New Academic Year

Get your votes in!!!

We had a very busy lunchtime today in Penygawsi....we held a whole school ballot to name the 'old' woodland area (formerly known by the unsavoury title 'The Bog') and the newly planted woodland area on the hill.

In previous weeks each class were asked to suggest and vote for names for the two areas and put these forward. Today's vote was about choosing a name for each area from the list suggested by all the classes. The Forest Rangers manned the Polling Station and encouraged all the children and school staff to vote. They also had the difficult task of counting all the votes up too! The results will be formerly announced in tomorrows assembly and from then on the areas will be renamed.

190 people voted (nursery and Reception held a class vote)
10 voting papers were spoiled.

The results are:
The Old Woodland area will be renamed: The Enchanted Wood (36 votes)
The New Woodland area will be renamed: Tree Tops (42 votes)

Thank you to everyone who joined in. Enjoy the photographs :0)
The Forest Rangers.

Well done to the 2010-2011 Penygawsi Forest Rangers who have worked so hard in organising FS events and keeping all the children informed of the Forest Schools developments in school. You really have set a very high standard for all the other Rangers who will follow in your footsteps. We are very proud of you.
In September you will receive a certificate for the work you have done with the Forest School Committee to put in your Proud to Present File and hopefully a little trip to say thank you.
Mrs James, Mrs Terrans, Miss Day and Mrs Bull.

Surplus Plants!

Topsoil!!

We owe another BIG thank you to Mr Ambler who arranged for us to have topsoil free of charge and he collected it and delivered it to us. The children have been busy filling our raised bed this week ready for planting. I know that Tim is also very keen to get the last 3 raised beds made before we break up. Hopefully next week we can start filling them with plants :0)

Mrs James

A GREAT BIG THANK YOU

Thank you to all the people that helped put up our school garden fence today. Everyone worked  really hard despite the rain. As you can see from the photographs it looks brilliant!
We have top soil arriving on Monday morning for the children's raised beds, we can then start planting.
The children still have to make 3 more taller beds for root vegetables.

Next week we are voting for names for the old woodland area and our newly planted area, as a whole school ballot. This week each class has voted and put forward suggestions for each area. Keep an eye on the blog to see the results.
Thank  you
Mrs James

Below are a list of the businesses that helped us out for free, They have also offered to donate their skills and time again in the near future when we continue with our allotment plans- Cheers

Tim has helped us to plan and organise our project, he has also taught and supervised the children in making the raised beds.
Thanks for all your hard work- we appreciate it. 

The work begins.

The fence is going to be erected today for our school garden thanks to a few Volunteers. We really appreciate your help. Here's a HUGE Thank you :0)
The Forest Rangers.
Keep one eye on our blog page for photographs!!!

The Plans....

Click on the image to get a better view.

Just in case some of you haven't seen the plans for the allotment in the windows of the school here they are! The allotment will be situated behind the lock ups and to the left of the port cabins. The plans are an amalgamation of the two winning entries in the design an allotment competition which we held earlier in the year.
The circular structure in the middle is a canopy/sheltered outdoor classroom area.
The rectangular segments around it are the raised beds, that the children are in the process of making. The theory behind the design is that it represents time -12 months of the year! The missing bed at the top will be a walkway into the allotment and this will be made into a virtual bed/frieze tiled floor with the children's artwork.
There will be a very shallow pond area - bottom left (hopefully) and a fruit tree area - bottom right. A sculpture made by the children will feature- bottom centre.
A tastefully decorated potting shed, with a sedum roof and patio, compost bins and water butts -top left. At the top right hand side we are hoping in time to build a green house from recycled plastic bottles or even better still have a geodome!

Thank you for supporting us by helping to raise all that money in the Welly Walk. Hopefully we can really get a head start with completing this project and more importantly use this fantastic resource as part of the childrens education.





Idea for a covered learning classroom in the centre of the school garden

A Geodome



A sedum roof on a shed

Day Two of making the raised beds!

The children are very proud of the work they did and can't believe that they had the opportunity to make the raised beds for the allotments. I think you will agree that they have done a fab job! Well done everyone. Scroll down to see the photographs of day 1.

Why not leave a positive comment about their achievements. I am sure they would love the feedback!

GRAND DESIGNS!

Wow! what a FANTASTIC start to our allotment. A HUGE thank you to Tim (Mr Orrell) who has supervised and coordinated the raised bed activities, we have made great progress with eight beds completed and a few more on their way.

The most important thing is that the children have made them themselves and have thoroughly enjoyed it!
The next jobs on the list are...

