Exciting news as Dalbeattie Primary School has now been awarded FairAchiever status by the Fairtrade Foundation. Evidence of our Fairtrade work was submitted, with positive feedback given along with the issuing of our FairAchiever Award. We look forward to continuing our journey to raise awareness and promote Fairtrade, not only in our local community but in the wider community.
Dalbeattie Primary has just staged a terrific performance of Scottish Opera’s ‘Tale O Tam.’
Primary 6 and 7 pupils made up the chorus groups of ‘The Tavern Crew,’ ‘The Witches Crew’ and the ‘Stormy Crew.’
The opera told the familiar story of Tam O Shanter drinking late in the tavern before making his way home on his old grey mare Meg before stopping to look through the window of the auld Kirk by Alloway where he sees the witches and warlocks dancing with the devil. He shouts out ‘Well done Cutty Sark’ and the witches take chase after him. He reaches the keystone of the brig but only after the witch pulls off Meg’s tail.
The whole show was fantastic: the singing was tremendous and the costumes were brilliant. The school is very grateful to Scottish Opera for coming to school to deliver a day’s workshops and rehearsals in the morning before the actual show in the afternoon. The school is also very grateful to class teachers and especially to Kate Picken who helped the children to learn and prepare the songs and music in the weeks ahead of the actual day. The whole school enjoyed watching the dress rehearsal before parents came to watch the final show before the end of the school day. This year’s Scottish Opera was funded through the Creative Scotland’s YMI (Youth Music Initiative.)
Remember Saturday May 20th is fast approaching… Between 10am and 3pm on this date it will be our Open Day. To mark the final months in our current building we are hosting this event to mark and recognise the history of Dalbeattie Primary school on its current site.
On Saturday 20th May, there will be one final doors open day which will take place in both the upper and lower school buildings. Visitors are welcome to visit Dalbeattie Primary School to reminisce, share memories and view the school as it is today. Doors will open at 10a.m and close at 3p.m . At 12 mid-day, we would like as many people as possible who have been pupils and staff at Dalbeattie Primary School (or indeed, the High School pre 1958) to join us in front of the bell tower for a large group photograph to mark the event. It may even get us into the Record books for the most former pupils and staff in a picture SO KEEP THE DATE! The photo will be taken from the air by a licensed drone. Please note, however, all friends, members of the school and wider local community are welcome to visit the buildings at any point during the day. We are very happy to announce that Dalbeattie Lions Club is providing eco friendly balloons to be released on the day too, as part of the mid-day photo. These balloons which have been sourced from a company which avoids any issues for the environment, have a competition tag attached for the balloon which travels the furthest
Spring was certainly in the air today as a group of 12 P6 and P7 pupils visited Alma House in Dalbeattie. The children visited residents and took part in some Spring and Easter Craft activities with them. Easter Bonnets, cards, and decorated boxes were just some of the items that they created together. The children were fantastic ambassadors for the school and were very engaged in dialogue with residents during the visit. A great example of intergenerational working.
The children enjoyed their non uniform day on Friday 24th March when they came to school wearing bright clothes. Many children also had their red noses to wear. Children were told they could bring in a voluntary donation, which many did. We raised £215.44 which is tremendous amount. Nursery had a separate fundraiser.
Our school Eco Group enjoyed a trip to Shirmers Burn to release our alevins today. Mrs Dyson’s Primary 5 and the Eco group have been involved in looking after salmon eggs in school. Rowan Armstrong from Galloway Fisheries brought us a tray of 100 eggs together with a water cooler, just over two weeks ago. They hatched a week later and so were ready to be released, today, into the water so that they can continue feeding once their yolk sacs are all used up. We will revisit the burn in June to take part in some electro fishing when we will be able to see how much our salmon have grown. By then, they will be ‘fry’ before becoming ‘parr’ when they are one year old. We were also very interested to see frogspawn in one pond and toads in another. Afterwards we enjoyed eating our snacks while enjoying the pleasant weather and the lovely views of the Loch Ken countryside.
The Scots poetry winners from each class visited Alma House today and recited their poems to the residents. Well done to the boys and girls who performed their poems extremely well . During our visit, the children also chatted to the residents. Thank you to Mrs Henderson for inviting us. We hope to visit again in the near future.
Recently, pupils have been taking part in a consultation about possible future uses of our current school site. School Pupil Councillors collated the information from written questionnaire sheets, which were filled in by children of all ages though-out the school. The School Pupil Council then met with Michelle McRobert of Dalbeattie Community Initiative to discuss some of the issues in more detail. Lots of ideas were taken aware from the meeting…… 
Dalbeattie Primary is delighted to have been awarded its fifth green flag as part of the two year Eco Schools Scotland renewal scheme. The school eco group has been working closely with teacher Mrs Dyson, over the last two years , on topics such as litter, energy and school grounds. The school received a letter congratulating the pupils on their outstanding work; work on calculating the school’s carbon footprint and links with local community groups and organisations, such as Galloway Fisheries and Fairtrade, were specifically highlighted. The school is looking forward to continuing its eco work as it moves to a new school site In October 2017 when we will finally have a flag pole to display our fifth flag! We will also be able to compare the carbon foot print of the new building with the old one and investigate ways to encourage wildlife habitats as well as growing more of our own produce in new raised beds! Our photo shows current Schools Eco Committee together with the two committees of the previous two years who worked so hard towards the fifth flag.
We are delighted to share the news with you that Dalbeattie Primary School has successfully renewed its Eco-Schools Green Flag Award status. We were notified of this during the Christmas holidays. Please see below the letter received from Eco Schools. Thank you to all those who have been involved in supporting the school in achieving this success.
