Leeds primary pupils write about becoming owl trailblazers

The pupils on their journey to find Leeds’ owls. 

Year 4 primary school pupils from Immaculate Heart of Mary Catholic Primary School who recently took part in Leeds Owl Trail have written about their experience, encouraging other young people to take the tour.

As part of the trail, the children were led around the city centre by a tour guide and encouraged to spot various owl symbols scattered around various locations including: Leeds Civic Hall, Leeds Town Hall and Leeds Museum.

The trail aims to inform and inspire young people about Leeds’ rich heritage and to create new owls for future generations to enjoy.

Here are a selection of blogs the pupils wrote….

Michael and Fergus wrote:

“I thought the Owl Trail was just going to be us going round Leeds finding real owls but we were actually finding statues of owls and what they were made from. We had to find the golden Millennium Square owls which were born in 1933 to provide work in the depression. We had to find the Civic owls which spends its days trying to catch a glimpse of its reflection in the tinted glass of the Rose Bowl. We also had a good look at the Leeds Museum Owls which were made by Cuthbert Broderick, who also made the Town Hall.

“My favourite owls were the Municipal Owls because we go to name them. I called mine Low because L-O-W uses the same letters as owl and my best friend Fergus called his Flappy because owls flap their wings.

“On the trail I learnt that the three owl claws are sign language for Leeds. We also learnt how to read a map so we could make our way around Leeds.

“The trail covered a few of our school subjects like:

“English, for when we were making owl jokes.

“Geography, for when we were reading maps.“

Pupils recreate the coat of arms of Leeds

Mary and Constance wrote:

“We thought the owl trail would be quite boring because we thought we would just be walking round the city ticking off the owls that we saw but it was completely different.

“Our favourite owls were the little old ‘lucky’ owls that had crowns. We liked them because we could name them ourselves and that they had survived the 2nd world war when all metal things were meant to be melted for bullets.

“We learnt the myth about the Town Hall clock. On the Town Hall there is a clock. The clock doesn’t strike twelve and nobody can fix it. The myth has it that if it does strike twelve the stone animals come to life and if they don’t get back to their positions by the next strike all the animals will disappear forever!

”What surprised us most was that a 76 year old man carried all of the gold Civic Hall owls to the very top that were apparently the weight of five elephants each.

“We used our eye sight a lot to find the owls. Some were very tricky to spot because they were small and very well hidden. The school subjects the owl trail covered were History, Geography, Science and Art. We learnt an owl hoot. It was FUN!!!!! We would definitely recommend this to children and adults of all ages.”

Aoife and Gwyneth wrote:

“Before we went on the owl trail we thought we would see and touch real life owls and learn about them, but actually it was about statues of owls around Leeds.

“Our favourite owl was the golden owl because it was pretty and shiny and also stood out of all of them.

“Outside we learnt that some owls statues had survived World War 2. We got to name our owls, Aoifes was Twooy, and Gwyneth’s was Victoria, the lucky owl.

“When we were inside we made owls out of clay we did the scratch and slip skill which is scratching your clay and making sure you hair is out and slipping you clay in together. We also did a skill that is smoothing your clay with your hands and making details with your scratcher, which is like a knife but not sharp.

“This trip was covering Art because we made clay owls and English because we had to answer questions and Geography because we looked in maps and History because we talked about the war and how our city crest changed through life.”