As well as Maths and English 1:1 virtual lessons with Becky and Rob, we've been offering a huge variety of other lessons with the rest of the staff such as story-writing, debate club, music, animals, science, sport, reading, meditation, games, boxercise and more.
Lego challenge
We’ve kicked our 2nd week of virtual schooling off to a great start by introducing a new fun and creative lesson to our timetable, The Lego Challenge! Jodie runs this lesson for an hour at a time whilst other pupils log in with their own Lego and build alongside Jodie. There is a different challenge each lesson. This week the challenge was to build a new ride for a theme park, which pupils had a blast with! It’s fun, creative and relaxing. Not to mention the lovely conversations between everyone that are had during this time too. It truly is a great way for everyone to stay in contact, bond, get creative and have fun together.
Music lessons
We are offering virtual music lessons such as piano with Lauren, guitar with Tom for and music appreciation with Gareth, a few days a week, which pupils have really enjoyed. So far the pupils have learned to correctly label the keys on their pianos, a general introduction to the world of piano and how to play a few tunes, from Twinkle Twinkle Little Star to Can’t Help Falling In Love by Elvis Presley. The talented Tom has been teaching them how to play Smoke On The Water - Deep Purple along with introducing them to the world of guitar in general and it’s sounding fab! Not only are these lessons fun, but they’re relaxing and therapeutic too. Some pupils even love to come along to the lessons simply to watch and listen which is great!
Netflix party!
GRK staff are completely on the pupils’ wavelength with this one. We know how many of them love getting cozy on their sofas and sticking a good movie on to watch on Netflix, so we wondered how can we bring that to virtual GRK and make it even better? By doing it as a school together, that's how - so that we all have each other there for company too. Our chosen movie this week was Shrek, a classic and favourite amongst many, and they can even use the “chat” feature on Netflix Party to stay in touch throughout the movie. All in all, a success! And something we would love to do again soon.
Animals
Just because we aren’t on the GRK grounds at the moment, doesn’t mean we’ve parted with all our wonderful animals there. The amazing Rosie, who lives just next door to the school, continues to go in and feed, clean and play with all the animals daily so they’re all being thoroughly looked after and loved. We are also still featuring them in some of our animal lessons too via the webcam which is so beneficial for the pupils so that they can stay regularly updated on how all the animals are doing. On the farm, some baby lambs have also recently been born and we are being updated on their births and progress by Iain, the shepherd at GRK, which we are all so grateful for and really enjoying. We even got to name the first lamb born! We called her Buttercup, born on 20/03/2020!
Walking Challenge
Although a lock down has been put in place across the world, it is still so important for us all to get some fresh air each day. The government advice out there right now is an encouragement for everyone to get outside for up to 1 hour each day either by yourself or with people in your household. Whether this be just in your garden or for a walk around the block. So Lauren is logging onto her Walk Lesson every afternoon for 1 hour, taking her little dog and her son for a walk in the woods whilst encouraging other pupils to join her virtually whilst they're getting their bit of fresh air each day too. We hope that seeing the staff and their families getting out for some fresh air each day will inspire the pupils to go outside too, even if just for a short while in their garden. So far, the pupils have enjoyed this and a few of them have managed to get out on their 1 hour walk each day, reporting back to Lauren that the fresh air has made them feel so much better, energised, awake and productive. Doing this as a group - virtually - means that whilst we are going for our walks we also have each other for great company, lots of encouragement and brilliant conversation every step of the way.
Here are some photos of everything we've been up to!