Latest posts from St John the Baptist Spalding

Over the Spring term, year 4 have been designing and creating bridges to span the River Welland.  We started by looking the best type of structure and found that arches and triangles are the most stable.  The we created a prototype from spaghetti and masking tape to practice angles and joins.  We then worked with a partner to design out final bridge using the triangle structure for support.

Once we had our final design, we measured our wood and then cut using a hacksaw.  For many of us, this was a completely new experience and we are pleased to say that everyone still has all their fingers.  Once our wood was cut, we had to create right angles for the squares which were carefully glued together.  We also used card triangles to strengthen the joints before adding the cross supports.  We discovered that you had to cut these pieces at an angle so that they fit the joint correctly and there was a lot of trial and error before every piece fit.

Everyone showed fantastic teamwork and perseverance as well as learning a lot of new skills.  Well done!

What an exciting first day back to school after the Easter holidays we have had! Today we had our first session of learning how to play a Ukulele led by Miss Hall from Lincolnshire Music Service. We were all so excited to learn new Music skills and see what our 12 week program has to offer. We learnt all about the different parts of our instruments and how to tune them. As a class (and in rehearsed in partners) we learnt different rhythms and learnt the different notes of the strings before putting these together with the backing tracks. Already, we cannot wait for next week's session!

Y5/6 finally got to take part in their Cross Country event with some excellent results. Corie in 5AE came first out of all the girls and Olly 6HSKL came fourth in the boys race. Excellent perseverance from Sienna, Millie-Mai, Saskia, Millie, Arijus, Sam, Rowan & Caison.

Year 3 have really enjoyed their DT topic this term making a cushion based on Ted Hughes' book "The Iron Man." The brief was to create a cushion with the Iron Man face on to help the illustrator, Chris Mould's poorly back. The children have fully embraced the challenge and have really gone above and beyond to make their cushions incredible. Many parents commented at parent's evening that their children have been asking to do extra sewing at home. A big thank you to Mrs Griggs who was in her element teaching the children new skills and also to our governor Mrs Marshall who gave up her time on a Thursday afternoon to come and help us. We hope the children keep them for years to come and remember this special time.

More Stone Age exploring has been going on in Forest school, the children thought about things they might eat if they were living in the Stone Age and created meal plans looking for inspiration around the woodland. They have also enjoyed bug hunting, learning about the flora and fauna, tree rubbings, digging, den building and some children have been really brave and taken a risk climbing some higher trees. 

"I climbed really high, I’m so proud of myself. I love forest school" – Bianca

"I need to think where I am going to put my foot – Jenny

"We found a centipede but I can see it doesn’t like being seen because it’s going to the bottom of the container" – Adam

"I’m going to collect ladybirds and make a house for them with lots of leaves" – Katrina

"I’ve found a worm. I found a bug that blends in" – Jack