Well, what a lovely first week back we have had – with the added bonus of two sunny days!

I’m afraid the chicks have been the focus of all our attention this week. For those of you who may not know, we had ten 19 day old eggs delivered to us on Monday..

It’s not expected that all of them make it to the hatching stage so we have done really well to end the week with six healthy, fluffy (and extremely cute!) chicks. We have two boys and four girls and the children have discovered that you can tell this by the colour of their feathers. It’s been amazing for the children (and the adults) to hear the chicks cheeping while still inside the shells, then see them start to rock..

..until eventually they stretch and use their beaks to start cracking the shell open..

The best part for me was watching the reactions of the children as they saw the chicks hatch – they couldn’t believe how skinny they all looked before their feathers dried out. They’ve learned about the role of the incubator and how this aims to replicate the job that the mother hen does in those final days. Children have been looking at the life cycle of the chicken, the differences between chickens that are farmed and those that roam freely and how this affects the number of eggs they lay. They’ve also researched what they need to stay fit and healthy, what they eat and what other care and attention they need. They have all impressed me with how quiet and responsible they have been around school because they understood that excessive noise could cause the eggs not to hatch..

On Monday, we finally get to have a cuddle! Here is a lovely video of the lovely week so far..

All of the Key Stage 2 classes have started their new topic this week also, which is Rainforests. They have some very exciting things coming up in the weeks ahead! Class 1 had the first trip out of the term on Friday…and what a gorgeous day they had for it! They visited Pennington Flash, a nature reserve near Leigh, to look at the bird hides and the different species of animals that live there. Mrs Elliot reports that they represented the school well as always and really enjoyed their day. They are going to use this experience to help design their own bird boxes which we hope to mount on some of the trees in the school grounds.

Class 1 were joined by Del the dog who lives with Mrs Elliott – he had a lovely day too!

Well, that’s all from me for now, I hope you’ve all enjoyed a relaxing weekend and look forward to seeing you soon.

Miss Thomason
Head of School

You can find our all blog entries here

Click here to read this week’s blog from Graham