WITH Her Majesty’s Platinum Jubilee right around the corner, Kingskerswell Primary school reached out to the Helen Foundation to find, and fund, a three day workshop for its pupils.

The workshop, which was led by local artist Peter Margerum, was a Helen Foundation supported workshop in partnership with Daisi, an arts education charity working across Devon to develop quality arts engagement opportunities for young people.

Spanning across three days, from March 29 to 31, pupils from Giraffe and Red Panda classes set about constructing a special tree for the school’s wilderness garden.

Using recycled bits and pieces, from wooden beads to kitchen utensils, coat-hangers to hat-stands, Peter helped the youngsters to incorporate their drawn studies of bees, leaves, grasshoppers and creepy-crawlies and they made a Jubilee tree to grace their wild area.

The very first task on day one was to create 10 branch sin small groups using parts of old chairs and wood offcuts which pupils were shown how to saw into shape as well as how to use a power drill, with adult supervision of course.

The group also made musical instruments using recycled wood and bits of metal.

Over the course of the next two days, Peter led the class through the remainder of the workshop, rounding out the workshop by installing the finished wooden structure into the pre-prepared hole alongside teacher Mrs Hewett.

The pupils, it is understood, were full of praise for Peter and they especially enjoyed working with the power drills, screw-drivers and wire for threading brand and leaves.