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Aren’t we the lucky ones? Renita Boyle – resident story-teller with Wigtown Book Festival offered to come along and share one of her wonderfully interactive story-telling sessions with us at lunchtime today!

After we’d eaten lunch, we excitedly found a spot on one of the picnic rugs and listened avidly as Renita shared her enthusiasm with a fun warm-up song of Heads, Shoulders, Knees and Toes (with a bit of a twist! We did this ‘Renita-style!) and then kept us all enthralled as she relayed the story of ‘The Strange Visitor’. We all took part in the actions as the story unfolded. Who was the ‘Strange Visitor’?!

This fabulous story comes from a book called ‘Strange Visitor’ by Renita and illustrated by Mike Abel. It takes an old Scottish tale and shares it in both English and Scots. We all LOVED it that’s for sure!

Thank you Renita. It’s always a joy to see you!

We are proud to announce that Leswalt Primary has achieved yet another Eco Schools flag, representing another two years of fantastic eco-friendly action from our highly motivated pupils.  This achievement recognises all the hard work, dedication and drive from our pupils, our staff and our wider community.  Our action targets for 2021 – 2023 focussed on:

• Litter and Waste
• Healthy Living
• Biodiversity

Many congratulations to everyone!

The Education and Learning Team from Keep Scotland Beautiful have written to us with this message:

A big congratulations to everyone for this great achievement that reflects so much hard work and commitment. You have demonstrated a fantastic whole school approach to your Green Flag award, with everyone in your school involved. It is great to hear how many local organisations you have worked with to help you with your actions. Overall, you have done a fantastic job and are highly deserving of this Green Flag Award.

Not only did we achieve our Eco Flag, but we have also achieved our RSPB Wild Challenge Gold award after completing a series of challenges to help nature and experience nature.

 

We won’t stop there as we’re already thinking ahead to our next action plan for 2023 – 2025!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

UNCRC Rights of the Child: Article 24 – Health, Water, Food & The Environment.

Sustainable Development Goal: 3 – Good Health and Wellbeing, 15 – Life on Land

Robert McCrorie Community Safety Advocate with the local Fire Service, visited us P5-7 this morning to give a presentation all about keeping ourselves safe with regards to fire hazards.

Each group had a picture of a room in the home showing many potential dangers. Discussion ensued and the pupils were able to spot the issues – and think of ways in which they could avoid these. This got them thinking about their own homes and bedrooms; might there be any instances in which they could make sure they were doing things in a safer way. One thing Robert mentioned was charging mobile phones in your room overnight – something Mrs F is guilty of too! It’s always better to charge your phone when you’re around the house and awake. I’ll be doing that from now on!

Robert also talked about new fire alarms in the home and left contact details in case any family would like a free Home Fire Safety visit.

In addition, Robert told the pupils about the app What3words which is extremely if ever you do need help from the emergency services as it can pinpoint within a 3m radius your exact location! Did you know that Leswalt Primary’s 3 words are cooked.jogged.moves? You could check out the 3 words for your house and members of your family might want to check out the app too!

Keeping yourself safe is THE most important thing (even more important than x tables!) And now we know more about avoiding any fire hazards too.  A good learning session this morning!

We had looked out the eggs and spoons, the sacks and the beanbags. The pupils were kitted out in their shorts and tshirts… yes it sounds like we were ready for Leswalt’s annual sports day and, what’s even better was that we actually got some sunshine too! We were Ready, Steady, Go!

Trooping over to the park for a 1:15pm start, the children were excited and raring to get going. And what a fabulous afternoon we had! Lots of cheering, supporting one another and excellent sportsmanship on display. Exactly the ingredients needed for us all to have lots of fun!

Many thanks must go to the Agnew family who provided all with an Ice Cream treat at the end of Sports,  and also the parents of Aria Rose and Kaiden who ensured all went home with a wee sweetie mixture too!

Results list will follow, but for the meantime, enjoy the photos of our fabulous Leswalt pupils enjoying some fresh air fun!

 

HUGE thanks to Kaiden and Aria-Rose’s family for treating every pupil in the school to a delicious ice lolly as a welcome refreshment in the sunshine!

Such a kind gesture and very much appreciated!

Report by Kaiden & Faye –

On Thursday 25th May all of the P6 pupils went to Operation Safety . The event took place at Stair Park football grounds in Stranraer. There were lots of workshops that we visited. This is a list of the workshops:

• Fire brigade to spot the different hazards to make them safe, like a knife in a toaster or too many plugs in a lead.
• Scottish Power workshop where we spotted electrical hazards outside.
• Stranraer Coastguard for water safety and how to save someone if they are drowning.
• Alcohol and drugs presented by PC McCutcheon where we got to try on beer goggles.

We then had our lunch in the stadium seat and afterwards we visited our last few workshops:

• Anti-social behaviour where we played a song really loudly and the council came and said he was going to fine us £20.
• Ambulance where we learned how to do CPR.

Our favourite workshop was the drugs and alcohol one because the drunk glasses were fun and felt weird.

Proud recipients of our Climate Ready Classroom Certificates!

 

All pupils from across our partnership participated in  a Climate Ready Classroom event day today.

Schools from across Dumfries and Galloway linked together online to take part in three themed workshops. By taking part in Climate Ready Classrooms (CRC) for Primary Schools, our pupils were able to:• Develop an understanding of the basics of what climate change is and why it is happening.
• Improve their understanding of the importance of biodiversity and how all species are connected and interdependent.
• Explore thoughts and worries around the climate change and biodiversity crises and why we should have hope.
• Identify opportunities to take action to tackle the climate change and biodiversity crises, working with local authority aims.

