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We have been on an amazing adventure to Australia and discovered all the strange and wonderful creatures that live there. We ‘dived’ into the Great Barrier Reef and found out about the beautiful coral and the colourful fish beneath the waves. We listened to the story of Captain’s Cooks expedition from England across the oceans and how he discovered the new land of Australia. We found about the hard life on board the Endeavour. How lucky were we to be able to visit a ‘real’ ancient ship just like the Endeavour and bring his epic adventure to life. It showed us first-hand how hard a life for a sailor was a long time ago.
We have loved getting into our new topic ‘The Rainforest’ we have been learning about all the animals who live in the rainforest, what they eat and where they sleep.
The Sloth is one of our favourites we have learned about.
We know rainforests can be divided into several sections.
At the top of the forest is a thick layer called the canopy, then is understory which contains small trees, shrubs, and plants. Then is forest floor, it is usually dark because the canopy blocks so much of the sunlight.
We have enjoyed roleplay and becoming explorers to see what wildlife we can spot with binoculars out in the school grounds, also vets to care for the animals of the rainforest who may have become poorly.
Keep an eye of for our next adventures.
We had a very busy but fun time at Easter HAF family camp.
The weather was typical British Spring, wet and cold but we did not let it spoil our fun.
We had an amazing day out to Adventure Valley, most of us met near school to get a coach to Durham, a few of our families drove themselves.
The weather was particularly wet that day so we had limited access to the outdoor equipment but we made the most of the mega softplay area, joined in an Easter egg hunt, fed the farm animals, watched bubble show and boggied in the disco so all was not lost.
Friday we had in the Rebound centre were we all bounced on the trampolines, done fabulous art activities with ‘Artventurers’, cooked healthy pizzas with ‘Healthworks’, enjoyed some chill time in the sensory zone.
We also visited The Centre for Life were we all had free time to explore the centre at our own pace, we then rejoined for lunch in a special suite together.
Our final party day had to be changed last minute due to a water leak at school, we were lucky to be able to hire Soccerworld near school at short notice.
The party was amazing, some cool dancing and lots of prizes won. We had access the football courts outside which everybody enjoyed using to run of a bit steam or just cool down.
Hi everyone – we thought we’d post an update on what we’ve been getting up to this half term. It’s been another fun and busy time as we have threaded our new topic ‘Africa’ throughout lessons and activities. This first half term we have put our focus into all things ‘Safari’.
First things first was to change our classroom environment for the children to play and explore. From a safari jeep to an animal watering station, animal light box, sensory trays and dressing up – the children have really enjoyed playing in these areas. We have also been using communication boards alongside their play, and we have seen the children really build upon their communication skills by pointing to symbols, joining some together and learning key vocabulary.
Our lessons have been fun and varied with Africa themed art work, songs, music and stories. The children have also especially enjoyed PE; moving and travelling like different animals they could see and hear on the big screen, as well as their Numeracy lessons; going on a Safari around school and in the wildlife garden; searching for hidden animals, ‘big’ and ‘small’ and ‘in’, ‘on’ and ‘under’ things. They really looked the part with their hats and binoculars!
Our day trip to Northumberland Zoo was a great success – a lovely place with lots to explore which we would highly recommend for a great family day out. The children had a great time as we visited all the different zones; seeing snow leopards, meerkats, birds of prey, wallabies and lemurs to name but a few!
Next half term we will be carrying on our topic, but now with a jungle themed twist, so alongside all the hard work there’ll be plenty of monkeying around!
What a wonderful few days we had at our winter HAF club. Our days were filled with so much fun and enjoyment.
We had so many activities each day such as a healthy eating programme with Healthworks where we made homemade soup and apple pies.
Art venturers joined us, we had a fantastic arts and craft session through out the whole day
We were also happy to host Joe Jangles and the Bare Toad circus skills team.
This winter HAF club we were lucky to experience trips to new places such as the Centre for Life to ice skate, after we had yummy hot chocolate and jacket potato’s.
We purchased tickets to a relaxed session of Peter Pan at the Tyne theatre.
We also enjoyed all of our rebound centre facilities we had a great time bouncing and lots of different sports activities on in the main sports hall.
We ended the holidays with a party, disco lights, party games, prizes, foam snow machine and great entertainment and magic show from the wonderful Party Gems. .
We are now planning our Easter holidays and look forward to seeing you all there.
I feel like we have blinked and the last 7 weeks have just disappeared in a flash.
After half term we got straight back into our topic of the dinosaurs.
We explored the features of a dinosaur, dinosaur skeletons and explored whether dinosaurs are still on Earth today?We carried out exploration of activities relating to our topic. The children engaged well in all activities.
This half term, we have been using the Rebound Centre to participate in sensory circuits. This support our sensory diets and really benefits all children to support their regulation.
I hope you all enjoyed our Christmas show. We had so much fun filming our version of Elf. 
We recently welcomed Lauren K to our class who has successfully completed her mainstream teaching placement in October. I know that she will be an amazing addition to the class and is very excited at teaching our little superstars.
Our new topic next term will be on the Farm. We are looking forward to getting immersed into this topic.
We would like to take this opportunity to Thank you all for your continued support. We wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year for 2024.
Love Fran, Lauren K, Lauren C & Michelle xxx
A big thankyou to all who donated gifts to our Christmas fayre, also the staff who worked really hard to make it magical.
It was a wonderful night, we all love to see our families and staff new and old relaxing and socialising together.
