Charles Dickens Primary School Blog

Ocean Literacy – Learning about our Commonwealth Oceans on RV Endeavour – free teaching resources available!

 

This week, pupils from year 6 have taught by the scientists and crew of RV Endeavor and they learnt an unbelievable amount about oceans and the life within them.

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As part of Commonwealth Week, we were invited on board RV Endeavor, the ocean-going fisheries research vessel which is operated by the Centre for Environment, Fisheries and Aquaculture Science (Cefas).

They learnt just that as human populations increase and the negative effects on the marine environment also increase, never has there been a more crucial time for society to understand the science of our oceans. This knowledge and understanding of our ocean can be termed ’ocean literacy’.

In just two days, they learnt how the ocean and life in the ocean shape the features of Earth and the weather experienced. Pupils also learnt about the diversity of life within the oceans including the Carribean Spiny Lobster ( our favourite).

Most importantly, we learnt that oceans and humans are inextricably linked and there is so much more we can do to protect these amazing and enormous parts of our world!

There are fantastic new teaching resources available for all schools on the TES here

Thank you to everyone at CEFAS for such a brilliant experience.

 

Charles Dickens Primary School Blog

Tuesday – baking, birding, nursing and herding

The sun has gone down on Tuesday and every day is different on the farm. Today we went birding – with big binoculars and high expectations. We observed from the hide, peering through cameras and saw lots of different birds – more exciting than some of the magpies and feral pigeons we get in central London. We felt inspired to try and encourage a wider range of birds into our school garden.

Later came a visit from the vet – that was interesting! The children’s questions were thoughtful and demonstrated strong levels of analysis and curiosity – some powerful lessons in managing the health and numbers in a herd!

We like to think we might be a bit more self sufficient than we when we left London last Friday. Behold our own pizzas, bread and crumble!

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Charles Dickens Primary School Blog

Meeting the Duke of Kent – School Food Matters!

This week we set up a stall in Southwark cathedral to introduce the Duke of Kent to the wonderful food growing that goes on in our school. He was very impressed to learn all the products we brought were grown in our school garden. He especially liked the pumpkin that had been planted from seed in Mr Paul’s class and then looked after by our gardeners in the year one raised bed. He also bought some eggs from Dickens’ chickens.

Although the children were noticeably nervous they all spoke wonderfully about our garden and the different fruits and vegetables that we have grown. After the excitement of meeting the Duke we were all treated to tea, cake and cucumber sandwiches of course.

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Charles Dickens Primary School Blog

Fareshare advent!

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On Wednesday we had a visit from Rachel from the charity Fareshare. She explained how Fareshare collect supermarket surplus and then distribute it to local charities to provide meals for vulnerable people. Some children from year six will be involved in making bread and soup to sell in Borough market using our garden produce. Money raised will be donated to Fareshare. Also, look out for our reverse advent calendar where children will be encouraged to bring in dry food in cans or packets to donate to Fareshare.
You can find out more about Fareshare here

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Charles Dickens Primary School Blog

Gardening Club – first session of the ‘growing’ season

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Gardening club had a really lovely first session after school this week.

After a tour of the garden we prepared our potatoes for planting. This is called chitting. Before going into the soil each seed potato needs to grow short, tough sprouts. In two weeks we will plant them into some soil.

Gardening club is led by Mrs Jamois.

Charles Dickens Primary School Blog

Eco Schools – Still flying the green flag!

A huge thank you to all the children involved in meeting our green flag assessor this morning.
She was very impressed by the eco-code song that was sung in assembly today and enjoyed touring the school to admire our: recycling efforts, musical instruments made from recycled materials and displays about keeping healthy. Isabella explained why we chose to get a worm bin, “so we can turn our compost into soil more quickly”. Jake and Sabrin spoke about ecological travel and how they have been encouraging people to walk to school. Tahir spoke about the planting he did in gardening club last year, while Elisha spoke about composting and the class rabbit. Joseph talked about our science walks. Elisha added that in her class children use scrap paper to make things with or draw on.

Thanks to everybody’s hard work in showing care and concern for the environment we have been awarded our green flag again!

A special well done to Mrs Jamois who leads our eco team, manages our garden including gardening club and also the junior travel ambassadors – her passion for the environment and living in harmony with nature is inspiring us all!

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Charles Dickens Primary School Blog

We love the Bees!

Well done to Barkis Class who performed a creative extravaganza in support of environmental conservation.

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The children wrote their own script, complete with puns and two great songs and brilliant musical accompaniment  . They managed to pack in all their learning from this term. We learnt the balanced arguments for and against development of a park, how to use an SLR camera to take great photographs, why bees are important and all through an adapted story of Anthony Browne’s ‘Voices in the Park’.

Thank you to Mr Oxenham for all his hard work on this assembly and for sharing his talents and passion for music with his class this year!

Charles Dickens Primary School Blog

Young Marketeers

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Today our young marketeers went on a trip to Borough Market where they had a tour of the market to observe and pick up ideas for creating their own stall in October. They made a mock stall with information, labels and bags for the Borough Market organisers to inspect. They were then shown where the waste from Borough is processed. It’s all recycled!
After lunch the children were shown how to sow seeds and tend to our young plants by expert gardener, Chris Collins. They planted pumpkins and beetroots to take back to school to add to our Eco Garden.

Mrs Jamois

Charles Dickens Primary School Blog

Big Schools’ Birdwatch!

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On Tuesday, Year Six were fortunate enough to be visited by Don Fuller, the South East Region officer from the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds. He helped us to take part in this years’ Big Schools’ Birdwatch, which helps the RSPB to track the number of different bird species found across Britain. Don introduced the Year Six children to some of the birds that they might be likely to see in the local area. He then took us on a walk through the eco-garden and to Mint Street. Although we didn’t spot an enormous amount of birds, we were able to record plenty of Feral and Wood pigeons; some long tailed tits; blackbirds; great tits; blue tits; magpies and a crow. The data will be inputted into the national survey log and we’re looking forward to seeing how our efforts compare with those of other birdwatchers across the country!