Tasked with the mission of preventing a fragile egg from breaking, the children showcased incredible creativity, resilience and collaboration as they designed and built their own parachutes, model boats, and model cars. Year 1, 2 and 3 excitedly tested their creations, holding their breath as eggs soared through the air in parachutes and endured thrilling free falls. The Year 5 and 6 children eagerly watched as their model boats floated across the water and their cars rolled forward, nervously anticipating whether their designs would succeed. The test arenas buzzed with laughter, cheers, and gasps, as each attempt brought a mix of suspense and joy. The children had an amazing time designing, testing, learning, and celebrating their successes, making it a truly egg-cellent adventure! Thank you to the parents who were able to attend.

The children have been taking part in their chosen activities:

Mileage Running Club - A few incredible facts about Mileage Club: The children have run approximately 280km between them. The highest record was 28km. Half of the children got to 10km and half got to 15km!  Students not only covered a huge amount of ground, earning cool wristbands to mark their achievements, but they also reflected on healthy wellbeing practices.

Board Game Design - Plenty of thought, design and collaboration have gone into this activity. The students created their own board games and the outcome was brilliant. They enjoyed playing them as much as they did designing them. Game Makers and Game Changers!

Illustrators - Our student artists shared a creative space to come together to explore the art of illustration and develop their skills. Creativity and self-expression were encouraged, and the outcomes were exceptional - there were inspirational ink drawings, watercolour washes, paintings and wonderful drawings. 

Jigsaw Puzzling - While developing their spatial-reasoning skills, students have been solving and creating jigsaw puzzles with lots of collaboration, problem-solving and creativity.

Paper Craft - Pop-up cards, butterflies, and origami hearts were just a few of the amazing paper creations the children crafted during this activity. Through following step-by-step instructions, working together, and using their imaginations, they brought their awesome ideas to life in 3D. 

Lego - With open-ended building activities and Lego creator kits, lots of fun learning has taken place unleashing creativity and developing collaboration.

Den Building - Impressive towering structures are standing in the Learning Souk after 6 weeks of designing, reviewing & adapting -and incredible teamwork. The children designed houses to protect us in different environments!

Archery - Improving their hand-eye coordination, concentration & focus, students have gained self confidence and used their mathematical skills too and the term ended in a tight competition!

Marble Run - Using tubes and materials to design and make marble runs, as well as our National Geographic magnetic STEM marble run creator kits, which has made for some challenging problem-solving activities.

After a hugely successful first term, we look forward to welcoming the students back after the winter holiday when they will start a new Choose-day activity and achieve even more of their Personal Learning Goals.

TERM 2: Cooking will make a comeback and we will introduce Gardening, Water Play, Felt and Fabric Art, Ultimate Frisbee and, wait for it....DRONES! ...and many more!

We began with a check in, reflecting on how we can be resilient like Walter the Spider. Using our personal goal of resilience, we explored ways to keep trying our best and tackle new learning challenges. The children were inspired by The Hungry Caterpillar as we read the story and explored the butterfly life cycle, creating a project based on the stages: egg, caterpillar, chrysalis and butterfly. We also went outside to look for worms and had a bug hunt, using prepositional language to describe where we found them. This project helped us understand the important role insects like butterflies and worms play in ecosystems and why it is crucial to care for our planet; key aspects of becoming globally competent. The children also created special goodbye cards for the butterflies, with drawings and messages inside.  What a busy and exploratory unit! 

As part of our Animals of Oman topic, we’ve been learning about the birds that call Oman home. Watching the birds up close inspired us to study their colours and unique features, which led to creating scientific drawings. By giving each other constructive feedback, we improved our work, learned collaboratively, and created some truly exceptional drawings that we’re all very proud of! 

In groups, children identified 5 common spices used in Omani food and explained the role of the spice trade in shaping Omani cuisine. Collaboration and effective communication enabled children to share their findings about spices using descriptive language. Keep an eye out for upcoming Omani-inspired recipes.

Each robot was carefully thought out, with the children writing detailed explanation texts about how their unique features would help them survive challenging conditions.

The excitement didn’t stop there—many children were so inspired by their designs that they suggested creating Top Trump cards for their robots. This wonderful idea added an extra layer of fun and engagement to their learning. Well done, Year 5, for showing such enthusiasm and innovation!

At PDO Primary School, we know how important it is to support staff in their professional development. When our team grows, so do the opportunities we can offer to our children. Ms. Sumaiya’s commitment and effort are a great example of this.

A big well done to Ms. Sumaiya—we’re all so proud of you!