Good afternoon,

Here is a little overview of our learning in P7M this week.

Health

This week in P.E we have been playing dodge ball. We had 4 captains and played 2 v 2, then 1 v1. The winning team from 1 v 1 got to stay on. In our lesson with Mr Richardson we were playing badminton and we split into teams of 4 and then we had 4 minute games. The others were referees during the games. On Friday we got to play rugby, we split into teams and played 5 aside. On Wednesday, two outreach members of staff from Alloa Academy visited us and shared a PowerPoint all about things to expect when we move to secondary school. We found out that the corridors are actually painted the same colour as the subject signs. This will really help us to find our way when we get to secondary school. We got to see photos of some of the teachers, including the guidance teachers and people who can help us. We know about the cashless system used and expectations for school uniform and P.E attire.

Literacy

This week we have been doing some Titanic reading comprehension. We used the chilli challenge to decide which level of questions we would like to answer. We tried really hard to answer in full sentences and have been practising this before we move to secondary. In writing, we continued with our diary entries and wrote about the first full day aboard the Titanic. We had to think about the activities we would have been doing and writing in past tense. We practised writing in past tense during our grammar lesson this week. In reading we have been skimming and scanning and reading aloud to help develop our fluency and expression.

Mathematics

In maths this week we have been learning about the use of negative numbers when we are working with temperature and money. We learned what the term ‘withdrew’ means and also how the number line works when we go below zero. On Wednesday, we were working in our math sets. We were working on times tables and fractions. We also got maths homework! We also learned how to complete long multiplication sums and answer multi-step written worded problems.

Social Studies

In our topic lessons this week we have been very busy. We have been creating a design brief about how we’re going to make a model to float in our school pond. We’ve also started PowerPoint presentations about Harland and Wolff ( the ship building company who made the Titanic). We also had a look at the timeline of events and ordered these in chronological order.

Science

In Science, we continued to learn about floating, sinking and buoyancy (or Beyoncé, ask your child what we mean!!)

. We also had a tin foil boat competition where we had to design a boat which could float with marbles on top of it.

Phew, what a busy week.

Mrs McGirr and P7M

Hi everyone and welcome to our blog this week. Here is a little snapshot of our learning this week.

WB-This week in P.E we have played dodge ball and had  choices between football, gymnastics and basketball.

BM1- In maths this week we have been doing word problems we had to answer 10 questions and do extension task. We were working out which operation we needed to do for each question.

GG-In health we have been improving our mental health skills and learning about our emotions and what calms us down. We have been looking at ways to calm ourselves if we need it. We thought about how we could stop little worries becoming big worries.

BM2- In chanter some of us have been attending a chanter lesson in the lunch hall.

BM1-In music we have been learning about different instruments like the keyboard, drum kit,  drum pads, guitar, xylophone & glockenspiel.

NH- In topic we have been creating posters to present to the class. We worked in cooperative groups and focussed on our Talking and Listening skills when presenting. We each had a turn to present and a turn to assess. We were looking for things such as eye contact, pace and tone of voice. Our posters were about the class system on board the Titanic.

By DP and JK

Dear Parent/Carer,

I hope you find the following information useful. If you have any questions please do not hesitate to contact me.

General Information:

Welcome to the start of new session here at Redwell. I am looking forward to continuing working with you and your child throughout the year. I’m sure P7 will thrive on the challenges and responsibilities that their final year in Primary will bring. They have already settled into our daily routines and have impressed me with their positive attitudes to learning and working with others.

P7 continue to have two 45 minute sessions of P.E each week, one on a Monday and one on a Friday. They will also have an extra 30 minutes of P.E. with me on a Thursday. The pupils will have Art with Mrs Barron, Food Technology with Miss Robinson or Music with Mrs Pennie every Tuesday, on a rotational basis. A reminder that Golden Time is on a Friday afternoon and a selection of activities will be available. Please ensure your child returns their Golden Time Diary on a Monday.

Topic/Learning Context

After consultation with the pupils, we have decided that our Learning Context for this term will have a history focus and will look at The Unsinkable Ship, The Titanic. We have started to look at the construction of the Titanic and the passengers onboard. We have created biographies for the passengers. Next week, we will look more closely at the class system used during the time of The Titanic.

Through this topic we will:

• Look at the timeline of events in the construction, sinking and discovery of The Titanic.
• Look at floating and sinking objects and use this knowledge to design and construct model boats to float (or sink) in the school pond.
• Research the class system on The Titanic and use ICT to create fact files of different passengers.
• Research the length of The Titanic and other famous ships and use this knowledge to create scaled drawings (1cm to 1m) in the playground using chalk.

Core Literacy

• Continue to improve our written work and story writing skills through focusing on some of the technical aspects of our writing, for example punctuation and grammar, as well as maintain the development of engaging our readers through word choice and descriptive phases.
• Develop and produce a variety of imaginative writing and organise writing with a clear structure and logical sequence ensuring we are referring back to our plan.
• Continue to work on comprehension skills during our Reading, Language and Interdisciplinary activities.
• Continue to learn spelling rules and participate in a variety of activities to promote and help develop our spelling.

Core Numeracy

• Consolidate an understanding of place value – that the individual digits that form a number each have a value and to build and describe numbers in a variety of ways.
• To further work on all multiplication tables and develop memory skills for these.
• To develop our understanding of fractions, decimals and percentages. Currently we have been focusing on fractions: learning how to calculate equivalent fractions, how to simplify fractions fully, find fractions of a product and add and subtract fractions with the same denominator.

Many thanks for your continued support

Mrs McGirr

Here are some of our highlights from this week.

RM: “We had maths this week. We split into 4 groups. Some of us some worked with Mr English, some with Mr Swan, some with Mrs Stephen and some with Mrs McGirr”

WB: “In P.E we were doing the beep test. We are working on our fitness, strength and stamina”

JK: “We were writing letters as if were just about to go on the Titanic. We were writing to a friend or a member of our family”.

DP: “In spelling we were learning new words and we did a spelling test”

RM: “This week in Art we cut out our Titanic pictures and added the background using oil pastels”

BM1″ In grammar we were learning about double negatives. We were identifying double negatives in a sentence and we were writing them out correctly on our whiteboards”

Check back next week.

P7M

We started our week with us writing about skiing on the laptops. We were writing a recount about the times when we were in the learning pit and the times when we were climbing our way out.

In Science, we were learning about microorganisms and we even built our very own microorganisms using play doh. DP said “There can be three types of microorganisms such as bacteria, virus and fungi. sometimes bacteria can be good for you and there is millions of bacteria on our body.”

In Writing, we learned about the forest fires in the Amazon rainforest. We then decided to write persuasive poems to inspire people to do something about it. Here are a few examples.

In other news, we all managed to use the tow at our skiing lesson and received a certificate. Mrs McGirr is very proud of the resilience we all showed during our lessons and extends her thanks to the hardworking staff at Firpark.

By NH and SM