This year for the Mod Port Ellen Choir are going to Stornaway. The Mod is on the 19th October. We are going to sing a puirt a bueil, and two unisons. I think we are doing pretty well so far and I am looking forward to the Mod. Some people are doing a solo, poem or a duet and I am doing the three. Soon we are going to have a fundraiser event to earn money for the costs of going to the Mod called the Pre Mod concert, we have to sing at it and some people are doing their solos, poems and duet. I am very excited to go to this mod too and I hope we will win something this year. We are going to the Mod in a short time and hopefully we will be ready for this year! We are against Bowmore Primary choir and many other choirs. We are singing at the Mod because we want to win and show people how good we are. We have learned to control our voice and to sing high and low notes very accurately a good pace when we are singing and learn and read Gaelic and sing Gaelic.
By Rowan and Kaya.
On Monday 3rd October P5/6/7 wrote Mesolithic quest tales for their clans. The clans are Orca clan, Golden Eagle clan, Artic Fox clan and Red Deer clan. Each clan had a different tale to work on and we had to have a hero to overcome a problem in the tale. While writing the quest tale we learned how to add onomatopoeia, personification, similes and metaphors into our writing and include paragraphs. Everyone in each clan gets filmed when they are telling their part of the quest tale.
On Wednesday 5th October, P5/6/7 from Port Ellen Primary School went to Cairnmore woods to live in Mesolithic times. At school we all have four clans, The Golden Eagle Clan, The Arctic Fox Clan, The Orca Clan and the Red Deer Clan. In our clans we got given a leaf and we had to find out what tree the leaf came from and then when we were at the woods we had to find a tree in our clans that aaas the same tree as the leaf. We then made a den at the woods. We made a model of a village for our clan and an actual den. The Golden Eagle clan had a beach tree. The 
Arctic Fox clan had a sycamore tree. The Orca clan had an oak tree and The Red Deer clan had the ash tree. The Golden Eagle Clan had a tree and they made their den under it and made the model outside. They also had a spy hole where they could see the Orca clan who had a mud trap near them. The Arctic Fox Clan’s base was a fallen over tree that we could get over to get to our den but the rest of our base had a massive mud pile in and we used some of the mud to make our mini village. We did a hunt for sweets, this was to improve our hunter gathering skills. The Orca clan got the most sweets. We also made clay tree spirits to leave guarding our dens. We had really good fun. We learned to observe objects better than we did before. We hope to go back soon.
On Wednesday 5th October p5,6,7 went on a trip to the woods. After we had made our dens and completed some challenges we went to have our lunch near the beach. When we went to the beach Mr Gairns had set up a fire for us to have our lunch round, and we had brought firewood from the woods to put on our fire. When we had finished all our lunch some of us went to gut some trout so we could put it on the fire to cook and we also got to roast home grown apples as well. We put the trout and apples on sticks to cook them and when they were cooked they tasted delicious. We also got to try other Mesolithic foods for our lunch, cockles and nuts. Not many people liked the cockles but we did like the trout and apples. It was interesting to see what food would have been like in Mesolithic times.
After we had had our dinner we were going to go on a night trip to The glowing flashing Kelpies. We left our day bags in our rooms. After dinner we got into our groups that we found out when we were on the ferry. We all partnered up and then left to see the Kelpies. On the bus it was dark so everyone was excited because that would mean the Kelpies would glow up. Before we got off the bus they talked to us about being safe they had said to stay away from the canal and watch out for cars also strangers. When we got there we got of the bus and walked towards the Kelpies everyone knew they were huge because they were really big even when we were far away from them. Once we had arrived there was two huge horse heads that were glowing up, they were changing colors after about a couple of seconds. I didn’t know it was going to be two heads I thought it would be one, it was a fantastic sight.
eptember it was Roald Dahl day! Everyone got Roald Dahl cakes and every cake had something to do with one of Roald Dahls books. We were doing art to do with Roald Dahl and at 2:30 we got to watch Matilda for a hour. It was great! Here is a picture of Bronagh with Mavis Gulliver receiving a framed copy of her BFG picture.
On Thursday 15th September p6/7 from all the schools from Islay and Jura went to Stirling University and while we were there we got to dissect fish. When we were dissecting the fish I was working with Rowan and we were testing to check the bacteria in the kidney but first me and Rowan had to push away a bubble that was protecting the kidney. After we pushed away the bubble we stuck a plastic stick in the kidney to get a sample of blood to rub it on a petri plate so that when they take it out a warm fridge they would be able to see the bacteria that was in the fish’s kidney. After we dissected the fish we did a quiz that had nine questions in it and me and Rowan got 7 questions correct and two questions incorrect. When we got back outside we all got tour of the university and we even got to see what the rooms would look like. After the tour we headed back to the youth hostel.
On Wednesday 7th September Mrs.Clark’s class and P1/2/3 went bramble picking at the croft road. There was 2 people in each pair and every pair was given 1 bag to put the brambles they find in. As we set off to get brambles a buildbase lorry went by and we all had to get on the grass and let the lorry pass. After the lorry was gone we started to pick the brambles and there was a lot of brambles found just at the start of the road. Matthew and his little brother William started to get further down the road. People were on left and right trying to get the biggest and most purple brambles so that they can make the best bramble jam. Ciaran was always at the front of all the people just because some people at the front said that they would get the most brambles because they were at the front. Closer to the end of the path there were more brambles but most of us decided to take out time because if we did that we could still find a lot of brambles which no one knows about. We picked over 5Kg of brambles and made it into bramble jam. Yum!
Today Ellie, Kaitlyn and Sarah found out about the Forth Road Bridge because their class are going to Stirling for an annual school trip. They will be visiting Bannockburn, The Forth Road Bridge, Stirling castle and Stirling university. We found out that over 70,000 vehicles cross the bridge every day and over 24 million vehicles cross the bridge every year. It took around 6 years to build and seven people died building it. On the 5th December 2015 a small 2cm crack was found and the bridge had to be rebuilt. The bridge is 51 years old. It is owned and operated by Network Rail. It is the 4th longest bridge in the world. It is over the fifth of the forth. It cost about £19.5 million. It is Britians first all steel bridge. It used nearly 40,000 tonnes of steel and 125,000 cubic metres of concrete. The designers were Benjamin Baker and John Fowler. They will be visiting it next week, hope they have a great time. By Kaitlyn, Sarah and Ellie<img
On the 25th of August, Port Ellen Primary along with their teacher Mrs Clark, Mr Gairns, Mrs Logan and Struan’s dad Mr Colthart, went to a fascinating archaeological trip to the Giant’s Grave. We were going there because we really wanted to learn about Islay History. As we got onto the bus, I was filling up with excitement. We were in the bus for quite a while until we got to Nerabus. As we got off the bus, I couldn’t wait to start walking to the Giant’s Grave. Also, Professor Steven Mithin walked with us.
On the trip, we walked one hour and ten minutes to the Giant’s Grave. Before we got there, my friend Abi fell into a big stream and got soaking wet. When we were all set we started walking again. On the way, we saw loads of blood red and white mushrooms. They looked really interesting. Finally we got to the Giant’s Grave. I thought it looked amazing and very inspiring. It was as peaceful as the sun crawling up a hill. As we were strolling to the heart of the dig I gazed at the awesome rocks forming the Giant’s grave.