Computing

Designing Mars Rovers in Year 5

28th April 202128th April 2021 by Mark Pollard

Last term, as part of our Space topic, the children were inspired by the landing of Perseverance on Mars and so created their own versions of a Mars rover, complete with a motor so that it could move forward and, most impressively a lever system to enable it to pick up ‘space rock’ to study. The children had a great time making and designing their own rover and, who knows, maybe this activity will have inspired our next rover designers of the future.

After they’d made their rovers, the children used the iPads and iMovie to virtually transport their creations to the surface of Mars with some Green Screen magic.

You can enjoy some of these videos below:

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"I enjoyed making the Mars Rover. My favourite part was designing and decorating the rover, but we did have some trouble with our electrics"

Emily

Class 11

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Penpol Pupils earn their Be Internet Legends Trophies

28th April 202120th April 2021 by Jacob Woolcock

Children in Key Stage 2 have recently taken home their very own Internet Legend trophy to celebrate their ongoing learning into online safety and how to become responsible online citizens.

It’s safe to say that these trophies have generated quite a buzz amongst our pupils and I’m sure they will be appearing on desks, bedside tables and shelves all over the place very soon!

The children have been encouraged to build their trophies with a grown up at home as part of the process involves answering a series of questions about being safe online in order to unlock the instructions step-by-step. These questions also serve as great conversation starters and will hopefully help open up lots of productive conversations about being safe online.

The reward for their efforts are these awesome 3D trophies which will remind them that they really are Internet Legends.

We’ve been sent in lots of photos of these trophies in their new homes through Showbie and this post will be updated as more photos come in so watch this space!

Writing Code that is “Out Of This World”

30th June 202116th July 2020 by Jacob Woolcock

This week the children in Year 5 have been taking part in an international event which is quite simply “out of this world”!.

Astro Pi is a fantastic event run by Code Club and the European Space Agency whereby school children can write a computer program to be run on a modified Raspberry Pi computer on the International Space Station. Yes, IN SPACE!

Each child in Year 5 has worked in a team to design and code their programs, which will display messages, pictures and the current temperatures to the astronauts onboard the ISS. The children then decided on their team names before finally submitting their error-free code into space.

As soon as their program has been run on the Space Station the children will receive a certificate which will show the exact time and location of the International Space Station from when their code was run.

Class 11 Team Photos

Class 12 Team Photos

World first as Penpol get a Be Internet Legends virtual assembly!

5th May 20204th May 2020 by Jacob Woolcock

On Friday we were lucky enough to be the first school ever to receive a Be Internet Legends virtual assembly. This involved all of our pupils in Key Stage 2 taking part in an interactive assembly with the team from Google and ParentZone.

In the exciting assembly children were reminded of the importance of being Internet Legends through questions and answers, audience participation and lots of other fun activities. Teachers were able to feed back to the presenters in real time as children responded on Showbie, meaning the presenters could then talk to the children and celebrate their learning with them during the assembly.

It was a lot of fun and we’re very lucky at Penpol to have been selected as the first school to experience this. The presenters said afterwards that we were such a lovely school to work with and that they hope you all keep up your Internet Legends learning over the next few weeks.

To help with this Mr Woolcock will be sharing weekly Be Internet Legends online safety activities on Showbie that you can complete with your family at home. They’re quick and fun and may just involve playing a few levels on Interland too…

If you missed the assembly you can rewatch it below

Penpol Pupils enjoying the assembly from home

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Exciting Connections at Swift Code Club

28th February 202028th February 2020 by Jacob Woolcock

Last term we started a brand new club at Penpol, App Design Club. In this club the children in Year 5 and Year 6 are invited to consider an idea or problem and how they might make an app to solve this. Following along with resources made by Apple, the children then learn how to write code using the Swift programming language as well as learn how to plan and design their own app.

In the first half term we had a live link-up with Mr Jenkins who teaches at Booth Wood Primary School in the Midlands. This connection allowed children from both clubs to have the chance to share their initial app ideas and to ask for feedback. This Focus Group session proved valuable as the children were able to adapt and refine their ideas as a result of this feedback.

Following this they then did market research and looked at similar apps to see what they could offer which would be a bit different.

When they had got a clear idea of their app it was time to move onto Phase 2 – the design.

Initially each child created a ‘wire-frame’ idea by sketching on the iPads. This showed roughly what the individual screens of their app would look like and how they would be connected to each other.

