Roaring Success for Our Year 4 STEM Designers!

We are incredibly excited to share some fantastic news from St Lawrence School… Our brilliant Year 4 pupils have taken part in the Colchester Zoo STEM Challenge—and we are absolutely delighted to announce that they have WON the Lower Key Stage 2 competition! What an achievement!

The challenge set by Colchester Zoo asked pupils to design a new enclosure for lions, and our Year 4 children rose to the occasion with creativity, determination, and impressive teamwork. Throughout the project, the pupils followed the full design process, researched lion habitats and their needs, explored innovative ideas to improve animal welfare, carefully considered space, safety, enrichment, and sustainability and produced thoughtful and well-developed design solutions. Every pupil in Year 4 contributed to the project, and the standard of work across the classes was exceptional.

This wasn’t just about individual effort—it was about collaboration! Pupils worked together to share ideas, refine their thinking, and support one another in developing their designs. They demonstrated resilience, curiosity, and a real commitment to improving their work at every stage. Their final designs showed clear evidence of creative thinking, problem-solving skills, scientific understanding and a deep awareness of animal needs and welfare

While the whole year group should be incredibly proud of their efforts, a huge KUDOS must go to the six pupils who represented Year 4 in the final stage of the competition. Competing against schools from across the country, they showcased their work with confidence and pride—and went on to WIN the competition! An absolutely outstanding achievement that reflects not only their hard work, but also their ability to communicate ideas clearly and think like true designers and engineers.

This project is a perfect example of our pupils living out what it means to be Agents of Change. They approached the challenge with curiosity, asking questions, investigating problems, and looking beyond the obvious to develop thoughtful, real-world solutions. They didn’t just complete a task—they explored, adapted, improved, and innovated.

We are immensely proud of all of Year 4 for their dedication and creativity throughout this project, and especially proud of our competition team for their incredible success. Winning the Colchester Zoo STEM Challenge is a remarkable achievement and a testament to the talent, teamwork, and determination of our pupils. Well done Year 4—you’ve truly roared your way to success!