Feed

We adventured into the sand dunes and had an amazing time. We also learned loads about keeping our sand dunes safe and healthy too including these: Sadly it only takes SIX tramples to kill the long and healthy grass at the sand dunes, the fences do an amazing job acting as a net that keeps us and our environment safe, the fences are put in place to stop sand falling and being level and stops the water flooding. We also got the chance to explore the sand dunes and all of its beautiful colours. There were some quite interesting ones like purple and some vibrant orange colours too. Soon after we gathered down on the beach to sit for 10 minutes and talk about how wonderful it is to have a beach so close to our school. As we looked around we found some fresh newly bloomed baby sand dunes! We also found some washed up drift wood we were told we could bring for the next session. We were all ecstatic, it was such a exciting and interesting experience, we can't wait for next time!

Primary 7 had a brilliant day today recapping our learning from nine months ago when our award began. We walked five miles exploring our local area and took part in a STEM group work activity at our local Loch. Pupils learned about the formation of the Loch here as well as displacement and why putting dense objects into water makes the water level rise. When we left the beach, pupils had great fun challenging themselves to jump as far as they could and exploring some unusual trees and animal tracks as well. By far the most popular activity though was rolling down the hill at break and playing with friends in the sun. Miss Falconer even learned a new animal beginning with 'i'! (An ibex). Everyone had a fantastic day.

Primary 7 has shared news of their John Muir Award efforts through our newspaper today with this fantastic photograph taken from the top of Dunan Hill. We are now focusing on completing our award and sharing this further with our families and the rest of our school. Now is time also to reflect and begin thinking about what what the award has meant, and what we have learned about ourselves and our beautiful outdoor spaces.

We did some tree and bird ID. From our photos we identified an oak tree (which wasn't out in leaf yet so we had to take photos of the buds) and Common Alder - which none of us knew before. Finn was adamant it wasn't a hazel and when we got home and compared the images we discovered that it wasn't - it was a Common Alder! Our sound recording weren't amazing because it was raining (the sound of rain itself and rain on an umbrella drowned out the sound of birds on a lot of our recordings) and we were standing close to a stream for a lot of the walk but we did manage to identified some of the birds we couldn't see but could hear as a blackbird a robin and lots of chiff chaff sounds!

5 miles (3.30 -7.00pm). Another nearby, fairly short walk as the weather was atrocious in the morning. It actually turned out to be gorgeous - not too cold, not too windy - which was important because we got high! We walked through Rowarth and up really high so we could see in all directions for miles. We then went over the top and steeply down in to another valley and through on to the Penine Bridleway on Matley Moor. We had beautiful views all the way! We saw loads of the same sort of things we did last time but also some new. Trees we saw: Ash, Hawthorn, Beech, Birch, Holly, Hazel, Common Alder, Oak (we needed to ID which type of oak when we got home) Willow (?) Elder, Sycamore, Rowan, Goat Willow. Birds we saw: Robin, Blackbird, Sparrow, Magpie, House Martin (we looked this up to make sure), Pheasant, Pidgeon, Sky Larks (by sound rather than sight), Canada Goose, Turn and Great Tit.

The Wey has been key to human industry along its route. Water provided power for centuries. Sadly, not much remains. I wonder if there were two water mills running here as there are two channels - what do you think?