• finish the beds and make deeper ones for potatoes and carrots etc to be grown in
• line them with plastic
• order some compost
• put them in place and fill them
• put up the allotment fence and gate

Enjoy the slide show :0)
Mrs James

Fingers Crossed!

On behalf of the Forest Schools Committee Mrs Terrans (who kindly volunteered)  is entering us into The Royal Welsh Show School Gardens Competition. We have to provide an A3 montage of all our plans for our allotment and fundraising activities. Some of the competition prizes are:

• Complimentary entry for the children at the show.
• Packets of Sutton seeds to help start your project.

Fingers and toes crossed that they like our ideas and plans! Look out for the competition entry on Penygawsi Forest Schools display.

We have made a start!!!

Last Thursday Eryri and Tryfan began to make the raised beds ready for the allotment area. They were really hands on with the measuring and sawing of the wood. On Tuesday they plan to continue working on fixing the wood together and finishing the raised beds. Thank you to Mr Orrell who has organised the activities and is advising us on how to develop the allotment site. Watch out for pics soon!
Forest School Rangers

FOREST SCHOOL RANGER MEETING AT 11.45am on MONDAY 13th of JUNE. PEN Y FAN CLASS.
AGENDA
FOREST SCHOOL BOXES
UPDATE ON ALLOTMENT AREA
NEW WOODLAND SURVEY
NAMING THE OLD AND NEW WOODLAND AREA
FOREST RANGERS END OF TERM TRIP :0)

More Trees!

I have just order another free Hedge and Copse Pack from the woodland trust through their Green Tree Schools award. This has given us another 2 points in the scheme and now we are only 3 points from a GOLD award. Only 400 schools in the UK have this award.
We successfully planted 30 Birch, Cherry and Rowan trees as part of our give it some welly day and they are growing really well. The new tree pack that will arrive in November and will allow us to plant more in another area of the school and also replenish any trees that have not survived in the new wild woodland area. If you look to the left as you are walking up the drive, on the hill,you will see a patch of longer grass. This is where the trees are planted and the grass has been left to grow to encourage all sorts of plants and mini beasts. We plan to do a survey of the area and we have been told by Mr Orrell that we have a wide variety of plants and insects already at the site. We will publish our findings when they are ready.

Our next plans for the Green Tree awards are:
- To recycle Christmas cards, mobile phones and ink cartridges.
- To visit a woodland.
- To carry out the woodland and words project.
This will make us a GOLD School, so please support us if you can.
The Forest Rangers have to produce a whole lot of evidence to show that we have been working hard on the scheme too!!!!
BUSY BUSY BUSY.....
Thanks Mrs James
-

We have scanned the ground and are ready to go...

Hopefully with fingers and toes crossed we can start next week.

Check out the windows in school that have our plans on...we are very excited!

Mrs James

GIVE IT SOME WELLY! What a wonderful day.

We all had a fantastic day when we participated in 'Give it some welly.' I hope your children went home with an overdose of fresh air and outdoor fun! It was lovely to see every child in the school joining in, working together in mixed age groups and helping each other. Everyone was on task and the school grounds were remarkably quiet with everyone concentrating on what they were doing. Thank you to the parents who joined us at the end of the school day and participated in some of the activities.
The activities in the photographs are:

• Tree planting- we planted around 30 new trees and created a new woodland area on the hill consisting of silver birch, cherry and oak. Lets hope they all grow!
• Make a shelter.
• Make a skeleton from found twigs.
• Build an elf house.
• Make a mud tree face.
• Make a nature crown.
• Twig towers.
• Welly wanging.
• Hug a tree.
• We had a welly treasure hunt after school.
• Welly line dancing.
• Welly cake auction.

Enjoy the photographs.
Thank you to all Penygawsi staff who joined in and worked hard in making this a really successful event :0)
Mrs James

Allotment update!!!

JUST TO KEEP YOU IN THE PICTURE!

We are having a site survey carried out on Thursday am to see if there are any services or utilities in the ground where we plan to put the allotment and pond area. If all goes to plan then we will hopefully be able to start after the Easter holidays.
The final count with fundraising from the Welly Walk is ....

£2,396.26

Thank you.

We can't wait to spend all of it on this wonderful outdoor learning area. Watch this space.

The Forest Rangers :o)



Sponsor Winners

Well done to SAM BURGE and LEWIS REES for collecting over £115.00 each in the sponsored welly walk. They both collected certificates in our special 'give it some welly' assembly and will both receive a yearly subscription to the Woodland Trust Nature Detective magazine and membership. Watch out for the post boys it will be coming soon!

Thank you for your huge effort in raising so much money!!

