This morning Leswalt opened our doors a little earlier to welcome our first crew of breakfast clubbers! On the menu this morning Mrs Kyle whipped up a delightful array of continental options – yogurt, cereal, toast and fruit. Just like the toaster, the first day of the breakfast was popping off with lots of happy, smiley faces enjoying their breakfasts, with some sampling many of the choices on offer – I think its fair to say the first day was a big success and we hope it continues to make everyone smile! I for one would love Mrs Kyle to serve me my breakfast each morning 🍌👩🍳🍽🍞
After breakfast some of the girls had a little play of the games on offer, including hungry hippos – but luckily there is no chance of any of them in the building now! 🤤 This breakfast club is funded by a successful grant application to Bright Start breakfast club to give our little people exactly that – a bright start to their day!
Meta Skills – Collaborating Cora, Communicating Cate
Article 27 – The right for children and young people should be able to have the food and housing they need to reach their full potential.
On Monday, we welcomed Richard Patchett back into school to do some outdoor maths with us! Richard had kindly collected some branches for us and we made sling-shots using elastic! Using the conkers we collected on Friday afternoon from the Wetlands and some kind conker donations, we (safely) launched conkers using our slingshots (Risk assessment assured😏). The aim was to launch the conkers to hit the target and use their adding strategies to tally up their scores! Such a fun, hands on opportunity for children to use their maths skills!
Tuesday – Big Maths with our Big People ✖️➕➖➗
On Tuesday afternoon, both classes welcomed their families into school to show off our Big Maths! Whether you’re Primary 2 or Primary 7, Big Maths is a big deal! We had a fantastic afternoon showing off our Clic Tests and the strategies we use to reinforce number operations and facts. We then tested our quick number fact recall with our Learn In Tests, with the added fun of our families joining in with the Primary 6-7 test! 😆Primary 1’s had fun with their big people in the hall, playing some fun games and showing off how we use Numicon to reinforce number recognition.🔢👨👩👧👦
Photoshop Filter Fun 🔣🖼
On Tuesday afternoon, Primary 4-7’s captured some of Leswalt’s beautiful landscapes; from still waters to winding paths, rowed up fields and autumnal trees at the Wetlands🍂🌳🌿 Back at school, the pupils worked hard to edit their photographs using the iPads ‘edit’ function. We looked at percentages and how the increase and decrease in saturation, vibrancy or sharpness percentages can really alter the shot. We experimented with the percentage combinations on our own shots and feel very proud of the Instagram worthy shots we have created!
James and Murray
Eilidh and Keira
Hannah and Lily
Colin and Ben
Rachel and Rebecca
Wednesday – On Wednesday both classes played some fun maths games indoors, Primary 4-7 played an all-time favourite – SPLAT! to practise their tables and number fact fluency! Miss Douglas had created a fun Kahoot Quiz to compete against each-other to solve maths word problems!✖️➕➖➗
Thursday – Chasing Shadows: Maths Measurement 🌞
This term, P1-3 have been learning about the sun, moon and stars. Today’s mission was to explore the movement of the sun throughout the day, by measuring their shadows at different times. With the help of their P4-7 buddies, they headed out early this morning to measure their shadows in the morning sun – afterwards, they predicted what would happen later in the day, would they move? would they get bigger or smaller? ☀️
Later on, they tested out their predictions by re-measuring their shadows, before and after lunchtime. 📏They were amazed to see that their shadows were not the same length as in the morning, and some were pointing in a different direction too. Some fun hands-on maths fun in the sunshine!
Friday – Mandala Maths in the Mud! 🍂🌳⚪
This afternoon Primary 4-7 ventured up the Wetlands to create some Mandala Pattern Art, practising some of the symmetry and rotation we have been learning as part of our shape focus in Maths! We collected sticks, stones, conkers and feathers and used these to create unique mandala patterns!
