NEWS

In Scotland, there is a very popular type of dance called Highland Dancing. It is unique but can also be difficult. Every single dance in all of Highland Dancing must be danced to bagpipes because it is traditional to dance to it. There were 2 competitions a few weeks ago, one of them was Tarbert, and the other one was Erskin. There were lots of dancers there and they were all amazing at dancing. When they jumped up and down it was as if their kilts were waves coming in from the ocean. 

In Islay there are quite a lot of dancers. Every year, we have Feis, it is a festival on Islay where thousands of people come over to see distilleries, they get to do whisky tasting and there is lots of traditional music as well. Because there were so many dancers (all of them were mostly from the mainland) it was quite hard to focus when dancing because of the amount of people. There are 4 categories, Highland, National, Jig and Hornpipe. All the dancers do different dances in groups together at Feis and it is lots of fun. At the competitions we just go up on front of the judges, then they will mark you as you are dancing, and then you will get medals at the end. 

Today the 30th of May 2023 Finlay and William (2 p7s)  went to Laphoaig open day and they were selling tea towels of a map of islay that had been designed by Port Ellen primary school pupils. We were walking around asking people if they wanted to buy any tea towels from us and we managed to get lots of sales; we even got a guy who bought 6 for £30!  At the start we were designing all the pieces of paper and put them over the tea towels. It said Islay Tea Towels designed By Port Ellen Primary Pupils. In total we made £150 pound all together after 1 hour and Chloe and Iona are having another hour after us and after them James, Teddy and Dylan are going to have another 1 hour.

Endeavour is a project that you pick to do until Endeavor Day. Our class does it every year, and it is so fun! On Endeavor Day people come round, and you show what you have done over the past few months, maybe even sell stuff. I’m doing cooking skills for my Endeavor. All the skills I have learnt so far are peeling, cutting and bread-making skills. I’m doing cooking skills for my Endeavour. 

 Firstly, I made delicious broccoli soup that was as good as candy floss mixed with cupcakes, the week after that I made little bread rolls for the class bread, so I developed bread-making skills. Finally, I made spaghetti bolognaise that had venison in it and when I tried it my mouth exploded! 

In school we had a health and wellbeing afternoon On Thursday 18th May so people could stay more healthy and parents and people from the community  came into school.  We also got to go round the school doing different activities:

• Coast guard,
• Mrs Harrison showed us how many sugar cubes were in drinks,
• Miss Tate got us to do orienteering
• There was MYFOS,
• we got to get a baby massage. 

My favorite was the coast guard because we got taught how to tie knots, we got to wear life jackets and we got to lift someone in the stretcher. They also taught us about water safety and what to do if we find someone in the water and the said “we need to call 999 and ask for the coast guard”. We got a wee bag with stuff to do with the coast guard. As we were leaving the different stations the teachers told us where to go next.  

When we were done, we had to go back into the hall and reassemble with our group. Before Mrs Mcdonald came in we got pencils and a toothbrush.   I really enjoyed the afternoon.

On Thursday 18th May we had a Health Afternoon. It was where parents came into school to do things like Orienteering, Coastguard talk, Baby Massage, and more. All the students went into teams had to work around all of the activities. It was so fun because we got to find out facts as well as activities. Every group had a leader in it who was the oldest person. It was great fun! Even though we got quite wet, we still had a great day.

Endeavour is an independent project that our class does every year. This project can be anything, baking, dancing, football and anything else you can make into a project.

My Endeavour is about Islay history, but it’s not just Islay history. My project is on Islay history, through a Childs view. What I mean by ‘through a Childs view’ is what children on Islay lived like in these times. I am making a website, it will give you a story about a child. Then some information about the time period or event. Then some more text about glossary,  because some vocabulary may be hard for kids to read.

I will also make other things for the Endeavour fair, but my main focus is the website.

Iona

Islay is very famous for whiskey but the whiskey needs to come from somewhere. That place is a distillery and I have done my endeavor on distilling because when I am older I  want to live on Islay and there is a high chance that I will work in a distillery when I am older. Another reason I chose it was because most my family works in a distillery.

Endeavor is a long-term competition that P567 try and make something and learn about a project they chose themselves. Everything is done independently.

I have wrote letters and reports. planned everything and a lot more.  I hope to build a distillery, have tour videos and some other things.

My endeavour is football coaching and I have coached lots of youngers ones/ people my own age. I have made a how to video on how to do different football skills that you can easily do yourself.   I have made a poster on very good football skills and I have made a poster on what skills and drills I will be teaching all the younger ones. And I wrote to Billy Wingrove who was a youtuber coach and a professional football player at one point in his career.   I have made my daily planner that you have to do and I’m thinking on making another how to video.

What is Endeavour?

1.  An Endeavour is a project where pupils choose an amazing project to do on their own. It must be ambitious and something that you have never done before. Like a hobby with more work put into it. Whole of P 5/6/7 are doing an Endeavor  

2.  In the classroom I came up with the idea of doing animation. This is what made it ambitious; having to edit, taking loads of pictures and moving the props in tiny little spaces. 

 3.Right now, I have achieved an animation that is nearly one minute long which takes about 300 photos. You need a story line and mine is someone who thinks he is cooler and better than everyone else. 

 4.What I need to do next is to do some research and finish my animation.  

ENDEAVOR 

Endeavor is when you pick a topic and you do it on your own and you need to pick something what you have never learnt before. Also, you start at the start of the year. 

