How Hill - Day 1

After a longer than expected coach journey, we finally arrived at How Hill at 11am. The 'Joy Rides' had done what they'd said on the packet, meaning that we were all in good spirits.

Having been allocated rooms and after various attempts at unpacking, lunch was taken.
The afternoon saw the children take part in two activities. First up was dyke dipping which resulted in muddy knees and trays full of all sorts of water life. Probably the most interesting were the caddis fly nymphs and a large leech.

Next up, we were split into two groups for a nature walk where we saw three very different habitats: Dry Woodland, Wet Woodland and Marshland. It was amazing to see the differences in such a short area. It was also rather incredible to see how deep the mud was in places.
A lovely evening meal has just been taken and the children are settling down to weaving, diary writing and 'chillin'.
I am indebted to Harry N and William H for this - we've had a technological nightmare!

Writer of the Week

Wall of Fame

Basketball Tournament

The two Earl Soham teams did themselves proud with a series of scintillating performances during this morning's basketball tournament.

After a rather slow start, the points total started to steadily increase every time they stepped onto the court. With sweat running down their brows and smiles beaming from cheek to cheek, Earl Soham became more and more competitive, fluent and effective.
Roared on by a large contingent of their parents, the children simply revelled in the environment which saw them at their best. By this I mean that they took a few early knocks in the opening games, but dusted themselves down, rolled their sleeves up, learnt from their experiences and flourished.
Our two teams did magnificently well to finish 3rd and 4th. To be honest, on the way back to school it felt like we'd won. I'm very proud of all 13 of you!

Gods' Argument: An animation

The following feature film was produced as part of a homework project during our topic on the Romans. I thought it was a fantastic piece of work and wanted to share it with everyone. Please leave a comment for the Year 5 boy who produced it. I'm sure he will be thrilled to hear what you have to say about his work.

African Drumming: The Performance

This morning we gave a performance of the African Drumming piece we have been learning. Unfortunately we cannot display the video online, but we are able to provide an audio track in case you were unable to be at the performance. If you would like to watch the video, please speak to Mr Mansell. 

Many thanks to Mrs Livermore for her excellent tuition over the last five weeks. We feel privileged to have taken part in this and hope to see her back again next year.

Romans and Greeks Day

On Thursday we celebrated the culmination of our half-term's work on Romans in Blue Class, and Greeks in Yellow Class, with an activity day, in which the children were invited to dress as an Ancient Roman or Greek.

In the morning in Blue Class, we prepared a range of Roman recipes which were taken from the E2BN Cookit! website's History Cookbook. We worked in groups to produce a range of foods (most of which seemed to contain honey) including Bean and Chickpea Salad, Dates Alexandrine, Cucumeres, Tiger Nut Sweets and Honey Cake.

In the afternoon, we dressed up and took in in turns to be slaves, handing around the food to our wealthy masters and mistresses, who were lounging on the floor in true Roman style.

The banquet was followed by some Gladiatorial bouts using the shields, swords and armour that many of us had made for homework (with strict instructions not to actually cause each other any bodily injuries!)

With adrenaline pumping we then set off to the hall where it was finally time to test the trebuchets we had been building in groups. Our target was the fort we produced last week, the ultimate test against marauding hordes!

We were then treated to some Greek Tragedies: a collection of short plays based on Greek myths, performed by Yellow Class. 

Thank you to all the parents who produced the lovely costumes to make this such a special day. We had a fantastic time!