Looking ahead, as part of empowerment and leading their own learning, the children created their own Climate Action Pledge.  All pledges will be shared across the region to create an overview of learner voices and learner’s action.  The actions identified by the children will feed into our partnership’s  Eco Schools topic for Climate Action going forward.

# Responsible Citizens & Effective Contributors

UNCRC Rights of the Child:Article 13: Sharing Thoughts Freely,  Article 24: Health, Water, Food & Environment.

Sustainable Development Goals: 12 – Responsible Consumption & Production, 13 – Climate Action, 14, Life Below Water, 15 – Life on Land,

Well, the forecast for rain was happily proved wrong and the sun did actually shine for us as we enjoyed out outdoor learning fun at Leswalt Primary!

From gathering materials at the Wetlands (to create our bird and bug habitats back at school) whilst enjoying the abundance of wild garlic and the scent of the bluebells- to all hands on deck to spruce up our playground and garden area! HUGE thanks must go to the Wetlands volunteers who very kindly gave up their own time to help us out. As you can imagine, having been off-site for 18 months and moving back home during Winter, our garden area had seen better days! Lots of clearing up and cutting back means that we’re well on the way to rebuilding our outdoor area again.

Whilst at the Wetlands we carried out some wildlife detecting.  We used our Spot It sheets to find signs of animals and insects around us.

Brushing, building, planting, weeding, painting, washing and foraging – it was a busy day! All activities were planned to ensure our school stays true to its eco ethos and has a bird and bug friendly environment in our playground.

Enjoy scrolling through the fabulous photos below (we do have a photogenic bunch!) and read all about our day’s adventures in Daisy and Cara’s (Eco committee members) blog report…

Outdoor Education Day 

At the start of the morning, P6 stayed back with Jane Sloan and all of her Aloudoran wetlands crew who helped us tidy up the garden. Meanwhile P1 to P5 headed to along to the wetlands to do some foraging! They also met the Gruffalo, the fox, the snake and the little brave white mouse! After 30 minutes or so everyone carried their sticks, leaves, moss and twigs back to school to be used in building the animal habitats in the playground.   

Back at school, the P6s had been super busy;  Hamish and Carys were tidying the toy box; Faye and Kaiden were helping the Aldouran volunteers with clearing the garden and Brandon, Mark and Cara were loading the branches that had been cut off the willow dome into the trailer. Then we served our adult helpers tea, coffee and a sweet treat! 

Once those jobs were done,  Mrs Mcknight and Mrs Ferguson put us into groups of three and gave an animal habitat to every group. We were kept busy making a bird bath, creating some earwig houses , designing a toad home, putting up our teacup bird feeders, building a log pile, finding areas for bumblebee houses to go, setting up a snail brick house – as well as weeding, gardening, brushing up and planting up some planters with some lovely red geraniums to hang on the  railings at the front door! After a long day of working, the boy and girls admired their efforts – the outside looks so fresh and clean!  

By Carys and Daisy (Eco Committee reps) 

And there’s always more to do! Our next steps will be … wall and tyre planter painting, path pressure-washing and seed planting. Watch this space…

Thanks to Megan Bark, Dental Health Officer for Child Smile, for visiting P5-7 to relaunch the toothbrushing programme.

As we are learning about microbes at the moment, it seemed perfect timing for us to focus on our dental hygiene too – bye bye bad bacteria…

The class learnt about the effects of bacteria on their tooth enamel and gums and the role of fluoride as well as getting their own toothbrush to use after lunch each day.

An extra toothbrushing stint each day can only be a good thing to ensure we all keep those million dollar smiles! Say CHEESE…!

Sunday dawned dry (yay!) as plans were put into action for Leswalt’s Parent Council’s fundraising Cream Tea! This annual event has been much missed as the last one was in 2019 and Covid-19 put paid to the next few years, but to the delight of the school and the community, it was back!

Bunting welcomed visitors into a busy school with stalls manned by parents and pupils. An array of raffle prizes enticed those to buy their tickets (thanks to all those who donated).

In the playground, the bbq was fired up and the aroma of delicious hot dogs and burgers tempted many to take a seat in the sunshine (yes it did make an appearance!)

In the P1-4 classroom, there was a well-stocked bottle stall, a delicious baking table, the chance to have some glittery hair extensions and superb face-painting on offer!

Pupils manned the stalls in the P5-7 classroom selling items made by the children as well as nail painting , temporary tattoos, a book stall and Guess the Bear’s Birthday!

Classes had been busy making things to sell with an Eco theme over the last two weeks. Bird feeder ‘Chirpios’, beautiful teacup and saucer bird seed holders, ready to grow seed pots, pretty painted pebbles and seed bombs in painted pots were hand-crafted and sold.

After browsing the stalls, visitors headed into the hall to enjoy the delicious Cream Tea – and what a spread! Huge thanks to all those who donated their baking to fill the over-flowing cake stands! Your kindness is much appreciated – and the visitors really appreciated and enjoyed the tasty treats.

All in all, it was a very successful afternoon! All made possible by the dedicated hard work of all parents who contributed in any way to the running of the day. Not to mention the pupils who made their crafts to sell and supported their school by manning stalls and coming along too!

A very big thank you to everyone involved. Your hard work is very much appreciated!