Game design is when you make a game using kudo or Scratch.   After lunch we get our things what we need to use. I am doing game design what is you make a game; you show your game what you made and how you made it. 

 I am going to make a game like a race where Kodu the robot and must get to the end first all. Meanwhile I will be looking at the robot if I have done something wrong.

 At the end of the endeavor we have a fair to show other classes and we show people what we have made, you can show them how you made it and how to play it. After that you have done your Endeavor for the year. If you made something, you could sell it. 

  I am planning to make a full race game what I have to build for my Endeavor, so I need to code it and test it. After I finish my game, I will let people try my game.

We have a thing called Endeavour

I do animation for my Endeavour.  I did my Endeavour alone.  I think I did good at my Endeavour so far.  I have done 59 sections of my animation, it was good therapy to watch, and it was funny.

This afternoon all the classes worked together in their houses to complete three World Book Day challenges; a scavenger hunt, costume design and healthy snack. We had a great afternoon together celebrating reading!

A’ comharrachadh na Gàidhlig air feadh an t-saoghail / World Gaelic Week – Celebrating Scottish Gaelic across the globe. 20-26 An Gearran // February 2023

Gaelic weather with P4. #SeachdainNaGàidhlig ⁦@bordnagaidhlig⁩ ⁦@sngaidhlig⁩ pic.twitter.com/1VLW0DiPOq

— Port Ellen Primary School (@portellenps) February 22, 2023

We had lots going on in Port Ellen for Gaelic week.  P12 made pancakes using Gaelic words, P567 made Gaelic healthy tuck for the whole school, P3 designed Gaelic T-shirts and as you can see, P4 made Gaelic weather forecasts! Sgoinneil a h-uile duine!

As we came around the final bend a blue sign came into sight, a sign that said Ardentinny. We drove up the drive and I saw a building, a building that looked like a dank grey box. This was Ardentinny.  We were coming here for a residential trip will all the P6/7’s from Islay and Jura on the 14th of February. Ardentinny is an outdoor education center that has activities like kayaking, archery and abseiling.

When we arrived, we went up to our dorm and unpacked a few things and went to dinner. After that we went on a night walk through the forest. I stepped into the jet-black forest. It seemed like my light got dimmer as we trekked into the forest, adrenalin keeping me going. I clung onto the rope for dear life and then we were told to switch our lights off, and we were plunged into blackness. When we were allowed to switch them back on, we quickly walked back. The next activity we did was a team challenge which was an obstacle course. In the afternoon, we did rock hop, which involves jumping from rock to rock and climbing.

The next day we did the climbing activity. Everyone was in a rush to the first activity. For climbing we climbed up three different slopes easy medium and hard in partners. Next, we abseiled where you must climb down a slope.  It was all so much fun!

Evie

The bus pulled up to an old dejected looking building. A building that somehow looked like a 1990’s prison. One at a time, we all made our way off the almost luxurious bus we had been sitting in for the last 2 hours. Lazily we all dragged our vast luggage towards the open door leading to the building. All P6/7 from Islay and Jura were very excited to be there.

After an introduction we briskly made our way up to the dormitories where we were supposed to get our room numbers. Without thinking, everyone ran towards their room. Everyone quickly unpacked and was down at the boot-room within 30 minutes. I headed outside and down the hill to the boot-room. We tried on our wellies and fitted them. Everyone got waterproofs for outside activities.

After the boot-room we walked up the hill, through the door and to dinner. About 15 minutes into dinner, a boy in group 6 ( Everyone was selected into groups 1-6 I was in group 1.) dramatically tipped the table and ran out the room. Everyone was talking about it for the rest of the night but it eased off as dinner continued. We all got about 20 minutes after dinner to unpack a bit and get changed, and then we went on a night walk. After that, we came back and had supper, and went to sleep.

In the morning everyone was complaining about the rooms but were still excited for all of the activities. We all sat and ate breakfast in our groups. I had 9 people in my group. That included: me, Evie, Maria, Catherin, John, Ruddy, Johnny, Jacob and Thomas. Our group leader was Catriona. We started off the day by meeting our group leaders and doing a team challenge, an obstacle course and an “Laser escape room” which actually wasn’t a laser escape room. Just some old rope attached to a tree to make a pathway to go through. I made it through on my second try, the main objective was to make your way through the rope/laser escape room without touching the rope. Everyone in my group thoroughly enjoyed it. But, I think everyone also enjoyed the obstacle course. It was a wonderful experience. After lunch we went rock hopping, rock hopping was probably one of my favourite activities out of everything we did. It was an activity that involved a bit of rock climbing, but with rock climbing you usually climb up the rock; with rock hoping you climb across. Rock hopping is an adventurous activity that consists of squeezing into tight spaces above ground. We took the Ardentinny bus to a beach nearby and walked up the path till we were at the place where we were to start rock hopping. We clambered across rocks and made our way towards the end, at one point we actually met team 3. Eventually, we made it to the final rock. We walked all the way back to the centre and packed up all our stuff and lay it down to dry. We all went upstairs to change if we got wet and then went down for dinner.

In the dinner hall we were given macaroni and cheese. There were also some side dishes that you could take instead, most people were fine with the macaroni and cheese but I took chips, garlic bread and pasta. After dinner we went downstairs to the boot-room to get ready for search and rescue, that was our night activity. We all did extremely well. Everyone was tired after a long day, we all fell asleep quickly.  It was so much fun!

Iona