Over the winter the Gardening Club have been busily preparing the raised beds for all the new crops that they will be growing. They have been planting seeds and germinating them ready to set out in the spring. Produce will be on sale to all when it's in season!
Through October and November parents and the wider community collected vouchers from Morrisons towards gardening equipment. Our wish list was 4,000 vouchers, but we actually collected 4,375! With these we were able to buy three greenhouses and more planting equipment, as well as lots of packets of seeds and compost.
A massive thank you to everybody who helped.
On Thursday 4th March, as part of World Book Day, all the children and staff dressed up their favourite book character. In the afternoon they had a sleeping-bag-athon where children got to lie down with their favourite books and read stories to each other.
In January, Ed and Class 3 went over the Friary Hills to investigate trees. The children were shown three different methods for measuring the height and age of various trees. Following this, Ed brought into school a barn owl and then children got to dissect owl pellets to find out what they owls had been feasting upon. One owl pellet contained four field-mouse skulls!
The information that was collected by the children will be used by the National Trust to keep a record of barn owl behaviour. Future work that the National Trust and Class 3 will be carrying out includes water quality testing and a possible visit to Sheringham Park to do a biodiversity study.
For the past six months Blakeney Primary School has joined up with The National Trust in order to take part in their Guardianship Scheme.
The aim of the collaboration is to enable children to access the local environment and see the different types of jobs that go on in the local area and how this affects the local economy.
So far the children have visited the Norfolk Wildlife Trust Centre at Cley, had a look around the hides and even helped the warden locate and cordon off Oyster Catcher nesting sites on Blakeney Point. They have also had a walk over the salt marsh and looked closely at the plants and animals that live there and how they are adapted to their harsh environment.
They have also taken part in a litter survey for The Marine Conservation Society, which will help them develop and enforce rules about waste that ends up on the beach.
They have also been on a Seal Trip courtesy of Temple's Boats. They disembarked at Blakeney Point and went to have a look at the old lifeboat station, where the wardens now reside. They looked at the role of the warden in protecting both the seal populations and the nesting bird colonies.
The children have also been to Stiffkey to see how the local fishermen grow, harvest, clean and then sell their mussels.
Tuesday 10th March 2009 saw Class 3 visit the reed-beds at Cley where they watched a demonstration of how the reeds are cut, gathered and bound by hand. The children were also given a talk about the many uses of the cut reeds. They were told of the importance of the habitat for wild birds and mammals.
Do you have any of the little white bags that hold washing powder tablets hanging around? If so, we would be very glad of them. Willie Weston, of Weston's in Blakeney and Morston Quay, has kindly agreed to pay 5p to the school for each bag they can find as he uses them as bait holders! We are still raising money for our plantation and playground.
The plantation is a wonderful natural resource for the children but it needs work. Teacher Helen Frier of Class 3 says, 'I have many ideas for the plantation such as planting native spring flowers, natural hedgerows, insect and hedgehog boxes, bat and bird boxes, raised beds to grow fruit and vegetables. I ultimately want to have an outdoor classroom, pavilion style, in the grassy area of the plantation, but this alone will cost about £8000. The money that is raised is also going on work that needs to be carried out on the playground. We need it re-surfacing and new lines being drawn. I want the children to work with a local artist to develop different areas of the playground'.
So please, search under your sink and in your cupboards - any washing-tablet bags would be greatly appreciated and you can drop them in at the school or pass them on to any of the parents.