St Mary's Primary Academy - Folkestone

Sri Lanka-Folkestone Museum:
Sri Lanka's visit to Folkestone Museum was an amazing start to the term! For the morning, we became real archaeologists and explored the past through lots of exciting hands-on activities. We carefully pieced together broken pottery, just like experts do when uncovering ancient treasures. We built skeletons, sorted fascinating fossils and archaeological finds, and discovered how they help us learn about history. We also organised artefacts on a timeline and became history detectives, using clues and evidence to work out who they belonged to. We even had the chance to look closely at some real Ancient Egyptian artefacts that were over 3000 years old, including scarab beetle amulets and deity statuettes. It was fantastic to investigate the past in such a fun way, and we all left feeling inspired, excited, and eager to be archeologists!

Peru-Mountains:
This term, Peru Class have begun their exciting new topic on Mountains. The children have been learning all about how fold mountains are formed and had great fun recreating this process using layers of different materials and plasticine to represent tectonic movement.
We explored the famous expedition of Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay, discovering that rocks brought back from the summit of Mount Everest contained fossils of creatures usually found in warm, shallow seas. The children used their growing understanding of fold mountains to investigate how this could have happened, leading to some fantastic scientific discussions and thoughtful conclusions.
To deepen their learning, we have also been watching videos about the experience of climbing Mount Everest. Inspired by this, the children are now writing diary entries from the perspective of a climber reaching the summit. They have produced some truly outstanding work, using rich and imaginative figurative language to bring their writing to life.

Outdoor Club:
What a lovely afternoon to be outdoors.
This week in Outdoor Club, the children completed a teamwork challenge, getting across a swamp using stepping stones. They definitely had to show perseverance to complete the task!
They then spent the rest of the session playing in Forest School. One group made an elaborate water chute with much discussion and laughter. The other children made spinners and fidget spinners, using a palm drill to make holes in wood.

Burkina Faso-DT
This week, Burkina Faso class have been learning about greenhouses in DT. In particular, we have been looking at the structure of greenhouses and how the frames our built. The children had lots of fun making frames using sweets and cocktail sticks.

Explorers-PE Coach:
We had a session with the PE coach who taught us skills using the bean bags and team work.

Adventurers-Forest School:
The Adventurers loved their first visit to the big Forest School! They had great fun balancing on beams, trying the tyre swing, and building car ramps with gutters. The children also enjoyed decorating shells, playing in the mud kitchen, and exploring the dens—showing lots of imagination and confidence.

World Cup Spirit:
Today, the children celebrated the start of the World Cup by wearing their country colours and kits. Everyone was in high spirits ahead of England's first game tonight!

Year 4 -Kenya Class:
Great excitement in Kenya Class as the children got to have their Forest School session.
The children were fantastic and enjoyed all their favourite activities. They played camouflage hide-and-seek, climbed and balanced, created an elaborate target game, and made some lovely muddy recipes in the mud kitchen.
Some of the children also used palm drills to create fidget spinners and spinning tops, which they used in their own made-up game. They involved all the children, and it was great to see everyone taking part.
Well done, Kenya Class.

Year 1- Forest School:
This week in Forest School, the children in Year 1 had the opportunity to do some pond dipping, exploring the pond habitat and finding out about the creatures that live in the pond.
They were very excited to find lots of newts, but also the “lion of the pond”, the dragonfly nymph. A fierce carnivore, it eats other pond creatures. When they looked carefully, they also found lots of other tiny creatures and, as the weather warmed up, saw beautiful damselflies and dragonflies skimming around the pond.
Not all children have had a turn yet, but those who did not get a turn this week are looking forward to having a go next time!