Y8’s ‘A Place Of Our Own’ at Doncaster Mansion House and beyond.

The final product for the Y8 expedition ‘A Place Of Our Own’ has culminated in a ‘Print Run’ where copies of students’ artwork will be exhibited in public buildings across Doncaster: CAST theatre, Civic Centre, Frenchgate shopping centre and Dreambakes.

This process was launched last Wednesday when Doncaster’s Mansion House hosted a group of our Y8s where we officially donated an A0 size print of the building. Check out the video below:

You can read more about the specific details concerning the expedition ‘A Place Of Our Own’ here, but I was immensely proud of the rigour that underpinned every aspect of its work: the anchor text that ran throughout the expedition was John Steinbeck’s ‘Of Mice and Men’, a historical enquiry revolved around studies of the causes and consequences of the 1930s Great Depression as well as the Suffragette movement in Doncaster, creative writing focused on prominent parts of Doncaster, renewable and non-renewable energy including an application for Eco School’s Bronze accreditation were explored in STEM, and the culmination of the artwork took place in X-Block where an expert from Sheffield’s Print Club taught students how to create prints of their work on local buildings.

Students also developed their scientific understanding even further by studying biodiversity and how humans can support healthy ecosystems and how to transfer energy in ecosystems, using food chains and webs, pyramids of number and biomass. Students accompanied their artwork with a first-person poem that embodied their vision of Doncaster and how to make it reflect their own aspirations – based upon Tony Walsh’s poem ‘This is the place’. In addition to this, students applied their knowledge of geometry and architecture in Maths to create blueprints of their own Eco-school, and used a computer aided design app called Room Sketcher to create specific designs.

Students, as always, then presented their work via the Presentation Of Learning to a wider audience of parents on 18th December. What an expedition!! Stay tuned for the curation of student work around school.