June

Y6 Science Fair

Music Prizes

Y5 Holdenby House

On the 22 June 2022 Year 5 went to Holdenby House in Northamptonshire. This was for an authentic Tudor experience where we would take part in various activities and workshops.

5KRH started with ‘Pike Drill’ where we learnt the formations of how to attack in battle. This included knowing how to fight people that would have been on foot and on horseback. We learnt the battle cry which was shouting ‘DEATH!’ at the top of our lungs. It one on the best parts of the day.

Next, we looked at traditional Tudor medicines. This included: lavender and dried flower petals to help with sleep; mouse bones which was for rich people to stop headaches and leeches for bloodletting. This was a bit gross and made some people feel a bit funny!

Calligraphy was the next session, where we had to write with a quill and ink. We learnt what was used to make ink and had a go at writing our names using complex letters. These letters were more suited for quill writing because you can only move the quill down, not up. Luckily, we had blotting paper to absorb excess ink, and no one was sprayed.

The last indoor session was ‘Heraldry’ where we created our own shields with images and designs that reflected our personality traits. For example, a serpent was for intelligence, a fist was for a hard-working man and a bee was for a hard-working woman.

Finally, we had a tour of the gardens, which were beautiful. We also had a question-and-answer session about anything related to the house or the Tudors. We discovered that the house was built by Sir Christopher Hatton to encourage Queen Elizabeth to come and visit, but she never did. A fun fact we found out was that he rebuilt the local village, as it disturbed the view from his window.

We had an extraordinary time at Holdenby House, but make sure you don’t look at the leaches for too long!