Author: Mr Cormack

P6-7 Term 4 Update – May/June

Numeracy – Primary 6-7 are now going back to different areas of maths that we have covered during remote learning to do some revision and ensure we are secure with every area of mathematics before moving on to the next school year.

Literacy – The children have been planning and editing persuasive writing and are now moving on to discursive writing in line with our listening and talking debates.

Primary 6-7 learned how to write diamante poems this week and we are now moving on to the features of a debate and how it links to our Topic of Current Affairs.

Topic – The class have been learning about the difference between the House of Commons and the House of Lords this week. We’ve talked about the rigorous screening that laws must go through parliament.

 

Sports Challenge – P6-7 are planning an obstacle course with Miss Davie to showcase to the parents and guardians for our sports challenge day in June. We look forward to welcoming you!

 

If you need anything at all, you can contact me on jodi.riley@aberdeenshire.gov.uk or you can still contact me via Google Classroom.

P6/7 May 2021

Numeracy – The children have been learning to solve algebraic equations in class. They are practicing using one and two step function machines and using these skills to solve basic equations. Some of the children are multiplying out brackets in equations and simplifying them by collecting like terms.

Other curricular areas –  We have started our current affairs topic and are learning about devolved powers within the Scottish Parliament. We spoke about the recent election and will be learning about the House of Commons and the House of Lords. The children will also have a go at writing their own manifestos and forming political parties.

PE – The children are learning and choreographing a dance routine in partnership with me! I am so impressed with how hard they have worked on this and the effort and enthusiasm they have shown has been absolutely amazing. Hopefully we can showcase it in some format (virtually or otherwise) before the end of term.

Virtual Learning – Primary 6/7 have been fortunate enough to take part in a variety of virtual learning this term so far. Last week was TechFest where we learned about Marine Plastics with a session from Ocean Activist Emily Penn in partnership with Macduff Aquarium. We also joined a presentation from Dynamic Earth who taught us about our carbon footprint. You can calculate yours at https://footprint.wwf.org.uk/#/

If you need anything at all, you can contact me on jodi.riley@aberdeenshire.gov.uk or you can still contact me via Google Classroom.

P4/5 May 2021

Maths – We continue to work on our fractions, moving between simplifying, ordering and matching equivalents.  We have been fortunate to do some fractions games outside in between the rain showers!

Literacy – We have been asked to write a persuasive letter to some approved funding bodies to help with improvements to the school playground.  The children have discussed what they think would make a good playground and what arguments we could use to write our letters.  We will continue with this next week as well.

Techfest – We have been fortunate to join Techfest this week with their on-line meetings.  We have learned about bugs from the Critter Keeper, looked at fossils with a palaeontologist, heard about a sustainable café in Torry Battery and been amazed at the amount of plastic in our oceans during a presentation by Macduff Aquarium.  If you would like to find out more, many of the presentations have been recorded.  The link for Techfest is: https://www.techfestsetpoint.org.uk/

 

 

P3/4 May 2021

Last week we had great excitement in P3/4 as we received the news that all our diary entries for the Young Writer’s Competition were chosen as winners! I am so proud of the children for the effort they put into their writing. Everyone is excited to have their story published in a book.

This week we have been working hard to plan a persuasive piece of writing linked to our Water topic. The children had the great idea of trying to encourage wider recycling in school, so this is the theme of our writing. So far, we have discussed the main arguments we will include and have gathered facts to backup our points. Next week, we will start the first draft of our writing.

We have learned about synonyms to widen our vocabulary. We identified ‘boring’ words we use too often and used a thesaurus and lots of books to help us create a Synonym Flowers wall display. The children thought of fantastic words we can now use to make our writing even better!

In Grammar, we have been learning about singular and plural nouns. The children have learned different rules for making singular nouns plural – although there are lots of rules to remember! We have practised this through games and sorting activities.

Last week in maths, we revisited multiplication. The children are making big improvements in their mental recall of the multiplication facts of the 2,3,4,5 and 10 times table. We practised our times tables through problem solving activities – the children particularly enjoyed trying to work out secret codes using their times table knowledge!

This week we have been working on place value and addition and subtraction. We have discussed lots of different strategies, comparing them to see which is the most effective.

Next week, we will be learning about fractions.

We had some fantastic discussion around Internet Safety in Health and Wellbeing. The children enjoyed watching a ThinkUKnow video on playing games online. We talked about the importance of being safe, and only speaking to people you know online.

This week we focused on Rights and Responsibilities, and we learned the difference between them. The children found it interesting to learn about their rights, and all the children showed a great understanding of what they are responsible for and how they should treat others.

We have continued with our Water topic this week. We tuned in to a brilliant live session on Marine Plastics on Tuesday. The children were fascinated and shocked by all the information about plastic pollution – this sparked the idea for our persuasive writing in Literacy!

We have learned about hot and cold climates around the world. From this we learned about why plants need water, and where the best places are for plants to grow. We made rain gauges and popped them around the playground so we can measure rainfall over the term.

Today we are carrying out an experiment on dissolving solids – I am sure the children will enjoy this!

P1/2 May 2021

In our topic we learned about what plants need to grow and went outside to make some “magic” potions. We worked with a partner. P1 then used this for their sentence building and P2 – for learning how to write a recipe.

P1 have been learning to subtract by using a number line and their fingers. We were writing our own take away stories and working on alternative subtraction language. In money we are looking at 1p/2p and £1/£2 more.

P2 have been looking at how division links with multiplication and some were working on division problems with remainders using their knowledge of times tables. We were also using the 20p coin.

