How is electricity made?

The children have learnt all about how we make electricity by investigating the components needed to make a circuit. They had a go at using a buzzer and making Morse code machines to send each other secret messages. They also designed their own switches so we could save energy by turning the electricity off!

The boy who harnessed the wind 

In Literacy the children have been reading the book 'The boy who harnnessed the wind' by William Kamkwamba. His story about how he made a windmill for his village in Malawi at only 12 years old has really inspired the children and shown them what you can do with a bit of determination and resilience! In our writing, we wrote a diary from William's viewpoint about the famine he experienced and then we went on to write instructions for our very own wind turbine. Unfortunately our motors wern't powerful enough to light our bulbs but with a bit of creative thinkng we turned them into battery powered fans instead! 

Engineer day!

The children dressed up as engineeers for the day and found out all about what a design engineer does and how products are made.  They recieved a box from Dyson and in it was the Dyson bladeless fan. They learnt about how this was invented to combat the problems of a fan with blades. They watched James Dyson talk about what qualities a person needs to be an engineer and then the children used all their knowledge to invent and make their own prototypes to solve problems with other items. We had a backpack with arms, a cup holder, a new fidget toy, a gluestick with an attached lid and a hair cut machine!