Usually weekends in school are very quiet with no one around, but on the night of the 24th June 2016 Woodland Primary School was a hive of activity with the children taking part in our 7th Annual Giant Sleepover.

The evening’s activities started with staff, children and parents etc taking part in a family football followed by supper and bingo. Parents left at 8.30pm and the children and staff then settled down in their pyjamas to watch a bedtime film. Lights were out at 10.30pm and the school began to settle down(!!!) with a little bit of talking, giggling and snoring!!

The next morning the children were up very early!!! The children had their breakfast outside in the sunshine and then enjoyed playing out together on the field. A huge thank you to all the staff that gave up their Friday night, so that we could all have some great fun together.

The children of Badger and Owl Class wrote our summer play, The 12 Labours of Hercules. On Thursday they performed it for family and friends in the school hall.  There was lots of exciting action and Woodland humour! Everyone enjoyed watching the performance and thank you for all the lovely comments.

Every year all the local small schools come to Woodland to take part in the Woodland Football Tournament. It was a fun day and all the players gave their all, fuelled by cakes and hotdogs sold by Friends of Woodland School. The matches were intense and tough but in the end Cotherstone were the overall winners. Ingleton were close runners up, followed by Montalbo and Woodland. Both finals were closely fought and finally decided on penalties. Thank you to all the supporters who came to cheer on the team and the fantastic bakers who brought in delicious cakes to keep us going.

Squirrel Class invited their parents and grandparents to join them for fun and activities inside and outside the classroom. We were pleased to welcome the children and families who will be starting Reception in September.  The theme was healthy choices and the human body.

On Friday morning the children joined staff, parents and grandparents to walk to school from either end of the village to support the Brakes Giant Walk.  This charity raises awareness of road safety as well as raising money to support those effected by road traffic accidents.  The children enjoyed their walk and we raised £40 for this good cause.  Thank you to Mrs Keenan for organising this event.

The Owl Class represented the school at the Barnard Castle Cricket Club today and played extremely well.  Despite the rather wet conditions a good time was had by all!  They won 2 of their games and enjoyed batting and bowling.  The strongest part of their game was the fielding where they showed superb teamwork.  Well done everyone!

Again this week we have welcomed lots of visitors in to school.

• On Tuesday Smooth Radio came to school in conjunction with Northumbrian Water’s ‘Dwain Pipe Campaign’ to help the children learn what can go down your toilet and sink and what should go in the bin.  The children all entered a competition by designing a shield with ‘Dwain Pipe to win a VIP Family Ticket to see Kynren.
• On Wednesday we welcomed parents, grandparents and family members to our ‘Maths Fun Afternoon’.  The children became teachers for the afternoon showing their parents how we complete calculations and also the kind of games they could play to improve there maths skills at home.  They also enjoyed sharing with their parents the games we play on computers and ipads during lessons. There was an outside Maths trail for those who were brave enough to go out in the rain!
• On Thursday Pets at Home from Bishop Auckland visited school to talk to the children about caring for pets.  They brought in 2 rabbits and a guinea pig which the children had the opportunity to hold and feed.  The Squirrel Class have be learning about different types of animals and creating their own pet shop and vets in the classroom.  All the children really enjoyed this.

  

  

  

  
  

  

  

  

  
  

  

  

  

  
  

Last Friday we decided to find out more about the types of food eaten in Ancient Greece. We enjoyed a tasting session and we were all very brave as we all tried all of the different foods. Badgers enjoyed tasting grapes, figs, feta cheese, olives and honey. We found we liked some foods more than others and some of us were unsure of the olives and figs. We giggled at the funny faces we pulled when we didn’t like the taste of something.

The Owl class also did some Greek cooking and they made a lentil soup and a Greek salad. They also made some honey cakes which they shared with all of the children in school.

This is what the children said :

Year 2: I really didn’t like the figs.

Year 3: I learned they only ate simple foods.

Year 4: They only ate food that they had grown or produced from animals.

Year 5: Greek salad was really tasty and delicious and healthy. Even though some of us didn’t like the olives.

Year 6: It was really interesting to find out what  they ate all those years ago.

On Monday 16th May we were visited by Gillian Bell, the North East representative from Parliament’s Education Service.  All of KS2 had a fantastic morning learning all about the Government, and how Parliament works.  We found out about the House of Commons, the House of Lords and how Henry VIII used to play tennis inside the Houses of Parliament buildings or the Palace of Westminster as it is known! We also made up our own political parties, gave our own persuasive speeches and discussed new laws we wanted to create just like they do in Parliament.
What a busy morning!
Some quotes from KS2 participants;
“It was really interesting to find out how laws are made.”
“I enjoyed making our own Parties and laws and trying to persuade people that our ideas were the best to vote for”
“We found out loads of information and discovered the role of the Queen in Parliament”

Woodland Primary School successfully applied to take part in this experiment launched by British astronaut, Tim Peake, aboard the International Space Station.
Tim took rocket seeds into space. The experiment is to see whether the zero gravity environment will affect the seeds. Scientists need to know if seeds survive in space to help them plan long manned space missions to Mars.
The test is a blind comparison test. We have been given two packets of rocket seeds – one has been in space with Tim, the other has stayed on Earth. We don’t know which one is which but we have made predictions, and  have made the tests fair giving both packets of seeds equal conditions.

The results so far: both packets have germinated, although the blue packets got off to a better start. This week we worked out the percentage of seeds from each packet that have germinated.
The experiment lasts for five weeks. We will find out which were the real space rocket seeds after all the results have been sent in.

Watch this SPACE!!