On the last day of term, 7^th April, Spring was certainly in the air at St Lawrence College. The sun shone brightly on the school as the pupils wore their Easter bonnets with pride and paraded around the playground in a traditional springtime celebration. The theme for making their creations this year was Recycling – the judges were looking for creativity and originality with old items reused on straw hats and caps of all shapes and sizes. Easter eggs were the much sought after prizes on offer – yum! Who doesn't love a chocolate egg for Easter?

Again this year, St Lawrence pupils in Years 5 & 6 have the opportunity to participate in the UK Mathematical Trust's Junior Mathematical Challenge competition. The Junior Mathematical Challenge is a 60-minute multiple-choice competition for children aged 9-12, which encourages mathematical reasoning, precision of thought and fluency in using mathematical techniques to solve problems.

The competition will take place on Wednesday the 26th of April so the children excitedly attended a meeting in the staff room this week with Ms Tsabanakis, the Junior School Maths Lead. They enjoyed hot chocolate and cookies as they listened to the expectations on them for successful participation in this prestigious event. Good luck to all our candidates!

On Tuesday 4th April, Year 4 had a school trip to Planet Physics at the Hellenic Cosmos in Tavros, as part of their science curriculum this term. The children are studying the fascinating topic of States of Matter, learning all about how temperature changes affect the state of matter of a material. There were experiments with these changes and live demonstrations.

Learning isn't confined to the classroom at this school!
 

On Friday 7^th April, Year 1 consolidated their Spring term's project of learning about everything British by pretending to travel to the UK! The children excitedly departed for a trip on a plane, did some sightseeing, and enjoyed a picnic in the style of a traditional English tea party! They waved their Union Jack flags and imagined themselves elsewhere.

Taking learning outside the classroom is always fun, isn't it!

On Wednesday 5^th April, Year 3 had a sunny day out of school at the Cultural Park in Keratea. As part of their learning for History, the pupils visited the park and learned all about the past. They thoroughly enjoyed the warm weather and fascinating features of the park. The smiles show how much they enjoyed themselves.

Here at St Lawrence College, we take our environmental responsibilities very seriously. On 5^th April, with this aim in mind, Years 5 & 6 attended a cinematic presentation on the subjects of conservation and care for the planet at Cinemax in Kifissia. What child doesn't enjoy a trip to the cinema? Our pupils were enthralled and educated by the whole experience.

On Thursday 6^th April, Year 2 visited the Pedopolis learning centre in Glyfada to learn about looking after the environment. The children took part in the Reduce, Reuse, Recycle & Replace Program, as part of their Science Unit on Materials this term. The outing was fun and packed with learning!

On Monday 30^th March, Year 2 took a fun-packed trip to Athens to the Museum of Illusions. This visit was a perfect accompaniment to their science unit of learning Light, which taught the children all about how we use the eyes, what we actually see and what we think we see!

How the mind can be tricked by the eyes … or how the eyes can be tricked by the mind … is a fascinating thing for the children to experience and think about. Take a look at some of the amusing results!

On Thursday 6^th April, the annual Early Years Gym Displays for FS1 and FS2 pupils started with a heart-warming dance. Following the dance, our youngest pupils displayed the skills they have developed throughout the year during their physical education lessons. The children thoroughly enjoyed performing in front of a large live audience which was made up of family and friends. 

Thank you to all who were in attendance cheering for the children as they put on a show of their accomplishments in PE this year. Most of all, well done to our amazing pupils who relished the chance to show off their learning!

On 24th March, Year 9 embarked on an exciting educational trip to expand their understanding of Science and History beyond the syllabi. We started at the Hellenic Cosmos Cultural Centre, where pupils had a private viewing of the course which delves into the heart of Ancient Athenian democracy, which has been painstakingly recreated by carefully reconstructing written and physical sources to produce an accurate depiction of the ancient city of Athens, with lots of interesting details added for the benefit of pupils – for instance, the solid gold head of the statue of Athina, the patron of the Ancient City, was so large that it could be seen from the sea.

