Diary Entry - February

A fantastic opportunity presented itself at the end of last month when all the Exmouth primary schools got together at Sandy Park (also home to the Exeter Chiefs Rugby Club!) for a conference called Making Learning Irresistible.  Part of the day provided a chance to showcase to teachers from other schools something at our own school that makes learning irresistible to children – and we chose our Rolls-Royce Science Prize greenhouse project.  The follow-up to the conference will include an opportunity for teachers to visit our school to see the project in action.  We’re excited about this and, at the same time, keen to learn from the experience of other schools – especially those with established areas of green space.  With this in mind, our Green Team made two trips to nearby schools (Brixington and Alphington) to find out how each manages its garden, and how a greenhouse helps them to grow better vegetables.  Also, two of our teachers attended a course on organic gardening techniques. 
 
Our vegetable garden began to take shape this month.  Over three Saturdays in February, Wayne Rowsell – a parent and husband of one of our TAs –began to cut through the playground tarmac with a diamond disc blade.  It turned out to be, as these things usually do, a mammoth job.  Three skips were filled by hand thanks in large part to a number of volunteers from the Exmouth Raleigh Rotary Club, and, in the end, the aid of a digger as well!  - operated by Wayne’s brother Mark.  We filled three large skips with rubble while managing to create a massive empty hole – then the 16 tons of topsoil arrived!  With the help of our caretaker Brian Kocziban, the soil was shovelled into the hole and – by the end of February – our vegetable garden was almost ‘good to grow’! 

All of this activity has, of course, been watched with great interest by the children, especially the younger ones whose playground has been temporarily ‘invaded’.  But the children have been busy too!  Year Six, for example, used the construction of a greenhouse as the subject for writing instructions, while Year One tried out a variety of growing conditions for cress.  Frances Pearce, one of our longest-standing volunteers and a very knowledgeable gardener, explored the school site with the help of a group of children.  They will decide which plants to spend a large chunk of our Rolls-Royce Award on, enlivening tired borders and neglected pots.  STEM Ambassador Rodney Battey has also been a regular at the school, running workshops each week with children from different classes.   

Adjustments have been made by children to their greenhouse prototypes, and some have gone on display in the Rolls-Royce Project Area.  TA Jean Betts has set up a ‘horseshoe’ of tables there to exhibit these models and other examples of work from the different age groups.  This includes ideas about different ways to transform a single throwaway plastic container, photographs of children at work and detailed information about the Rolls-Royce Science Prize. 

Finally, as the soil settles in our new vegetable garden, children are beginning to sow seeds in their classrooms and design tests for their greenhouses.  With frost still in the air, the mini-greenhouses will need to work like cloches or cold frames for tender plants.  The problem of how to anchor these lightweight greenhouses to the soil will also need to be solved, as will the issue of irrigation.  Plenty of challenges lie ahead for the children to solve in partnership with the rest of the school community.  In summary, this month has been about several things: training, sharing ideas, hard physical work and planning for the future.  Robin James  

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