In RME we were discussing our responsibility for looking after the Earth and how this is taught in different religions. It was good to hear from a child who recently joined us that Fettercairn has a very tidy playground! Other children were able to talk about taking their litter home and recycling.

In art we were looking at Renoir’s Les Parapluies and we painted our own versions!

Primary 4/5 – Welcome Back

Welcome back to Term 4!  We have wasted no time getting back into our classroom routines.  In literacy we have just finished a series of weekly debates around topical issues chosen by the children.  The children have split into two teams and argued for an against the subject.  I have been very impressed with the levels of maturity and respect that the children have shown when discussing different points of view.  The children have also followed up this activity with a short essay giving the pros and cons of the argument.

We also continue to read our class novel, ‘The Elsewhere Emporium’

In maths we are revising fractions.  Last week we looked at how to simplify fractions and this week we are looking at equivalent fractions.  We will be moving on to adding fractions before looking and decimals and percentages. The children have played equivalent fraction snap, used worksheets and watched a video on equivalent fractions.  The weather has unfortunately been too changeable this week for outside fractions activities.

The children have made some brilliant posters with Mrs. Smith showing their understanding of adjectives which are now up on our display boards.

Homework is posted at 3:30pm on google classroom for your children to complete.  As ever, if you have any queries or concerns please do get in touch.

P6-7 Term 4 Update

We have loved our time back at school! The children are really thriving being able to work alongside their peers again!

Literacy 
We are learning to infer (read between the lines) when we are reading our class novel, Wonder. We are using the formula ‘text clues + background knowledge = inference’ to try to understand things that the author doesn’t directly say in the text.

The class are learning to write persuasively. We are learning about putting across arguments, backing them up with more information, writing an introduction and a conclusion and using bossy verbs.

Numeracy 
The class have been measuring length, mass, and capacity with some using formula to calculate volume. We were using the scales to weigh things and jugs to measure volume.

We are moving on to revision of topics covered over the year and consolidating topics covered during remote learning.

Other curricular areas 

Topic – This term, we have been learning about Europe and will be moving on to Current Affairs. Within this the children will be having a mock election and will write manifestos.

PE – The P6-7’s have been putting their hockey skills of passing, dribbling, defending, tackling and shooting into practice and we have been playing games of 4 v 4 and 6 v 6.

Health and Wellbeing – We are continuing to work on building positive relationships within the classroom. We have covered name calling, friendships, language and appropriate behaviour in school.

 

Thank you all so much for taking the time to meet with me for our parent teacher meetings. It was lovely to see you all again! If you need anything at all, you can contact me on jodi.riley@aberdeenshire.gov.uk or you can still contact me via Google Classroom.

April 2021 – P3/4

For our writing task this week, we challenged ourselves to up-level our weekend news that we wrote on Monday morning. The children self-assessed their piece of writing and decided how they were going to make it even better. P3 worked hard on this task, and each child produced a great piece of writing!

Last week we linked our writing lesson to our topic on Water. We learned about the Water Cycle, and then we wrote about the cycle from the perspective of a water particle going through the process. We then used our writing to produce some wonderful Water Cycle posters!

We have been learning about Common and Proper Nouns. We have been trying hard to include capital letters in the correct places, as well as forming our letters correctly.

Since returning after the Easter holidays, our focus in maths has been Measurement. We have explored measuring in metres and centimetres, choosing the most appropriate unit of measurement based on the size of an object. We always estimate before measuring an object, and as the children are becoming more confident, their estimates are getting closer to the actual length of the items! We learned about capacity and had lots of fun experimenting with water, rainbow rice and cubes.

We are currently learning about weight, where we will be using the kilogram and ½ kilogram next week. With Miss Davie, the children have started to focus on problem solving skills.

Last week in Health and Wellbeing we were describing and recording strategies for getting on with others in the classroom. The children had some great discussion about what we (both children and adults) need to do our best in school.

This week we have discussed money and responsibility. The children have created lots of interesting discussion around wants and needs, as well as spending and saving money.

In PE at the moment, we are focusing on Hockey skills. This has been a hit so far!

We started our new topic on Water since returning to school after the holidays. So far, we have learned about the Water Cycle. We did a science experiment to see the Water Cycle being re-created in a plastic bag stuck to the window! This proved to be successful and the children identified the different parts of the Water Cycle in the bag. We are learning about solids, liquids and gases, and have carried out another experiment exploring melting ice and insulators.

April 2021 – P1/2

Primary 1/2 have been doing a lot of work on money, and many are finding it a struggle to recognise coins. This is only natural as they have had so little experience of using coins in the past year as we have all tried to stay away from handling anything that might be a source of germs, and families have not been in shops. It would really help if they could safely handle coins from 1p to £2 at home, and practise recognising, naming and ordering them for value. Making coins rubbings would also help.

Primary 1 have been working on forming capital letters and trying to make sure they are the right size, as well as working on sounds ee and oo. Primary 2 have been revising nouns and verbs, and learning about using adverbs.

In PE Miss Davie has been working with us outdoors on throwing skills, balancing and listening in team games.

We have been listening to stories and songs, and playing games to help us learn colours in French.

P1/2 – Summer Term

P1/2 will continue to work on new spelling patterns, with more focus on common words. In writing we will create our own characters and short stories. P1 will learn to form capital letters correctly and P2 will be working on adverbs, plurals, antonyms, alphabetical order and speech marks.

In Numeracy and Mathematics P1 will revise number bonds to 10 and use those to work on subtraction. P2 will use their multiplication knowledge to gain understanding about division and fractions. We will also begin to learn about money.

Our topic ‘All Around Us’ will take us outside as we follow the children’s interests and look closely at our immediate environment for connections between humans and nature.