Hitcham's Head Chef - Week 2

This week it was the turn of the puddings! The children joined us with renewed enthusiasm and confidence, buoyed by their successes in the previous week, and were very keen to get started.
They worked carefully and methodically to create their delicious deserts.
We were treated to Raspberry cheesecake, Chocolate pear pudding, Chocolate melting pots, Doughnut french toast with raspberry coulis and home made icecream and Chocolate brownies. Each dish looked and tasted just wonderful and they were created completely independently. Ingredients were measured precisely, baking times checked and extended as required, equipment organised and used well, and decorations applied with precision. Well done everyone!
Huge thanks to Mrs Chapman and Mrs Aldred for their invaluable roles as guest judges this week. An unenviable task to choose between such talented young chefs.
Next week we welcome four new chefs to challenge for the title. We can't wait.

Science Club - Electrons

In Science club, Year 6 looked at the electronic configuration of various elements. We talked about how many electrons needed to be in each energy shell and represented titanium, oxygen, helium, hydrogen, etc using plasticine and wool. We also looked at the bonding in water and carbon dioxide and how the electrons needed to be distributed.

Milk Plastic - Science Investigation

On Tuesday afternoon, both year 5 classes got together to conduct an inter- house Science investigation. They made a substance called ‘casein’ which is created when the protein in the milk meets the acid (vinegar). The solid was moulded into various shapes which were left to dry.

Wow! - History detectives visit the local castle and church

Class LH, JC and AB used Framlingham Church and Castle for the 'wow' moment for their topic of "Towers, Tunnels and Turrets."  The year 1 and year 2 children have been learning about castles and their features, about mark making and graffiti and about historical artefacts relating to castles and churches.  

Mrs Colchester gave a short introduction in the church and the children then set off as history detectives to find examples of graffiti around the church.  

They found some on the pillars, the floors and even on the pews!  They used crayons to rub the imprint of the graffiti.

We also looked at shields in and around the church and found some with lions, crosses, and stars on.  We even spotted the school shield of Sir Robert Hitcham!

After that we went to the castle and had a treasure hunt to do to find arrow slits, towers, doors, windows and other key architectural parts of the castle.  This was great fun and many of us took a while to find the "flying door!"

Here we are identifying arrow slits, ramparts and the towers as key features of the castle.

We sketched examples of the key features which could be seen on the existing castle. 

We marched around the ramparts like soldiers and thought about what life was like as a soldier defending the castle and also how difficult it would be to attack the castle.  We pretended to shoot our bows and arrows through the arrow slits at the enemies attacking us. 

All the children had a very action packed and fulfilled morning at both the castle and the church. Thank you to the volunteers who without their help it would not be possible to enrich the children's learning.  It was a great morning, the children were a credit to the school and we all came back buzzing about the castle and the church. 

House Captains 2017-18

We managed to get a quick photo of the House Captains & Vice House Captains before they went off to their afternoon of PE Games....
to find out more about the Houses at school see the website. 

Eco Council 2017-18

Here is the new Eco Council for the next school year... to find out more about what the Eco Council do, take a look at the website.

A visit from the Sleeping Beauty Characters

On Thursday Class AB received news that some of the characters from Sleeping Beauty would be paying them a visit. AB got to work writing down questions to ask either Sleeping Beauty herself, The Wicked Fairy, One of the good Fairies or The Prince. We discuss what questions were and what kinds of things we wanted to find out before writing them down in our books. The characters arrived shortly after lunch and the class was able to read out some of their questions to each of them.

Here are some of our questions.

Wicked Fairy "How did you manage to find a spinning wheel?' - Reuben

Prince "Where did you get your cape from?" - Diego

Sleeping Beauty "How did you feel when you pricked your finger?" - Lily

Huge effort to tidy up the vegetable plots

Gardening Club had a very busy week tidying up the beds from the summer crops.  The sunflowers were all pulled up and the heads left on the fence to encourage the birds in to feed off them.

Pulling the sunflowers out after the heads had been taken off. 

The heads were then attached on to the fence for the birds to feed off. 

Great teamwork in picking some of the crops including spinach and beetroot.  Unfortunately, some of the radishes and runner beans were too old and woody although some of the children did take the runner bean seeds to dry out and plant later on next year. 

A hive of activity - busy picking crops, digging the beds, pulling up the weeds, removing the dead plants onto the compost bins and sorting out the canes. 

Bikeability Cycle Training underway

We are very lucky to have secured the support of the Suffolk RoadSafe team to help deliver cycle training for our Year 5 & 6 children.
Over the last 2 weeks 24 children have taken part in the 2 day course and a further 24 will get to complete the training in March 2018.

Hitcham's Head Chef - Week 1

We had a super start to our Hitcham's Head chef competition this year. Congratulations to all the children who took part cooking their savoury dishes this week. Once again we were wowed by their calm confidence, knowledge and skill. We were treated to Mexican Tacos, Salmon with dill and vegetables, Homemade Margherita Pizza, Chicken Fajitas with a trio of dips, and Paella. All the dishes were absolutely delicious and I did not envy the judging roles given Mr Hambling, who kindly joined us today as a guest judge, or the staff members who joined us for the tasting.
Next week we will be sampling the sweet dishes put forward by these talented young chefs. I can't wait!

Maths

This week, class VW have been learning about formal methods of addition and subtraction with decimals. 

To contextualise their learning, Miss. Whipps set the class a challenge:  to spend a fictitious budget of money in order to purchase items for the school. 

Children had to keep a running total of how much they had spent, taking care to set out their workings methodically. 

They could not purchase more than one of each item and had to purchase a minimum number of items. The children needed to spend as close to the budget as possible but not a penny over!

Parallel or series?

Today, Science Club children were challenged to construct series and parallel circuits. 

We discussed the difference between the two:  a parallel circuit is a closed circuit in where the current divides into different paths before coming together to complete the circuit. 

The children were challenged to make more complex circuits and to consider the current passing through the circuit at different stages. 

New Parent Welcome Tea

Some of our lovely Parent Council reps welcomed new parents to the school today with a cup of tea and a slice of cake (Baked by Mrs Aldred from the school kitchen).
It was opportunity to meet other new parents and to ask the Reps or Mrs Picton questions about school.  Mrs Picton encouraged the new parents to think about joining the Parent Council and Friends association to help play a bigger part in life at the school.