STEM Week at Earls Barton Primary School sees opening of a new outdoor science classroom

The week started with great excitement as we cut the ribbon on our brand-new outdoor science classroom, funded by our incredible PTA.

Every class has had a chance to have a session in the outdoor classroom this week and have all thoroughly loved being able to learn outdoors! Our school science ambassadors went round to every class to lead a session on fingerprinting. Also in science, each class took part in a whole-school data gathering investigation with Key Stage 1 children trying to answer "Are the oldest children always the tallest?" and Key Stage 2 children investigating "Do taller people have bigger hand-spans?"

Children have shown off their technical prowess by completing an 'Hour of Code' activity, aimed at improving their knowledge of computer science. We also celebrated the nationwide 'Safer Internet Day' on Tuesday 7th February with school-wide assemblies and activities relating to online safety. In maths, children were tasked with completing a 'matchbox challenge' to try and fit either the most, the heaviest, or the longest object they possibly could within their matchbox. Our maths for the week has also revolved around the book 'How Many Jellybeans?' with children completing and creating their own jellybean maths problems and attempting to guess how many jelly beans are in a jar.

In engineering, children designed and created their own eco-related projects. Reception children had to create their very own bird's nest, while Year 1 and 2 were creating hedgehog houses. Further up the school, Year 3 and 4 made their own insect hotels and Year 5 and 6 made bird feeders. We have also had a variety of visitors coming in to talk to the children about their careers in STEM fields, including a linesman from the National Grid and an experience on board a police fire control vehicle!

Towards the end of the week, we invited parents in to come and celebrate the children's learning by putting on a showcase. Children set out all of their work they had completed over the course of the week and eagerly shared it with their parents when they came in.