The day's work was split into two parts: Rivers data collection and Mapwork studies. The river data collection involved the chil-dren investigating the following questions: How does the river channel vary down-stream? How does a river's discharge vary downstream? What evidence is there that the river is eroding and depositing materi-al? What evidence is there that human ac-tivity has influence this river? To investi-gate these questions the children were ex-posed to some valuable fieldwork tech-niques including: taking measurements, timing rubber ducks in the river, field sketches, pebble collection & note taking.

To analyse their data, the children drew cross sections, calculated the river's dis-charge, labelled field sketches and looked for explanations for their results. Further exploration of the children's findings will take place after half-term; the fact that one rubber duck managed to travel upstream for a while is likely to produce some inter-esting debates!

The mapwork studies involved some initial analysis of OS maps in the classroom. This helped the children to add detail to their outline map of the route that they would be taking through a section of the forest.

Using information on their maps, the chil-dren were able to check their location as they progressed through the forest and also predict what they would be passing on the next section of their journey; a cleared area, where part of Harry Potter has been filmed certainly caught the in-terest of many! Throughout this mapwork journey, the children were also educated about the work of the Forestry Commis-sion and the important role they play in promoting biodiversity.

A special thank you must go to Helen and Charlotte from Alice Holt Forest who pro-vided an excellent experience for the chil-dren and to Mrs Sanders, Mr Mitchell-Innes, Mr Bather, Mr Figgis & Mr Piper who kindly gave up their time to help us on this trip.