Shivering with cold. In the Science programme for Key Stages 1 & 2 (2013) there are some notes and guidance (non-statutory) about properties and changes of materials. The latest government guidance reported by the BBC is that schools need to keep the windows open in classes in order to ‘help stop the spread’ of Covid. So, this means that teachers do not have to take children outside to observe icy puddles or conduct a science experiment by the ‘wrapping of ice-cream to stop it melting’ mainly because it would take too long to melt inside…As a comment by a frustrated teacher said on BBC’s Twitter Feed, ‘I’m wearing thermals + kids are shivering in their coats, what a glorious way to learn’.

Years ago, pre-national curriculum (<1988), children’s experience of cold would be exploited by the teacher by teaching genres of writing including poetry, or art, or science, or maths…but phonics could be challenging. In fact, there was a joke at the time that children were warned not to look out of the window because they might have to write about it. We are ‘told’ by Ofsted that we should now widen the curriculum - so go for it!

M