Apologise for no recent postings....my computer has beeen unwell and caught a bug!
Mrs James.

The winners....

The winners, who collected the most sponsor money, will be announced in our special assembly on our 'Give it some welly' afternoon. I can't believe that sponsor money is still coming in. You are all very generous.

We have also been lucky enough to have 30 saplings delivered to the school free from the Woodland Trust. Along with a tree seed planting kit. Here comes our new woodland area!
Thank you
The Forest Rangers :0)

Lovely outdoor activities for you to do with your family!

http://www.naturedetectives.org.uk/download/extra_hour.htm

Click on the link above to visit the nature detectives.

GIVE IT SOME WELLY...A DATE FOR YOUR DIARY!

LOOK OUT ON MARCH 22ND.........
We are going to be 'Giving it some WELLY' in support of The Woodland Trust. We will have a fun filled (educational) afternoon and after school activities for you and your family, to join in when you collect your child from school!
Just to get you excited...some of the things that are planned...

• Welly Wanging
• Giant Welly Art Attack
• A range of Forest Schools Activities
• Welly Treasure Hunt

It's going to be outdoors, fun and not one to forget!

This is not a fundraising event, you can donate to the Woodland Trust if you wish. Information will be available on the day how to do this, if you wish to do so. You have already supported us greatly in the Welly Walk in raising funds for our project, which is enormously appreciated.

Come along and join us in some outdoor educational fun so you can gain a greater understanding in the Woodland Trust's work, Forest Schools learning and the best bit...experience it for yourselves.

Family members...make sure you practise your over arm throwing for the welly wanging! Are you going to be the Penygawsi Welly Wanger of 2011?

P.S. Dust off those Wellies!!!

GET READY FOR WICKED WOODLAND ACTIVITIES!

The Forest Rangers

New total so far....

We are over £2,000!

Diolch yn fawr

The plaque is finished.



As promised to the competition winners. One completed plaque!



We are already thinking ahead...just to get you excited!

We are thinking big and making plans, we will be following our competition winners designs of course.

This is hopefully some of the things that we will be able to enjoy soon.

It is still growing!!

Our total so far is a staggering £1,750 and still children are telling us that they have sponsor money to be brought in!

Please can all sponsor money be brought in by next Friday.
Once again, Diolch yn fawr :)

The Forest Rangers

As promised the 'Welly Walk' photographs.

WOW!

Well I can't quite believe it and we still haven't received all the sponsor money yet...

SO FAR YOU HAVE HELPED TO RAISE...

It was an absolute pleasure to see all the children enjoying the Welly Walk experience. The school grounds were full of the joys of squelching and laughter. I have taken some great photographs and will post them soon. Thank you to the Forest Rangers who arranged and marshalled the course. They were out organising all afternoon and did a superb job. I have to say a great big thanks to the staff who were full of enthusiasm -making sure that everyone was having fun and ensuring the school was kept mud free. It is not easy when you have 30 children who have muddy wellies and trousers! The event would not have been a huge success without the grown up Forest Rangers who have been laminating, photocopying, cutting out and organising too-Thank you for your help :)

Mrs James

(who is still cleaning her wellies and trousers and all the muddy equipment...but I don't mind because it was FUN!)

Keep visiting for an up to date total. When all the money has been received we will post the name of the child who collected the most and let you know what they have won.
ALLOTMENT AND POND HERE WE COME... HOORAY!

Rangers Next Meeting...

Forest Rangers we are meeting next Monday at 11.45 am PROMPT in Pen y Fan. Please make sure you bring along your wellies and coats. We are mapping out the course for the welly walk on Wednesday :)

WELLY WALK IMPORTANT INFO...

Don't forget to collect lots of sponsors for the 'Welly Walk' next Wednesday.

Remember that there is a certificate and prize for the most sponsor money collected.

Everyone needs to bring in wellington boots to wear and waterproof trousers on the day.

If you don't have waterproof trousers then an old pair of joggers that are allowed to get very dirty will be ok.

The event will take place even if it is wet, so please make sure you have a suitable wet weather coat with you. We might get wet and muddy...it is all part of the experience :)

Rangers Next Meeting...

Wednesday 2nd of February @ 11.45 am in Pen y Fan class.

Agenda:
Organisation of the welly walk...marking out a route.
Up date on FS activities/events.

Thanks
FS Staff

Competition Winners.

Mr Gilbert, winners and the Forest School Rangers, standing at the site where the allotment and pond area will be built.

Mr Gilbert from Tidy Towns came to school today to award our winners with their prizes and to collect the winning designs for our allotment and pond area.

