Brailes CE Primary School: July News
The Summer term has seen our Early Years children in Squirrels class travelling around the Big Wide World! The children had a wealth of ideas of how to travel in style, from front-loaders and tractors, to helicopters and hot air balloons. They began by looking at our world on Google Earth and identifying the land and the oceans before travelling around the World on a magic carpet with “My Granny Went to Market” by Stella Blackstone, visiting lots of countries and looking at a suitcase of objects from all the places they stopped at.
Next, they talked about and explored our school village of Brailes and the surrounding countryside, and compared it to Mama Panya’s village in Africa. The children played with animals from the African continent, dressed in traditional clothes, played the drum and thumb piano and made beautiful Ndebele patterns with pastels. Continuing with the animal theme, “Under the Same Sky” by Britta Teekentrup introduced them to animals from different habitats. Identifying the wild animals found around Brailes, they also
discovered where lions and elephants live, and where you’d find a polar bear or a walrus. It’s been a magical learning adventure filled with curiosity and wonder.
Children from Years 3, 4 and 5 enjoyed a wonderful visit to Sculpture at Kingham Lodge. Beneath a blue sky and glorious sunshine, the children explored 5 acres of beautiful grounds – a magical home to hundreds of sculptures.
They were welcomed on arrival by Christopher, the owner of the garden, who challenged them to explore the grounds and find sculptures made of stone, metal, glass, wood and resin. He explained that the sculptures had been made by local, national and international artists as well as children from local primary schools. Some of the sculptures stood tall and proud whilst others were hidden away in the long grass, hedgerows and leafy branches. They also spent some time sketching their favourites which helped them to look even more closely and notice tiny details.
We are very grateful to the work of CATS: Cotswold Art Through Schools, a charity delivering art, drama, dance and music experiences to schools in the Cotswolds, who funded our visit to the garden. The children found it very inspirational and it was a wonderful opportunity to widen our horizons and aspire to greatness!
Throughout this term, we have continued to build valuable momentum and our commitment as a school and wider community to encourage and support a Smartphone Free Childhood for our children, living our core values of courage, compassion and curiosity, growing together and shining brightly!