After this we were lucky enough to have a Skype conversation with Sabe who teaches in a city called Sharjah in the United Arab Emirates. He led the club through a fun and exciting lesson on creating App Prototypes using the Keynote app. The children followed intently and by the end of the session they’d created a simple app to browse animal facts.

We’re now taking the ideas learnt from Sabe and using them to create working prototypes of our own apps. This process is going to take a little while as we are trying to pay close attention to how the app functions and how it looks.

Hopefully later in the year we’ll be able to share an update with everyone where the children can share their app designs with the world!

– Mr Woolcock

Sharing ideas in a Focus Group session with Booth Wood Primary school in order to develop and expand their ideas.

Club members following along with their App Designs carefully following the instructions from Sabe in the UAE.

Creating Mayan Temple Animations in Year 6

9th March 202024th February 2020 by Jacob Woolcock

Our Year 6s have been learning all about the Mayans in their Topic lessons this half term. In Computing we’ve been taking this learning and creating our own animations based around the idea of an ancient Mayan Temple.

The animation itself is lovely, but to really appreciate it you need to know that the children have actually built their temples brick by brick in Keynote. This process has been incredible to watch as the children have added a whole host of new skills in their graphic design and animation toolbox. Well done Year 6!

– Mr Woolcock

Egyptian Animations from Year 3

26th February 202021st February 2020 by Jacob Woolcock

This Half Term the children in Year 3 have been learning all about the Ancient Egyptians. As part of this exciting topic they have created some beautiful animations of the Mask of Tutankhamun set against a colourful Egyptian scene.

Class 7 Animations

The children paid close attention to detail when drawing the mask itself, looking at the ornate decorations and the beautiful gold finish. They then researched King Tut to find some interesting facts to accompany their animations.

Class 8 Animations

Well done Year 3 for a great project!

– Mr Woolcock

Year 5 Space Spectacul-‘AR’

11th February 202011th February 2020 by Jacob Woolcock

This half term our year 5 pupils have been learning about Space and the Solar System. As part of this exciting topic, the children have been using their knowledge of our Solar System to create some video documentaries on the iPads.

However, obviously getting video footage of the actual planets is quite tricky. So instead the children have carefully re-created each planet using their own artwork and Augmented Reality.

They’ve then put these AR planets together in the video app Clips and added their own voiceovers, titles and special effects.

The children have worked phenomenally hard on this project and the videos below are testament to this. Please do jump right in and watch a few to get a flavour of our out-of-this-world Space Documentaries!

Class 12 Space Documentaries

Class 11 Space Documentaries

Year 4 build LEGO robots to help save a stranded astronaut!

11th February 202028th January 2020 by Jacob Woolcock

In a very dramatic turn of events, Year 4 pupils arrived into the Mac Suite this morning to discover that a situation had arisen overnight. An intrepid LEGO astronaut had got himself into a spot of bother on the surface of the moon.

He’d unpacked his suitcase and was enjoying a warm drink in the Moon Base when he realised he’d left his Moon Rover back on Earth. Oh dear!

To make matters even worse, ahead in the distance he could see two massive pieces of Moon Treasure that were too far away to reach on foot.

Thankfully, Classes 9 and 10 were on hand to help. When faced with a challenge, these classes can always built a robot to help out! So over the morning, both classes built, tested, refined and polished their Moon Rovers to help Astronaut Alan reach the treasure. We had a variety of designs, a huge array of different programming styles and a lot of trips back and forth testing their creations.

But at the end of the morning, I’m delighted to say that Astronaut Alan reached the Moon Treasure and safely returned to his base – safe in the knowledge that the treasure was actually just two foam cubes with patterns on.

Mission complete!

Year 3 Create their own Winter Ornaments

9th January 20208th January 2020 by Jacob Woolcock

This term children in Year 3 have been learning how to use the 3D design program Tinkercad.

They’ve learnt how to rotate, resize and combine objects into creative and imaginative shapes.

As well as this they’ve completed a series of mini-challenges to really test their digital building skills by creating 3D models of various objects using a very limited number of building blocks.

After these challenges the children set about creating their own design for a 3D Winter Ornament. They were allowed to use two colours and used examples from last year as inspiration.

Everyone got the chance to create several different designs before choosing their favourite one to be printed.

Check out all of the amazing designs below, aren’t they great?