Phew! We’ve had a fantastic week and luckily some fantastic weather to celebrate Maths in Nature as Part of Scotland’s National Maths Week! 😆
This morning P4-7 , armed with snacks and carboard headed over to Kirkcolm for a morning of flight with Visible Fictions’ “The Impossible” Project!✈️
Over the course of the term the boys and girls have been learning about the 4 forces of flight, famous aeronauts from the past and what exactly is in a flight deck of a plane!? They put this knowledge to work by creating their very own flight decks to take part in the audio drama, this gave them a space to experience the story from which helped to immerse them in the experience.
When we arrived, we teamed up with Kirkcolm’s upper class for a game of ‘Guess What’s in the Box’. The three volunteers used adjectives to describe the textures of the unknown objects and using their clues, we identified a pilot’s hat, a yellow plane and a globe which led us to think about famous pilot Amelia Earheart and her plane, ‘the Canary.’👩✈️ Afterwards, we wired up our headsets, and immersed ourself in our cardboard flight decks and enjoyed an audio drama of a plane journey and crash!
We had a fantastic morning learning about the history of flight and having fun with our Kirkcolm friends! 👩✈️ 👨✈️
A warm sunny day in September… unheard of! Primary 1-3 made the most of the great weather today by heading outside for some fun shadow science 🌞! This term, they have been learning about the sun, moon and stars. Today’s mission was to explore the movement of the sun throughout the day, by measuring their shadows at different times. With the help of their P4-7 buddies, they headed out early this morning to measure their shadows in the morning sun – afterwards, they predicted what would happen later in the day, would they move? would they get bigger or smaller? ☀️
Later on, they tested out their predictions by re-measuring their shadows, before and after lunchtime. They were amazed to see that their shadows were not the same length as in the morning, and some were pointing in a different direction too.
It was a wonderful day of hands-on learning , making the most of the sunshine! 🙂
Today, Primary 4–7 pupils armed with iPads explored the beautiful landscapes of the Wetlands and Village, capturing everything from still waters to winding paths, rowed up fields and autumnal trees.🍂🌳🌿 The trip followed a special visit from a local photographer, Chris Smith who shared expert tips on how to frame a shot, look for interesting angles, and use light creatively. We put his top-tips into practice outdoors, taking some lovely landscape photos.
Back at school, the pupils worked hard to edit their photographs using the iPads ‘edit’ function, we experimented with colour, contrast, and cropping to make their images stand out. The results were fantastic – We are very proud of the effort and enthusiasm shown by everyone, and we look forward to displaying some of the pupils’ favourite shots around school!
Check out the photo library to see our work! 😄 📸
Eilidh and KeiraColin and BenHannah and LilyRachel and RebeccaJames and Murray
According to Gregor, today has been the “best Friday ever!”. This judgement was based on all the sweet treats provided in school today.
At breaktime the boys and girls of Leswalt were treated to some birthday cake from Noah, in Primary 1. Noah is only 4 today, but tomorrow he will turn into a big 5 year old! Happy birthday to Noah ! 🎂
After lunch, the boys and girls of P1-3 enjoyed some jelly, cream and sprinkles from Mrs Mc Knight. Yesterday, they had all made the jelly in school as part of their writing and writing the procedure on how to make jelly. 🍹
Then, to end the day the younger children enjoyed some Oreo biscuits – this time as part of their Science learning and teaching. They enjoyed taking bites out of the biscuits to demonstrate the different phases of the moon. 🥮
So, fruity Friday was replaced for one week only with some sugar. By the smiles on their faces, I do not think they minded!
