Seaside fun!

On Friday 12^th May Balmoral, Chillingham, Corfe, Skipton and Conway classes all boarded the coach for an adventure to Mudeford beach. The weather forecast was looking a bit wet – but that didn’t put us off! We arrived with our buckets, spades and packed lunches ready for a fun day.
After arriving at Mudeford we all queued to board the ferry. This was a new experience for lots of children on the trip; they were all very brave and enjoyed the boat ride across to the beach.
Luckily just as we arrived on the beach the sun decided to come out! All of the children had a wonderful time paddling, playing in the sand and building sandcastles.
Balmoral and Skipton went on a special visit to the RNLI centre. We watched some videos of real lifeboat rescues and had a tour of the centre. Gerald taught us lots of things about the RNLI. All the people who go out on the boats are volunteers. They have special pagers to wear when they are at work. Everyone got very excited looking at the lifeboat. We were taken to the changing rooms and shown the kit that needs to be worn. Jo quickly volunteered to try it all on! We were amazed to learn that most of the volunteers can change into their full kit in less than one minute.
After a very busy day we all enjoyed an ice cream before heading back to the coach for the journey back to school.

The Kennet Games

The Castle School Post-16 team of Alisha, Amber, Esme, John, Tyrell, Chris and Justin all did really well on Saturday at the Kennet Games. Chris, Bradley and Tyrell were one of our Boccia teams and they were the overall winners!


All of the Post-16 team played in the Unihoc team where we came second and we won the zone basketball - with a little help from Matt! Chris won the shot with a ridiculously long throw. However, special mention should be made of Sophie Sandars who came away with a cup for the best standing athlete. Well done Sophie for your great sportsmanship. Chris also showed great sportsmanship when set against a younger pupil in the obstacle race. He wanted to give the pupil a chance so did not go all out to win.


Thanks to James  Whybra for coming to support. Thanks to Gill Foster and Sharon Giles who was with us all day. Thanks to Liz Magurn for sorting all the paperwork! A special thank you to Matt Greenwood for organising this event so well.


As always, all our students demonstrated excellent behaviour. 

Go Karts at Post-16

Students from Lancaster and Caernarfon classes embarked upon a project to make a Go-Kart with only a You-Tube video for help.....


We managed to get hold of two old bikes and our first task was to break them down for parts (see top picture).


Next we had to find out what parts and materials we needed and as part of this process we visited the Bike Workshop at the Furniture Project where we were able to get two small wheels and the all important bearings.



Some of the challenges that we faced included finding the right axles, and how to make the wheels spin freely.  We got Jon (head teacher) and the expertise of Paul at the Bike Workshop as well as some input and tools from James.



It was fun to work out and learn new skills with the tools. (see middle picture) and to do something really practical.   We haven't quite finished putting final touches to the kart or given it a real test run, but it works!  (see bottom picture).



Chris Q & Justin H

 

Agricultural Challenge Success

On the 27^th April 2017 Windsor and Richmond Classes worked together to take part in the Agriculture Challenge at Arlington Arts Centre at Mary Hare School.

We made a collage for a seaside scene which came first and also made a recycled bird feeder, homemade planters with herbs in them.

We also made a basket from weaving recycled items using willow, hose pipe and bottle tops.

Lastly, we made a chocolate cake which looked like an Easter egg.

We recorded our work by taking photographs and making booklets of what we had done to make the items.

Overall we all had a good time and enjoyed the food that was laid on for us.

We received certificates on the day and winning money which we will get in due course.

Windsor and Richmond Class

Last chance to send in Sainsbury's Active Kids vouchers

Dear wonderful parents - there are only around 6 days left to get Sainsbury's Active Kids Vouchers to school. The vouchers enable schools to buy extra sports and cooking equipment so are very helpful. If you are going to collect some vouchers please make sure you do this before 2nd May and then please send them in to school.

Many thanks - your help is very much appreciated.

Thanks to the Coop

A huge thank you to the staff and customers of the Coop in The Burwood Centre in Thatcham. They raised an impressive £369 for our school from a fundraising day where they sold cakes, had a raffle and also gave a generous 1% to the school on card purchases for that day. It is very much appreciated and we are very grateful.

Happy Easter

I would like to wish everyone a wonderful Easter. We all return to school on Monday 24th April 2017. I look forward to seeing all our students for the summer term.