Colchester Zoo – Yr.6

Along with Year 3, Year 6 went to Colchester Zoo today. It was an excellent day full of amazing animals. Some of the highlights for the children were the bird of prey display, the underwater sea lion viewing tunnel, holding stick insects, feeding lorikeets nectar, feeding elephants and giraffes by hand and the walk through lemur enclosure.  Some of us also saw some species for the first time such as sea lions, anteaters, binturongs, aardvarks, pigmy hippos, vultures and sloths.

All the children represented the school well and enjoyed looking at the amazing adaptations each animal had to its natural environment. Amongst other things, we learnt that sea lions can hold their breath under water for forty minutes, lorikeets have papillae on the tip of their tongue arranged into a fringe, working like a paintbrush to gather the pollen and nectar and that male orang-utans have the strength of over three adult men!  We also looked at how high we could jump, how fast we could run, how long we could hang for and how far we could jump in comparison to other animals.  There are some pretty amazing creatures out there!

Well done to all the children from both classes who managed the very long coach ride home due to operation stack and heavy traffic on the A12. You made us proud again!