Water for everyone

Water for everyone

Upper Primary pupils are now working with a new IPC-topic called ‘Water for everyone’. It is a really interesting topic and pupils are eager to learn more about it.

During the Entry Point pupils filled a bucket with 10 kg of sand and then carried the bucket across the playground for a few minutes. They also tried to estimate how much water they drink in a day and how much water their families use in one day. To follow up on these activities, during our Knowledge Harvest pupils discussed what it felt like to carry the heavy bucket. They shared previous knowledge about water and also tried to imagine what it would be like to live in a community where the only water source is far away. Who would fetch water? What would the physical repercussions be when carrying so much water every day? Would the water be clean and safe to drink? How much time would they have for school, work and education if they had to fetch water for their family every day?

To understand where the water in our taps comes from, Primary pupils visited a water tower here in Ghent. Miss Iris from FARYS gave us a guided tour and told us many interesting things. The water tower is 46.6m tall. There were 203 steps up to the big conference room in the water tower and the reservoir tank in the tower contains 1 000 000 liters of water! It was difficult to grasp how so much water could be stored high up in a tower.

Pupils are now learning about the causes of water pollution. They are beginning to understand that we all have a role to play in helping others and safeguarding this precious resource for future generations - which is the Big Idea of our IPC unit! We are lucky to live in a city where the tap water is clean and of good quality. Pupils want to keep the water clean and they want everyone to have access to water.

In class, pupils also continue working with other topics as well. In numeracy we are learning more about the properties of shapes, about angles, measuring length, weight and capacity and doubling and halving etc. During our literacy lessons pupils continue to learn about grammar rules, read books, discuss and write texts, and we have also been reciting poems. Our new class book is ‘Alice in Wonderland’.

During Jump Jam, pupils have started practising a new exciting dance! We also had our first school assembly for 2016! Pupils have also continued to work with the Lego WeDo challenge! A lot has happened since we started school after the Christmas holiday!