On the 29th of March our Year 8 pupils visited the Hellenic Cosmos Cultural Centre in a daily trip organised by the Greek department and the Head of Year 8.

First, the pupils watched the play “Oliver Twist” by Charles Dickens, a popular moral story for children and adults alike. This story ends on a note of hope, arguing that truth, purity, and innocence can be preserved even in an environment of poverty and social inequality. 

Then, the pupils enjoyed their lunch under the blue sky, a well-deserved day out for our Year 8 pupils!

In early February 38 of our pupils in Years 9 to 11 participated in the Intermediate Mathematics Challenge, organised by the United Kingdom Mathematics Trust. The Intermediate Mathematics Challenge is addressed to pupils in Year 11 and below with the aim to promote the love for problem solving and encourage mathematical reasoning, precision of thought, and fluency.

All our pupils enjoyed taking part in the Challenge and we are very proud of their results.

We are particularly proud of three of our pupils who qualified for the next Olympiad rounds.

Nicholas Zafeirakis in Year 10 was qualified to participate in the Hamilton Olympiad and Xinyi Hu and Konstantinos Zafeirakis in Year 11 qualified to participate in the Maclaurin Olympiad. We congratulate our pupils for this big success. The Olympiads took place on March 16^th and we wish them good luck with their results.

We are proud of all those who participated and many of them were awarded with gold, silver and bronze certificates. More specifically:

In Year 11:

Gold Certificates: Xinyi Hu (Best in Year), Konstantinos Zafeirakis

Silver Certificates: Jiachen Lin

In Year 10:

Gold Certificates: Nicholas Zafeirakis (Best in Year), Zhuoxuan Ying, Jiayu Zhu, Mohamed Fattah

Silver Certificates: Athanasios Argyros, Ximan Yin

Bronze Certificates: Alexandra Mavromichalis, Sofia Tzagkaraki-Kaseta, George   Tzoutzourakis, Boya (Ency) Gui, Yehua Yang

In Year 9: 

Gold Certificates: Jiawei Wang (Jason) (Best in Year), 9 Hyeyoon Jun (Hayley).

Silver Certificates: Amalia Papadaki, Anna-Lena Lambropoulou, Shangzheng Li (Lee), Ziyi Li (Leo)

Bronze Certificates: James Cook, Marios Lempidakis, Zhu Min (Julia) and Zefei(Alice) Mu

We now wish our Junior Mathematicians good luck for their Junior Mathematics Challenge which will take place after the Easter break, on April 26^th.

On Friday 17^th March, Reception and Year 1 pupils visited Cinemax 1&2 to watch a selection of short animation movies. The movies were followed by engaging activities and discussions about the message of each film, allowing children to further understand them and freely share their ideas. They certainly had a great time!  

The robotics competition was a thrilling experience for our Year 8 group of students, who had spent countless hours designing and building their robot. They were determined to showcase their skills and compete against other teams from around Greece. The competition was fierce, but our students remained focused and worked together seamlessly to navigate their robot through the challenges. Their hard work paid off as they earned high scores and impressed the judges with their innovative designs. It was a truly rewarding experience for our students, who not only gained valuable knowledge and skills but also formed lasting friendships and memories that they will carry with them into the future. ”

Through the month of March, we held the exciting Junior School Inter-house Quiz Finals. After hotly contested earlier rounds, the Key Stage 2 classes sent forward their teams of finalists who confidently represented their Houses: Attica, Epirus and Macedonia.

With six rounds of questions on spellings, mental maths and general knowledge, the pupils gave it their all to try to come out on top. The results were often close but ultimately there was always a winner. Congratulations to everyone who took part and especially our winning teams!

Year 3 – Epirus

Year 4 – Macedonia

Year 5 – Attica

Year 6 – Epirus