Supporting Whirlow Hall Farm Trust

As part of Whirlow Hall Farm Trust’s 480 Club we’re proud to help fund a recent educational residential trip to the farm for pupils of Beck Primary School. Read all about it below, as written by Lisa Clowes from Whirlow…

“I am writing to let you know how the Beck Primary School visit went last week, which was supported through your 480 scheme sponsorship this year.

I spent some time with them on Friday, by which point they’d had plenty of time to settle in on the farm and were full of stories to tell me! They stayed in the newly refurbished Westfield Barn off Ringinglow Road.

 

The group were between Y5 and Y6, so a little older than our usual audience. So they took part in some of the usual activities such as pony riding and farm tours, but in addition they spent a morning in the woods nearby making sculptures out of natural materials. This involves the children looking around in the undergrowth to find sticks, stones and leaves. It’s an opportunity for the team to teach them about how leaves rot to soil, and lifecycles in the woods. They also found larvae, chrysalis and mushrooms, so they learnt more about how butterflies and bugs grow and the effect of all the moisture that we’ve had recently on our woodland!

I gather they really enjoyed this. The other favourite activity was ponyriding, they told me eagerly that both of the boys had been scared of the horse before they rode her, and the girls weren’t scared at all!

The teacher with the group told me that the visit is part of an early transfer for the children from Y5 to Y6 and this week of getting to know each other and their new teachers outside of the school environment was hugely beneficial and developed strong bonds before such an important year at school. She had done the same with a previous group and said that they had talked about their stay at Whirlow for the rest of the year!”

Here’re some pictures from the visit…