Our topics in Russell Robins this week were Diwali, Fireworks, Remembrance and World Science Day. The children have certainly had a super busy week and although the weather has been quite wet, we have still enjoyed the great outdoors. One of our favourite activities is walking through the woods on our way to the Outdoor Classroom. We packed the class bag and set off, exploring and listening to autumnal sounds on our way. There was lots of excitement when I mentioned the words hot chocolate treat. The children sat beautifully and waited patiently for their warming drinks, just what was needed on a chilly, wet day. As the leaves are falling, it is now much easier to spot the trains going past, especially as we have some keen trainspotters!

The children have been super creative, adding lots of colour to their Rangoli patterns. They used cotton buds to add paint and they used their funky fingers to peel back sparkly stickers. Afterwards we watched a video on the CTOUCH called Rama and Sita. We spoke about the Festival of Light and Diva lamps and how they link to the story by lighting the way back home for Rama and Sita. I thought it would be nice to combine the Festival of Light with the Skittle Experiment as the colours resembled fireworks. Lots of fun was had watching the colours separate from the Skittles as they moved closer to the middle of the plate.   

There was also lots of exciting news from home and it was lovely to share the Home/ School Journals together during snack time. There have been some fabulous holidays and visits to the cinema to see the new Paw Patrol film. It was nice to read some news that one of our Robins visited his grandparents (Famor) to check on his seeds which he took home from class. This was wonderful to read as it shows that our activities are also continued at home with the children’s families.

Can you remember our pretty Halloween pumpkin which we decorated before half term? Well, we decided to use it for one of our cooking activities this week. The Robins enjoyed adding chunks of pumpkin to our soup maker, along with water and vegetable stock… delicious. We all enjoyed this as part of our morning snack. Snack times in Robins are special as this is when we come together to share delicious fruit, vegetables, crumpets and toast. Before eating, we discuss the variety of foods on the tray and the colours. Even the Form 6 children like joining in with us and they always model such fantastic manners.  

Remembrance Day played an important part of our week as the children enjoyed making a variety of things to show in our Pre-Prep assembly as it was our turn to host. The Robins did a fantastic job and they all stood at the front, displaying such great confidence in front of their friends and teachers. Pre-Prep took part in a quiz and they also learnt some interesting facts. We finished the assembly with the CBeebies Remembrance video, titled Poppies which is a gentle way to introduce children to Remembrance Day.

As part of our cooking activities, we made Poppy bread rolls, banana bread (as we needed to use the bananas rather than wasting them) and pumpkin soup.

The Robins were super thrilled when they discovered a new workbench in class and it has certainly been very well used. It was great to see the children sharing the resources and working together to build.

It may still be November but our Christmas celebrations have already started to practise the songs for our Christmas Concert. I am sure you will hear your children singing along at home!

Mr McCarthy visited us on Thursday morning to read some of our favourite stories. He was very impressed with how nicely the children sat and listened to the stories.

We finished the week with a two-minute silence on the front court remembering all the soldiers and armed forces that have lost their lives fighting for our freedom. The Robins proudly displayed their poppies as they stood quietly. Well done, Robins!