We would like to remind you that we will be holding our Nursery Burns celebrations tomorrow. Once the children have enjoyed their “Burns Supper”, we will sing the Scottish songs that we’ve been learning to finish off our celebrations. Please remember that you are invited to come in to hear the children sing at the end of the Nursery session at either 11.20 or 2.50. We look forward to seeing lots of parents to give the children an audience.
Tag: Scotland
Scottish Celebrations
As we started our week of Scottish celebrations, on Monday morning both the Rainbow and Sunshine rooms joined the rest of the school to enjoy entertainment by a band playing Scottish music. We learned about different types of music and soon we were clapping and tapping our feet in time to reels and strathspeys with everyone else. Thank you very much to Mrs. Lewis and her band for taking time to come to our school – we really enjoyed your visit. We are looking forward to a visit later in the week to Nursery from Mrs. Roberts, a band member who works at Hecklegirth, to learn more about Scottish music and in particular the fiddle.
Music To Our Ears
We had a lovely end to our week with a visit from Lewis who is a former pupil
of Hecklegirth. It’s a few years since he was a pupil in our Nursery but it’s always great to welcome him back.
After our recent work on Scotland, Lewis came to talk to us about the playing the accordion and to give us a tune or two. It certainly seems a tricky instrument to master but Lewis has been practising for a few years and he entertained us well. As the Nursery children have been learning about Robert Burns, Lewis was also kind enough to give us a beautiful rendition of the Burns’ song he will sing in a competition at the week-end.
To close our musical afternoon, the children sang their Scottish songs for Lewis who proclaimed, “There’s no doubt that Hecklegirth’s got talent”.
Lewis is certainly a talented young man and we wish him well for his Burns’ competition. We look forward to hearing how it went when he visits next week to perform to the morning children. Thank you Lewis for being a super visitor – we enjoyed your performance very much.
A Touch o’ Tartan
What a wonderful week we have had with the various activities to celebrate our learning about Scotland. As well as learning about the fiddle and Rory’s Dad’s super storytelling, we enjoyed our Burn’s celebration on Tuesday with Primary 1 and Primary 2/1 followed by a great day on Friday when we were part of the whole school celebration.
We appreciate everyone making a super effort to provide the children with ‘a touch o’ tartan’ on both days. It certainly added to the occasion and they all looked wonderful. We hope that you enjoyed hearing the children sing on Friday and that you were able to take the opportunity to have a look at their work on display. It was great to see so many families join in our celebration with a coffee and a taste of the shortbread made by the children. Thank you for everyone’s support and lovely comments.
Here is a taster of our week in photos. You can see a fuller outline and photos of our learning about Scotland in our ‘Thinking Books’ which are in the book area in Nursery.
The Storytelling Daddy
Rory’s Daddy came in to tell us the stories he had written using Scottish dialect. We heard about a little girl called Rosa who wanted to be a barber and enjoyed the story of a ‘moose’ who went to the moon. Rory’s Mummy was also able to explain the story in Polish to some of the children.
As a thank you we sang them the Scottish songs we have been learning which they seemed to enjoy. We would like to thank Rory’s family for a wonderful storytelling visit.
Fiddle Fun
As part of our learning about Scottish culture, the afternoon children were invited to Primary 2/1’s classroom last week to learn about the fiddle. Mrs. Roberts told us about the different parts of it and how the sound comes out of it. She played us several Scottish tunes and then gave us a big surprise when she played a tune that we know. We all joined in with “Ye Cannae Shove Yer Granny Aff a Bus” then we managed to record it and listen back on to our singing on the computer which was great fun. If you turn up your volume and click on the link below you can hear the children singing along to Mrs. Roberts playing the fiddle.
Mrs. Roberts even helped some children hold the little fiddle and they were able to make some sounds with it. Maybe one day they will be able to play like Mrs. Roberts.
Thank you so much to Mrs. Roberts as well as Miss Cameron and Primary 2/1. We really enjoyed our visit to your classroom. Hopefully the morning children will be able to enjoy this experience with Primary 1 later in the week.
Scottish Celebrations
We would like to remind you that, as part of building an awareness of Scottish language and culture, we will celebrate Burn’s Day on Tuesday 24th January. This will take the form of some fun games and a small “Burn’s Supper”.
It would add to the occasion if the children were able to wear something tartan but please don’t worry if your child does not have anything as this is a fun, informal event. We are looking forward to Primary 1 joining us in the morning and Primary 2/1 in our afternoon celebration.
Next Friday will provide the opportunity for families to come in to hear us sing our Scottish songs and see some of the work that all the Early Years classes have been doing as part of our Scottish celebrations. Details are in Miss Wilson’s recent newsletter. We look forward to a busy and fun week.
Our “Tartan Party” Preparations
As Burn’s Day approaches, we are learning about Robert Burns and Scottish culture. The children have been amazed to learn that Robert Burns has visited Annan and some may even be dragging you to the local chip shop to see the plaque on the wall that tells us this.
To prepare for our Burn’s celebrations, or as one of the children called it “Our Tartan Party”, we have been learning “Ye Cannae Shove Yer Granny Aff the Bus” and “Three Craws” which we will perform next week. The afternoon children will celebrate on Tuesday with P1, P2 and P3/2. The morning children will have their celebration on Wednesday with P4 and P5. If possible, it would be great if the children could wear a little tartan to help us all join in the spirit of the event.
Along with oatcakes, cheese and Irn Bru the children thought that some shortbread would be a tasty addition to our “Burn’s Supper”. Miss Wilson has spoken to the kind ladies in the kitchen and they will be making some for us. However, we are also baking shortbread ourselves: as you can see from the photos, some of the children are demonstrating very good skills. Mrs. Lindsay, Mrs. Hamilton and Miss Wilson were lucky enough to be chosen as “tasters” and they were very impressed with our baking.
