-73f770356e48

This week, I would like to share some of the wonderful design technology learning from the junior classes, alongside some of the other activities children have been involved in.

Design Technology

Class 4 are designing a playground structure, which they will transform into a model by the end of term. They started with design sketches, which were  then uploaded to NewArc AI to see what their designs might look like.



Rudy's design sketch is on the left and then AI's interpretation is on the right.

Rosie added some children to her sketches, which the AI tool was able to add to the interpretation of her design.

We were all in awe of the power of this technology, which has helped the children visualise what their finished model may look like. The next step was to plan their design more carefully using Tinkercad, a Computer Aided Design platform. There is more work for the children to do but these are Alfie, Arabella and Josh's CAD playground structures so far.


Class 3 continue to explore different mechanisms through making model prototype cars. This week, they constructed rubber band racers which were tested at the end of the lesson. Well done to Lowenna and Sophia, whose car travelled the furthest.


Football
Unfortunately, our Year 3 and 4 footballers were unable to win either of their two matches this week, but I am really proud of the determination and teamwork on display and feel a first win is just around the corner. Well done to Jacob, Eva, Abigail, Spencer, Max, Edith and William for their efforts.

World Book Day
It was lovely to see the children dressed as book characters yesterday to celebrate World Book Day. I also enjoyed seeing the range of favourite books they brought in. From fantasy novels to traditional tales and favourite information books to riddles, we had the full range of books being shared. As J.K. Rowling once said, 'if you don't like reading, you haven't found the right book'. Well yesterday showed that there is a book for everyone.

Staffing Update
We welcomed back Sam Watts this week after his parental leave. I know the children were very excited to see Sam. On Thursday 12th March, Tom Ottewell-Taylor will be undergoing a routine operation. His recovery period takes him up to Easter, so Abi Flashman will once again help us out by teaching Class 1 full time until the end of term.

I look forward to sharing more from the classes next week. 

In Geography this week, we have been exploring different sources of energy and discussing the advantages and disadvantages of each one. We compared options such as nuclear energy-which can produce large amounts of power but creates long‑lasting waste-and hydropower, which is renewable but can affect river habitats. In Maths, Year 6 have been practising multiplying and dividing decimals, while Year 5 have continued developing their long‑multiplication methods. In English, we've also been learning how to use parentheses to add extra detail to our descriptions, especially when writing about the fantastical creatures of Pandora, like the fierce Thanator (a powerful predator from the rainforest).

Welcome back to everyone after the half term break. As ever, it has been a busy week, with lots of fantastic learning taking place across the school.

Design Technology
Class 3 are learning about mechanisms through model vehicles This week, they learnt to make a prototype model car to roll down an inclined plane. Children had to work in pairs to achieve their learning outcomes in the lesson and then test their car.


Art Exhibition
We hope all those who were able to join us for the art exhibition on Wednesday enjoyed viewing the children's work. It was great to see the variety of approaches on display.



Year 3/4 Football Tournament
Despite losing both games from the first round of matches this week, I thought the players were terrific. Many of the children were playing their first ever game and were very unsure what to do at the beginning. However, by the end, they had improved significantly.

Swimming
Year 1 and 2 children started their swimming programme this afternoon. With half of them assessed as non-swimmers, it shows the value of these lessons.

I look forward to sharing more of the children's learning next week.

Thank you Class 2 families for making it to our Art Open Classroom session on Wednesday. It was lovely to see all of you in the classroom sharing the children's works. It was especially wonderful to see you all sharing your children's illustrated stories. They are all very, very proud of their books... as you might have noticed!

This week in Maths, we have started a new unit on measurement. Our class have had a lot of very active Maths lessons measuring things around the classroom using our rules and meter sticks. Please see below for some photos from one of our lessons. We have also started a new unit of writing in Literacy. This half term, we are writing explanation texts. This week, we explored a WAGOLL and identified the key text and language features we can use in our own writing. We also consolidated our understanding of writing in the present tense and have had a go at independently writing the introductions to an explanation text.

