Achievement

Our learning is relevant, challenging and fun, so that we can be the best that we can be

We try, we practise and we learn from our mistakes and never give up

We always try new ideas

We are all valued and our differences are appreciated

Our environment is safe and friendly

We are all part of the community, in school and outside

We love activities to keep us fit and healthy

We celebrate the achievements and successes of every individual

Gardening

Preparing the garden for the colder seasons.

Winter

Dovelands School visits Rhs Chatsworth Flower Show 2019

Chatsworth Flower Show 2019. We won third prize!

Chatsworth Flower Show Preparations

Our Awards

Our 5th Grow your own grub Gold award.

Spring in our school garden

Spring

Our greenhouse donated to the school garden by Mr Spencer.

13th of March, frog spawn in the pond!

On Monday 27th March we noticed the frog spawn had developed into tadpoles!

There were lots of frogs in the pond followed by lots of clumps of frog spawn.

Frog Spawn

After returning from Easter break, we found on Monday the 11th of April, that our frog spawn had now become wonderful little tadpoles.

Tadpoles!

Summer in the school garden

In the summer we had a garden full of fruit, veg' and flowers.

Busy in the garden

The Garden was Blooming

We sponsored Hedgehogs and planned for wildlife gardening.

We were successful in completing our project, raising enough money to sponsor these 7 hedgehogs and then being awarded our RHS Level 5. The story was then covered in the Leicester Mercury. This was seen by Mr Wilton who contacted the school to share his interest in wildlife gardening. He very kindly made and donated a bird table, bird boxes, an insect hotel and a hedgehog house to our school garden. Thank you Mr Wilton.

Our Pond

Harvest Time

All the cooking apples grown in the school gardens were used to make apple crumble for lunch in September. Thank you to City Catering and all the kitchen staff at Dovelands for supporting our Year 5s who helped prepare that pudding.

In Autumn we harvested the sweetcorn that had been growing in the school garden all over the summer.

We were also busy drawing sweetcorn pictures to decorate the outdoor classroom.

Seeds

We invited pupils, friends and family to come and grab rocket salad seeds and radish seeds from the edible planter in the KS2 playground to grow at home.

Autumn

Autumn is a time to start thinking about looking after our garden birds. Some of our eating apples and seeds saved from the sunflowers were combined to create these wonderful bird feeders. Well done to our Year 3s for being this creative with our garden resources.

Leaf Mould

Leaf mould is extraordinary stuff. On the surface, it’s just rotten leaves – high in carbon, low in pretty much everything else, but if you apply it to your hard clay soil, leaf mould will help break it down; it will also bind thin, loose soils and help to lock in moisture. Leaf mould is really useful stuff and it is free!

How to make you own leaf mould:

Rake and collect the leaves that have fallen from trees in the Autumn,
Fill big plastic bags with all the leaves, making sure they are damp,
Next, sit on the bags to compress the leaves,
Load up all your bags into an enclosed area,
Wait about 12 months
Finally, spread it on your planting areas and let the earthworms pull it into your soil.