At the beginning of the school year all pupils were given the opportunity to take on a bit more responsibility around our school by applying for various positions including; Pupil Council, Eco Committee, House Captains, Digital Leaders and Monitor jobs. These jobs ensure that pupils’ voices are heard in everything that we do and allow them to take ownership over our fab wee school! ❤️💬
Having looked through the applications , we have now selected our reps for the current session – these effective contributors will be working together to help our school continue to be the happy place it is and make it shine even more🌟
Pupil Council
Jack (P1), Betty (P2), Cameron and James H(p3), Eilidh (P4), Olivia (P6) James McD (p7)
Eco Committee Leo (P1),Gregor (P2), Jorgie (p3), Emma (p4), Murray and Rebecca (P7)
Digital Leaders
Rachael and Ben (p7)
House Captains
Rachael (Corsewall) and Colin (Lochnaw)
Monitors:
Playground – Jorgie (p2) and Lily (P5)
Meta Manager – Eilidh (P4) James McD (P7)
Dinner Hall – Beathan (p3)
Cloakroom – – Erin (P2) Keira (p4)
Library – Hannah (P4) Jessica (P2)
Today we welcomed local photographer and Kirkcolm Parent Chris Smith into P4-7 to talk all things photography – our art focus this term. Having explored what photography means and looked at some Macro photography in the playground. This week our focus has been on portraits.🖼
Chris was able to show us some of the breathtaking landscapes he’s photographed and his camera kit and discussed with us how he goes about taking his photos and the effort that goes in to taking a good landscape photo.🏔 He even showed The times you have to get up at in the morning, to drive to the ideal location, to then climb where you need to be, to get the perfect shot at the perfect time… and it’s still not guaranteed! The pupils had many many(!) questions for Chris, all of which he patiently answered, and we are all left feeling fairly inspired to dig out our cameras from the back of the cupboard and have a go ourselves!
Afterwards, Chris even let us have a go at taking some portraits using his professional camera. He showed us the different lenses he uses to capture the perfect shot. We even managed so squeeze in some quick selfies! I’m sure Chris’ camera roll will have some beautiful and interesting photos of Primary 4-7 this afternoon! 😍🤳
A big thank you to Chris for taking the time to visit our class this afternoon and for his inspiring chat on photography. We can’t wait to put his top tips and feedback into practice as we continue our photography in the following weeks! 📸
This afternoon P4-7 welcomed police officer, PC Amy McGregor into our classroom to talk to use about harmful substances and keeping ourselves safe and healthy, to support our HWB learning – substance misuse. 👮♀️🚨🚓
She spoke to us about the dangers linked to smoking and vaping, alcohol and drugs and warned us about the effects that these substances can have on our bodies and choices and most importantly the importance of making safe, healthy choices. PC Amy encouraged us to think about peer pressure and the importance of looking out for each other and encouraging our friends to make positive choices.
It wasn’t all serious, though – PC McGregor had a warm and friendly way of explaining things and made sure that everyone felt comfortable joining in the discussion.
Thank-you to PC McGregor for taking the time to visit us!😃
Meta Skills
Collaborating Cora
Curiosity Carlos
UNCRC
Article 13 – Share what you think, unless it harms others
This morning our P3-7’s traded their usual classroom seats for a bus journey to Stranraer Academy to meet a real-life author. Excitement levels were high as we prepared ourselves to meet the likes of Julie Donaldson, Roald Dahl or Michael Murpurgo… When we arrived we met the one and only Martin Stewart, a talented Scottish book author and former teacher from Troon!🌟 ✍
Martin has written amazing stories like Riverkeep and The Sacrifice Box, and he told us all about how he dreams up his ideas. He shared funny tales from his own writing journey, gave us top tips for creating characters and plots, and even showed us some pictures of his pets who feature as characters in his books.📚
We were fascinated – and more than a little impressed. Turns out, being an author is equal parts imagination, determination, and a dash of madness! Pupils asked some brilliant questions, and Martin gave honest and inspiring answers.
The bus ride home was filled with chatter about new story ideas and how maybe one day, a Leswalt pupil’s book will be on the shelves too. A huge thank you to Martin Stewart for sparking our imaginations, and to Stranraer Academy for hosting such a fab morning. 🚌
