cameras

Today the y3's rounded off their artistic endeavours based on the theme of light by making small pinhole cameras.

From a 2d net they constructed working models that captured, on a small tracing paper screen (about 5cm sq.), recognisable images. This photo (showing an image of the art room windows - upside down of course) looks remarkably like the first picture taken by Fox-Talbot!

back at school - yay!

Managed to put our 'Tudor' houses on display - they were only completed on the final day of last term! Partnered them up with our model of the Globe to portray a small section of Shakespeare's London! It looks quite impressive in the flesh - each house stands around 25cm tall. 
(And I seem to be able to email myself pics again!)

The children made peg doll characters to populate the streets.

Warhol & Tudors

Y6 have finished their self-portraits in the style of Andy Warhol.

And our Tudor real estate is nearing completion. Today we fixed the upper and lower storeys together and added the internal roof structures. Just the thatching to do. Hope it doesn't rain before next week!

sgraffito & Tudor housing

Today y3's decorated their fired terracotta coil pots from last week. They used a sgraffito technique to scratch through a layer of black paint back to the clay.

Meanwhile the y4's have embarked on an ambitious Tudor housing project. They are aiming to construct 20+ two-storey dwellings complete with thatched roofs! First part today was to cut the timber to construct the panels that will make up the lower storey.

dinosaurs finished

Some of the y2's completed their dinosaurs today. They installed the pneumatic systems that work the mouths and added other embellishments - eyes, teeth (making sure they were herbivore teeth!), tongues, claws etc.

 

 

Below is a very short video;

 

 

And now I've figured out how to upload videos, here's the one of my train automaton from a few posts back;

 

Apologies for the wobble at the end - the camera was stuck to a jar lid with blu tack. Must invest in one of those small, table-top tripods!

food tech

Y5 made sugar mice today - they've been looking at 'Charlie and the Chocolate Factory' by Roald Dahl and have embarked on a short quest to produce their own sweets, which they hope, at a future date, to recreate and sell to their schoolmates. Mixing the icing sugar into a paste was tricky, the plastic spoons we used weren't really up to the task. Must put metal spoons at the top of my next shopping list - all the school ones seem to have disappeared.

 

 

Shaping wasn't too bad,

even though the end result looked a bit flat!

We used chocolate sticks for the tails (we couldn't find any liquorice laces in the local shop), white chocolate buttons for ears and raisins for eyes. Mmmmmm, tasty!

globe shaping up

Week 3 of our 'Globe' model. We've got as far as assembling the seating 'units'. Here they are glued and held together with bulldog clips. Each stack of 3 is about 30cm high. Stacked like this, even at this early stage, there's a semblance of similarity.

 

 

Once dry, the brown paper will be torn off and the boxes opened up. Next week we plan to floorboard and attach the front railings. Keep watching this space.

the globe theatre - foundations

Today in y4 we embarked upon an ambitious technology project. We are aiming to build a representation of the Globe theatre, using (real!) wood for the main structure. We sawed and glued a lot of pieces that we then assembled into panels that will be clamped together to form the cylindrical shell. It won't be an accurate scale model but will hopefully bear more than a passing resemblance to Shakespeares old stomping ground. I'm envisaging it taking a good few weeks to complete as we only get an hour or so once a week in which to do it. I'll hopefully post pics as it takes shape - if I can remember to take them in the heat of construction.