Recently in Class 1…

12th November 2024Elouise Chadwick

It’s been a busy few weeks in class 1. We started this half term with a bang and carried out a ‘fizzy firework’ experiment! The children enjoyed making predictions and made observations. We then made our own sparklers using straws, tissue paper and pipe cleaners. The children took an interest in learning about the past and listened attentively to ‘The Gunpowder Plot’ story.

One of our favourite times of the day is being outside. The children have recently took an interest in finding different insects. They have handled them with love and care…

Class 1 continue to blow me away with their hard work in our phonics and maths sessions. We have been using our segmenting fingers to spell words and have enjoyed counting some new collections that have appeared in our counting library. For such young learners they show a real love for learning. Well done for a great start to this half term Class 1…

Lest we forget.

11th November 2024Sarah Winkley

As part of our Remberance Day celebrations Nursery learned why we wear poppy’s around this time of year, as a mark of respect for the fallen and serving armed forces. The children explored remembrance through a simple story thinking of days we would like to remember and days we’d like to forget, titled Lest We Forget by Kerry Brown.

We learned some simple actions to help the children embed the story into their minds about what happened on the battle fields, imagining that the children were bunny rabbits at that time. The children pretended to be aeroplanes that flew over the bunnies and then bombs that dropped, exploding like fireworks. The children show empathy for the bunnies, understanding that they would “be hurt”, “die” or “be scared” and “frightened”.

The children then made poppies from creative materials, play dough and paint to show their thanks to our soldiers and service people. Wow!! Beautiful work in big moments.

Celebrations of tradition & light.

11th November 2024Sarah Winkley

Last week Nursery were learning all about the traditions around celebrations of light. The children focused on Bonfire Night and Guy Fawkes as part of our own heritage and traditions in England. They learnt who Guy Fawkes was and what him and his catholic friends were planning to do as part of the “Gunpowder Plot” against King James 1. The children sequenced the events in the story during a Crew session and then created their own Guy Fawkes sock puppets during time in provision. This activity took lots of fine and gross motor skills to draw on Guy Fawkes features but to also stuff the sock with straw and then use their cutting skills to make him a hat. Just look at the beautiful work the children produced.

The children thought of ways in which we celebrate bonfire night and created firework scenes in the play dough and also used their painting skills to paint fireworks, which they had experienced at bonfire celebrations that they had attended. We also learnt a fabulous firework song, using actions to mimic the fireworks and our voices to imitate the sounds that they make.

At the later stages of the week the children compared the Hindu celebration of Diwali with our own experiences of Bonfire Night. The children investigated the traditions of Diwali through the story of Rama and Sita. They learned how the community of Rama and Sita celebrated their return by lighting Diva Lamps to help guide the couple home. The children also compared the demon king Ravana (a ten headed and twenty armed monster) to Guy Fawkes as the children recognised that that they were both “unkind” and “baddies” with “moustaches” who had “nasty plans” (Guy Fawkes to blow up the Houses of Parliament and Ravana to kidnap the Sita, the beautiful wife of the Rama the renowned warrior).

The children used collage to recreate their own Ravana, observing his skin colour and traditional dress, along with his jewellery.

Nursery also attempted to make Rangoli patterns using loose parts, to decorate our space.

Sharing our Stories: 08/11/2024

8th November 2024Geoff Hewitt

Beautiful Work This Week

Jeff Tech High

This October half term, 9 members of staff from across XP Trust travelled to San Diego to work with the best project based learning teacher in the world – Jeff Robin. Each teacher brought with them a personally crafted exemplar – a tangible product of their passion and planning – to refine and inspire transformative future Expeditions.

Inspired by Jeff’s groundbreaking work at High Tech High, the school that inspired XP, they sought to elevate their teaching through creativity, activism, and lasting legacy. Away from the familiar, they embraced new ideas in a setting that ignited their imagination…

Stay tuned for the full length documentary and story of Jeff Tech High…

Green Top’s new Sensory Room!

Stay & Play at Carcroft!

Open Day @ Norton Infants

Top of the Blogs

Fun in the autumn leaves @ Norton Infants

Investigation Friction @ Green Top

Fieldwork Explorers @ Plover

Air Resistance – Parachutes @ Carcroft School

Celebrating 70 Years of Lord of the Flies @ XP School

Norton Remembers @ Norton Juniors

Beautiful Work from Danny in G28 @ XP Gateshead

Crew White Supports the Eve Merton Trust @ XP East

Share your stories with us!

We now have a new dedicated news email so that you can send your stories, updates or ideas about potential news articles directly to us in Comms.

It might be something you or your students have achieved, a charity you’re supporting or anything at all that deserves a wider audience.

Write to us at [email protected] –  we want to hear about it, write about it and celebrate it!

We are Historians

8th November 2024Laura Parsons

Class Five have blown me away this morning using their historical vocabulary to explain their learning to their partner! It was lovely to hear how knowledgable and enthusiastic the children are.

Mrs Parsons xx

Autumn Fun

8th November 2024Emma Powell

Children in Class 2 have loved exploring the outdoors this week. We have spent lots of time playing in our wonderful outdoor area. Many children have been amazing stewards and have used sweeping brushes and wheelbarrows to sweep and move the huge amount of leaves that have fallen from our tree. We have also had some fabulous examples of mark making, children were especially keen to draw fireworks that they had seen on Bonfire Night.

EYFS Community Meeting

8th November 2024Emma Powell

Today we celebrated the end of a very busy first week back after the half term holidays. We gave praise to all of our Reception children for being kind and working hard this week. They have all made us so proud. Special mentions were also given to the children below who have been role models in class all week.

We also felt very lucky to receive thank you cards from members of our local community at the food bank and Campsall Church. They were delighted with our kindness in donating items for the food bank at harvest time and also our flower bouquet and straw dollies for members of the congregation at the church.

Keep up the super work Reception, you are all amazing!