News list
Form 4 spent their French lessons during Book Week creating their own Monsieur Madame (Mr Men & Little Miss) books. The project enabled the children to explore lots of new language, to practise their artistic skills and to tap into their creativity as they chose where their character lived, what their hobbies were, what they ate and drank and what they were like.
Five authors and poets gave talks to inspire our children during this year's virtual Book Week, including Chris Bradford, Matt Dickinson, Onjali Q. Rauf, Joseph Coehlo and Gillian McClure. Senior House Librarian, Mrs Kelly Johnson, explained, "What an incredible and memorable Book Week this year! Despite the challenges of an online Book Week, the children and staff enjoyed it immensely. The visiting authors were entertaining and inspiring and managed to interact with the pupils in a way that made them feel they were actually with us in school." The children also loved, new to this year
Form 3 have continued their hearing and sound Science project during remote learning and have used objects from home to create a 2D or 3D anatomical model, painting or drawing of the ear. The children could decide whether this represented the whole ear or focused on a certain part, such as the eardrum or ossicles.
The annual RSPB's 'Big Garden Birdwatch' returned on 29 to 31 January 2021. Children across the school were encouraged to take part and they found out how to spot the best birds in their garden with a handy RSPB birdwatch guide and recording sheet. 2021 marks the 42nd RSPB 'Big Garden Birdwatch', which saw keen birdwatchers across the UK join the largest garden wildlife citizen science project by spending one hour tracking the birds they saw in their gardens. During that time, across the UK hundreds of thousands of people
Pupils across the school have been marking Children’s Mental Health Week with the theme ‘Express Yourself’. Children’s Mental Health Week was created to highlight how important children and young people’s mental health is. Throughout the week, teachers have discussed with the children healthy ways of expressing themselves and reinforcing how self-expression can help boost feelings of well-being. On 3 February the school ran a ‘Dress to Express Yourself' day where children could dress in a colourful way to express how they are feeling or wear their clothes inside out to show
Twenty four hundred years ago, Plato, one of history’s most famous thinkers, said life is like being chained up in a cave forced to watch shadows flitting across a stonewall. In Form 6’s Thursday Afternoon Philosophy sessions, they unscrambled the symbolism behind the philosopher’s words in his ‘Allegory of the Cave’, and created their own cave models.
Mindfulness continues to be used across the school as a way of slowing thinking down, bringing attention to the present moment and reducing stress. As part of the Mindfulness in Schools Project (MiSP), ‘.breathe’ sessions began for Form 4 at the start of the Michaelmas term. This is a continuation of the ‘Paws b’ programme which Form 2 participate in and pre-empts the ‘.b’ sessions in Form 6.’
Children at Byron House have learned about Swiss sculptor, Alberto Giacometti, in their remote learning Art lessons and have studied the artist's bronze figures. After sketching stick men, the children considered how we position our bodies for different movements and how body language can convey varying emotions. The children used kitchen foil to create elongated figure sculptures with the help of a pre-recorded introduction and explanation from their Art teacher.
Forms 3 and 4 have been studying the work of Cornish artist and fisherman, Alfred Wallis. Having watched a clip from local gallery, Kettle’s Yard's ‘Alfred Wallis Rediscovered’, the children were encouraged to paint using memories of their own seaside holidays and how they too could use recycled materials as Wallis had, such as leftover wood and paint from boat building.
As part of their online English sessions, Form 3 have been studying free verse poetry and have extended this to writing their own. Free verse is an open form of poetry than tends to follow the rhythm of natural speech. Free verse does not typically use consistent metre patterns, rhyme schemes, or any musical pattern and because it has no set meter, poems written in free verse can have lines of any length, from a single word to much longer. Form 3 looked at clips of the poets Joseph Coelho reading his poem, ‘Cards Dealt’ and Michael Rose reading