In Science, we have begun our unit on Life Cycles by learning about the life cycle of humans. In DT we have begun our unit on textiles by learning how to handle a needle and to sew a running stitch. In Geography, we looked at the 4 countries that make up the United Kingdom. We learned the names of the capital cities and explored some physical and human features found around our country.

Finally, we ended our very full first week back with an exciting first swimming lesson on Friday!!!

Have a lovely weekend and see you again on Monday for another week of learning fun!


  

What an exciting and inspiring week we've had!
Art Exhibition - Art Activism
We are incredibly proud of all the children for their amazing artwork showcased at our Art Activism exhibition. The theme encouraged pupils to use art as a powerful voice for change, and the messages they created were thoughtful, emotional, and full of purpose. A huge thank you to all the parents, grandparents, and family members who attended. Your support means so much to the children, and they absolutely loved sharing their creative ideas with you.

Science - Phases of the Moon
In Science, we've been learning all about the Moon and its phases. The children have explored how the Moon appears to change shape over the course of a month, and we've talked about why this happens. To help us understand these phases, the class created fantastic Moon phase pinwheels, which turned out brilliantly and really showed their understanding. We've also enjoyed observing how the Moon looks each evening and discussing the changes we notice.

 Maths - Year 5 & Year 6
In Maths, each year group has been working hard on their current learning: Year 6 have been mastering how to multiply decimals, showing excellent problem-solving and reasoning skills. Year 5 have continued practising their written multiplication methods, building confidence and accuracy day by day. Both year groups have shown great determination and focus-well done, everyone!

Now we have reached the end of this half term, I'm not sure where the weeks have gone. The staff and children have been working extremely hard and everyone deserves a rest. Hopefully, we will have some better weather next week and when we return on Monday 23rd February. I was told it has been the wettest January on record in Cornwall and it has certainly felt like it.

Art Exhibition
At 3.20pm on Wednesday 25th February, we are inviting parents and carers to join us in classes for our latest art exhibition. Here is a taster of what you will see. Class 3 have been learning about art activism and produced their own artwork with a message they want to share with the world. Class 3 have been learning about repeating patterns and how they are generated for the textile and design industry. They have created their own. We look forward to welcoming you on the 25th.




Football Tournament
Well done to our Year 5 and 6 football team, who completed their tournament fixtures this week. A 5-0 win against Menheniot in the first match was followed by a narrow 3-2 defeat to South Petherwin in the second. I was very proud of their attitude, effort and teamwork. A special thanks to Jacob from Year 4, who stepped in to make up the numbers and support Rioch, Rosie, Belle, Seth, Alfie and Jayden. 

Half Term Activities
I look forward to seeing everyone again on Monday 23rd February but, in the meantime, here are a couple of ideas for half term:





Finally, here is something for the summer term:

Over the past few weeks, the children have been hard at work crafting their own setting stories inspired by Pandora. We've been exploring how to build atmosphere, use descriptive vocabulary, and bring imaginary worlds to life. The pupils have shown incredible creativity, and we are delighted to share some examples of the excellent writing they have produced. Their attention to detail and imagination have really shone through!

In addition to our storytelling, we've also been diving into our new topic on the Ancient Greeks. The class has been researching who they were, how they lived, and the huge impact they had on the world. From democracy and theatre to architecture and the Olympic Games, we've been thinking carefully about the legacy the Ancient Greeks have left us. All of this learning is helping us prepare for our "big write" after half term, where pupils will bring together their knowledge in a longer, independent piece
of writing.

As we head into the break, I hope all the pupils enjoy a well‑deserved and restful half term. They have worked incredibly hard, and we look forward to continuing our learning adventure when we return!

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This last week of the half term has been a fun filled learning adventure in class 2. 

We have spent a lot of time reflecting on and consolidating our learning from this half term. In Literacy, we have all finished writing our "triumph over terror" stories, and have been illustrating our stories so that we can have our very own picture books. We can't wait to share them with you when we come back after the break! In Maths, we have consolidated our understanding of multiplication and division, especially multiplying and dividing by 2, 5 and 10.