Ben and Charlie both received certificates, vouchers and a plaque which will be displayed in the new outdoor area when we build it. Well done boys and thank you Mr Gilbert.

Fingers crossed that we can get things moving soon!

Mrs James.

Sponsored Welly Walk 9th of February 2011. Dig out those wellies...we are all going walking :)

If your form is bursting with sponsors already (and you have used the front and back of the form) then download another one here. Click on the form and right click to select print. Remember there is a prize for the person who collects the most sponsor money.

Forest Rangers are collecting ideas.

Keep an eye out for our Forest School Rangers during playtimes and lunch times they are coming around with their clip boards to ask you what you want to do outside. How can you help us to improve our outside environment? Please find them if you have any ideas and you can't wait to let us know or post a comment below.

Don't forget to be out and about Forest Rangers. The children of Penygawsi are counting on you to let Mrs Harries know what you need and how we can improve the environment :)

Silver Award from the Woodland Trust.

Here is just some of the things we have done as a school to achieve this award.
Registered with the Ancient Tree Hunt.
Registered with Nature Detectives.
Reduced CO2 emissions- by installing solar panels.
Took Part in a Yell challenge.
Attended a Woodland Trust planting event.
Ordered Hedge & Copse planting pack.
We need to collect 5 more mature oak points to receive the gold award which is a wooden plaque. I will post more details of how we can achieve this at a later date. Look out for our certificates on our Forest Schools display which will be up shortly.

A special assembly...

FOREST RANGERS

Don't forget to look smart on Monday for our special assembly with Mr Gilbert from Tidy Towns- you will all be expected to stand out the front! Wear your Forest School badges please.

Mr Gilbert will be our guest of honor and award the winners of our 'Design an allotment competition' their prizes and certificates.

That's you...Ben Crook and Charlie Coles, well done.

I am very excited! All that's left to do is raise LOTS of CASH!!!!!!!

That's where I hope we all will dig deep!

Mrs James ;)

Forest School Rangers!!

For all our forest school rangers who may need some information for the "Give it some welly!" posters.

1. 22nd March 2011 - this is the important date for " give it some welly! " (Don't forget to write it in your diary's!!!)
2. Don't forget to mention some of the activity's being held! How many wellies can you fit in a car?, welly art attack, welly cake stalls, welly disco, design a welly competition and many more!
3. Don't forget to mention what " Give it some welly" is all about, raising money for the Woodland Trust and Penygawsi Primary Schools very own allotment and pond area!

If any more information is needed then don't hesitate to ask Mrs James, Mrs Bull, Mrs Terrance, Mrs Vowles and myself as we are always willing to help! We are all looking forward to seeing the posters ALL around the school!

Good luck all of you!

Miss Day :)

OLD WELLIES WANTED!!

We want all your old 'Wellington boots' please. Any size, colour, left foot or right! We are collecting them for some fun in the future. Please can you send them into school in a carrier bag marked with Mrs Terrans/Mrs Bull/Miss Day's name on them. They will be responsible for 'Welly storage' until we need them.
Thank you for your help.
Mrs James.

Just a reminder...Forest Rangers you have a meeting on Monday @ 11.45 am in Pen y Fan. Please let all the Rangers know :)

Competition!

We had a look at all the designs for our allotment and pond area, and can proudly announce the winners are Charlie Coles and Benjamin Crook! Both winners will receive a voucher to spend in Argos. Well done boys!

Thank you to all the children who entered the competition for all your hard work and effort!

Miss Day :)

Our Bronze Award.....

We have earned our Bronze award from the Woodland Trust and are well on our way to gaining our Silver award also. Look out for it on the Forest Schools display that will be up shortly!

Click on the images to get a larger look and visit the website to find out how we are earning points towards the scheme :)

www.naturedetectives.org.uk/schools/award.html

Forest Rangers Next Meeting

The next Forest Rangers meeting is on Monday 24th of January ay 11.45am in Pen y Fan.
Agenda:
Posters for around the school (don't forget to bring them!!!)
Competition winners for design an allotment.
'Give it some welly' fundraising day and activities.

Recycling mobile phones/christmas cards/ink cardtridges

Thanks Mrs James

Staff forest school meeting...

STAFF Forest School meeting on Monday 17th of January 2011 @ 3.30pm in Pen y Fan:
Agenda:
Give it some welly fundraising ideas/activites/date of event.
Costings for FS & KS2 Resources.
Agenda for FS Rangers Meeting.
PB time allocation to make resources.
Forest School Display
Cheers JJ

Staff Forest schools meeting Tuesday 11th of Jan in Pen y Fan @ 3.30pm
Thanks JJ