Celebrating Windrush Day

On Tuesday 22 June, the Junior School celebrated Windrush Day, paying tribute to the contributions and sacrifices of the British Caribbean communities who arrived in Britain some 73 years ago.

There were a range of exciting activities that took place for pupils throughout the day, starting with a morning assembly from teacher Mrs Epps who retold the inspiring story of the HMT Empire Windrush and the Windrush generation. This was followed by a steel drum workshop for our Year 2 and 4 classes, which provided a wonderful introduction to the vibrant sounds of Caribbean music. Children and staff also got a chance to sample Caribbean fruit such as papaya and uncooked plantain, while teachers across the school shared Caribbean poetry with their classes and pupils created some beautiful artwork for their classrooms.

Over the past few weeks a lot of learning has also been taking place in the classroom, with Year 2 pupils locating the Caribbean islands on a map and challenging themselves to identify all the names of the islands. No mean feat! They have been keeping five-day weather diaries, comparing the weather in Kingston, Jamaica and London. The children found the differences in temperature between the two locations hard to believe with Jamaica hitting a steady 30 degrees celsius almost every day.

Mr Heil, Head of Key Stage 1 said: “The Caribbean music and poetry readings have provided the perfect backdrop for our Humanities learning and have enriched this wonderful topic for us.”