Thank you to everybody that helped and attended the Halloween Party on Wednesday night. There were lots of fantastic costumes and some brilliant carved pumpkins. A fun time was had by all!

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Squirrel class have been looking at different authors and illustrators as part of the ‘Picture This’ topic. We were really lucky to take part in a Durham Book Festival event where we met the author and illustrator Helen Stephens. She showed us all how to draw a lion and she read two of her books ‘How to Hide a Lion at School’ and her new book’ How to Hide a Lion at Christmas’. We were some of the first children to hear her new one. She dressed Lucy up as a lion and we really enjoyed our visit. Helen Stephens signed our copy of How to Hide a Lion. We have been writing stories about hiding a lion in our school since our visit.

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Only at Woodland Primary School can children create a game that involves the wind!   They had a great time this week seeing who’s coat would stick to our school fence the longest!

During this week in Squirrel class we have been learning about Picasso. We have painted beautiful watercolour self-portraits. We had to mix the right colours ourselves. Then on Thursday we made tree faces in the wild area using clay and other natural materials.

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As part of Owl Classes ‘Picture This Topic’ involving food technology and art all the children over the next few weeks will be making a ‘Pizza Portrait’ of themselves.  This week the children in the first group had great fun doing this and especially enjoyed taking it home to eat for tea!  A special thank you to Karen our school cook who help the children with this fun activity.

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On Thursday we all enjoyed a fantastic visit to the Bowes Museum. We all felt inspired by the wonderful Quentin Blake BFG exhibition. We had the chance to look at the painting he created especially for the museum as well.

The Owls spent the morning in the exhibition before sketching some images of the BFG which they then made into ink drawings. In the afternoon they completed orienteering BFG trail around the grounds – which the children really enjoyed. They also spent time in the gallery looking for paintings which they liked. They recorded information about them discussed their own ideas and opinions. The Squirrels had read The Big Adventures of the Smalls in school and they looked for some of the objects in the book at the museum. They also enjoyed the BFG paintings and exploring the museum. In the afternoon they looked at portraits in the gallery and participated in a workshop making a collage picture of themselves.  They produced some excellent work.

We all enjoyed the opportunity to watch the fantastic silver swan at the end of our visit.

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On Monday 9th July we held our Sports Day. We were all split into groups and we completed team games. We then did an egg-and-spoon race, a sprint for each year group and a team race.
On the same day, was the £5 challenge. We had each been given £5 which we got from the Virgin Money Grow £5 and we had to think of a way to make more money than we started with. This was a project we did in school over 2 weeks. We had to come up with an idea, order resources and equipment and make our produce to sell.  We sold everything at the Summer Fair and we made £137 profit which we will use to buy some equipment for school.
On Sports Day we also celebrated the 50th anniversary of Woodland Primary School in the new buliding. There was a special cake and a speech which was made by Jacqui Richardson who attended Woodland School at the time this building was being built. Everyone had a great time.

By George

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At the beginning of July, Year 4, 5 and 6 children were lucky enough to go to PGL Winmarleigh for a residential trip.  At the centre  we had the chance to do some water activities such as canoeing and raft-building and of course go for a swim afterwards. We also did a range of activities on land from a giant zip wire to a low level rope course. Our instructors were really nice,  James even let us throw wet sponges at him. On the last night we had a campfire and we had toasted marshmallows and sang a large selection of campfire songs. It was a great experience!

By Ellie & Poppy

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This week we made the River Tees and we had the paddling pool out in the mini play area. We found out about water cycles and wrote down some information. We used some pipes and made bridges out of Lego. We did some watercolour painting.
By Sophie E

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On Wednesday Owl Class pupils performed their Summer Play ‘ Survival of the Stranded’ to a full house of parents, grandparents and family.

They wrote the play themselves and it was fantastic!  They all really enjoyed performing it and we had some lovely comments for the audience.  I think we have some budding actors and actresses among them.  Well done everyone.

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