The Purbeck School hosted a brilliant Jurassic Coastal Change Day on Thursday 29th March for 100 Year 4s from three Purbeck first schools.
Children from Stoborough, Lady St Mary and Bovington First schools arrived at The Purbeck School early Thursday morning to watch a mini play presented by Year 10 and 11 Purbeck School students. The Purbeck Students read ‘The Purbeck News’ with a special feature on coastal erosion in Swanage followed by ‘The Aidan Burt Show’ featuring an engineer, a geologist, residents, an environmentalist and hoteliers all talking about their different perspectives on erosion.
This day formed part of two wider projects – a continuation of the Jurassic Coast Pathfinder project and a transition project as the Purbeck school system goes two tier from September 2013 (Year 4s will stay on into Year 5 from this September as the First schools change to Primary Schools)
The Year 4s then had a fantastic afternoon making their own fossil prints run by Year 10s in the Purbeck School’s art department and annotating cardboard models of the Swanage coastline with members of the Jurassic Coast Team, Dorset Coast Forum, the Environment Agency and Year 10 Purbeck students. This was a superb day, allowing older students to run activities with the younger children and to broaden the first school children’s understanding of the Jurassic coastline. The students have created some exceptional work which we hope to have on display in a Purbeck heritage centre of museum over the summer period.
Alexandria Potter, Education Coordinator