In Science, we completed the final recording of our experiment and spent some time discussing our findings and drawing our conclusions from it all. We have found that water is very essential for a seed to germinate, and that it does not really need soil to do the same. In History, we wrapped up our learning from this term by answering some key questions on the topic of the history of flight. On the left is a photo of Roma's beautiful write up about the key facts we have learned in this unit. In Computing, we consolidated all our learning about word processing by creating a document with details about a friend. We typed our text, formatted it in our friend's favourite colour and inserted a photo of them.

Finally, a very well done to:
> Roux for getting the Ready Award for his fantastic progress in Maths, especially his knowledge of multiplication and division.
> Harriet for getting the Respectful Award from Mrs Connell for her fantastic attitude during RWI lessons.
> Emily for getting the Safe Award for being a super helper to Mrs Connell, helping her with the gates every morning.
> Isla for being nominated for the Safe Award by the Positive Potato Police for letting others join in her game.

Have a lovely half term break, and see you all bright and refreshed on Monday, 23 February 2025.

This week two classes went on trips in the local area. It is always good for our children to connect with their local community and the environment as it gives them a sense of place.

Tree planting at Cotehele
The National Trust is planting millions of trees across their estates and this week Class 4 helped plant beech, oak, hornbeam, pine, sycamore and lime trees at Cotehele. The children worked in teams of three to plant and stake over 100 trees. They did an amazing job and really understood the value of the contribution they were making to the landscape and the local habitat.



Haye Farm
Class 3 visited Haye Farm to learn how plants get their food. The visit supports their work in science this term. They will be visiting again in March to learn more and may get the opportunity to see some newborn baby animals too.

It's a girl!
Congratulations to Sam Watts and his partner, who welcomed their baby daughter into the world yesterday. Sam is understandably feeling very proud and asked us to share this angelic photo. We will send a congratulatory card and gift on behalf of our school community.

What a long, full and amazing week we've had here in Class 2!
In Literacy, we have finished writing our stories and have edited them, ready to write them into our neat copies. Watch this space, next week, we are going to get very creative with our stories! In Maths, we have come to the end of our unit on Multiplication and Division. Next week, we are excited about spending time recapping some of the key concepts we have learned and getting more fluent with our 2, 5 and 10 times table and related divisions.

In Science, we had a huge discussion around what plants need to grow. We had a very important question we needed answering - how do plants get their food? Some of us suggested that they get it through their roots which connected to the "wood wide web," while some suggested they got it from the soil. Finally, had a lesson on how plants used sunlight, water and carbon dioxide to make their own food. This was further reinforced during our walk down at Haye Farm on Wednesday afternoon. You can see some of the pictures from the trip on the slide show below. 

In History, we learned about the first men on the moon. We watched actual footage of the Apollo 11 mission and watched Neil Armstrong as he stepped foot on the moon for the first time. We finished off by reading "The Sea of Tranquility." At the end of the lesson, we had quite a few of us who wanted to change our "When I grow up..." banners. Harriet shouted, "I want to be an astronaut! I will be the first girl on Mars!"

We ended the week with a huge collaborative Art project. We crafted our own mark-making tools using a variety of objects and mixed primary colours to make a range of secondary colours. We use them to experiment with mark making.

Finally, a very well done to:
> Jimmy, Jane and Darcie for getting the Ready Award for their brilliant improvements in their Arithmetic skills.
> William for getting the Respectful Award for trying his very best to wait for his turn to speak.
> Darcie for being nominated for the Safe Award by the Positive Potato Police for being a kind and considerate friend and checking on her friends.

Also find attached below, this week's number bonds homework.

We've had an exciting week in class, highlighted by our fantastic trip to Cotehele, where we planted young Scots pine and oak trees to help support the woodland for future generations. It is all part of the National Trust's scheme to plant 20 million trees over the estate.  Back at school, we've been sharpening our maths skills by exploring fractions by adding and subtracting breaking the whole.  Year 6 started looking at decimals and how they can be partitioned.  After school,  we also represented our class brilliantly in football matches against Copper Valley and Bishop Cornish schools. To round it all off, we've begun planning and writing our own settings stories set on different planets, blending real scientific facts with our own imaginative ideas based on our unit on Pandora.  There have been lots of imaginative creatures created as part of this planning process. What a brilliant week of learning and adventure!