In P3 we have been learning a little bit about our five senses as well as autumn and the signs of Autumn.  We have used our Outdoor Learning session to go and look for the signs of Autumn in our school environment.  From this we are hoping to write an Autumn Senses poem.

In Numeracy we have continued our work on Developing Number Knowledge and partitioning numbers (up to 4 digits!!!) and recognising their digit values. This was tricky to begin with. We also have been using our knowledge of numbers to compare and order a range of numbers from smallest to biggest. We enjoyed it when Miss Anderson wrote different numbers on the balls and threw them around the class. It was fun!

In Maths, we have started to look at 2D shapes and their properties. There are some with very funny names like a parallelogram and trapezium! We have been counting how many sides and corners each shape has. We also went into the playground to hunt for the shapes. Squares, rectangles and circles were the most common. We couldn’t find a single pentagon!

In literacy we’ve been reading – we like sharing our book with a partner in class. We have also started to look at comprehension. Did you know – comprehension is showing that you understand what you read.  We are also practising to write in proper sentences with a capital letter and a full stop, knowing when we need to begin a new sentence.

In Health and Well Being Mr Ross has been teaching us about having a Healthy Lifestyle and we made posters to remind us of this. To have a healthy lifestyle we need to; get enough sleep, eat a balanced diet, have a shower/bath, drink water, etc.  We also began looking at the five main food groups and identified foods which came from each group.

We are really excited to get started PE with Mr Sharp today and fingers crossed we can carry it on after the October holidays J

In P5/6, we have been learning lots! In maths, we have been learning about decimal points and place value. We have practiced the bar method and the formal written method for multiplying and the formal written method for addition and subtraction. We have also learned about negative numbers. Currently, we are learning about time and how to read timetables. For Maths Week Scotland, We took part in the Sumdog competition and came 180^th! We also completed Pascal’s Triangle which was tricky!

In literacy, we have been using lots of descriptive language such as synonyms and similes – we have been using Outdoor Learning to help us with this and have created our own Tweets to summarise how we have done this. We have been writing imaginative stories and including descriptive language in these. We have been summarising lots of texts such as our class novel, our Accelerated Reading books and short video clips. We have also been practicing our prediction skills. We have practiced using punctuation such as, speech marks, commas, capital letters and full stops. We read Christophe’s Story as a class and focussed lots of our learning in Literacy around it.

In Health and Wellbeing, we have been learning about food labelling and what the traffic lights mean. We have focussed on what foods are good for you and which foods are not – and learning about healthy choices and how food gives us energy. We created our own food pyramids. We have been learning about how we are resilient and what strengths we have to help us through difficult times. In P.E., we have been focussing on football and practicing our passing and travelling skills.

Autumn Term Blog

We had to get used to lots of changes to keep us safe.

We have been reading George’s Marvellous Medicine and doing pieces of work connected with it.

We also read Horton Hears a Who! And had lots of discussions about what makes a good friend.

We did poetry connected to our outdoor learning about trees. We have started Accelerated Reading. We did the Tiger’s Whiskers with Mrs Renaud and acted it out. We have done lots of work on using describing bubbles to help us with our descriptive writing. We did leaf art where we invented our own patterns. With Mr Ross we did doodles and flower art. We have done some geometric autumn art.

We have looked at addition and subtraction, involving exchanging and decomposition. We have explored place value. We have revised some of our tables. Recently we have revised shape and data handling and started looking at negative numbers.

We have been learning about ways to include people and how to deal with different situations. We have been looking at and discussing the book, The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse.

During Term 1 we have been busy in P6/7.  We have been focussing on Maths, Literacy, Digital Literacy and Health and Well Being.

In Maths we have been learning about decimals.  We have been looking at the place value of decimals, ordering, adding, subtracting, multiplying and dividing them.  The week beginning the 28^th of September was Maths Week Scotland 2020.  Each day we looked at a challenge set by the Depute First Minister of Scotland, we completed tasks from the Maths Week Scotland website, we solved a Cryptography clue and we watched and discussed various women who use maths in their jobs.  Everyday we do mental maths to warm our brains up for the maths lesson.  We read the weekly issue of the Daily Rigour.  It creates maths problems based on current news stories.  We also follow a mental maths rotation.  In the mental maths rotation one group completes a mental agility booklet page, one group discusses mental maths strategies with the teacher and the third group answer questions on Sumdog.

In Literacy we have continued reading Oranges in No Man’s Land.  We have completed a word finder task using the book and have created literal, inferential and evaluative questions based on the text.  A partner then had to answer the questions we had created.  We created a mind map based on a news article and then used the mind map to write a summary of the article we had chosen.  In writing we have focussed on writing our own character and setting descriptions.  We are going to use these in a creative story.  The week beginning the 28^th of September was the Reading is Magic Festival.  We watched various videos and listened to different authors.  We created our own cartoon portraits and were encouraged to be more creative by Cressida Cowell, the Waterstones Children’s Laureate. We took part in a Big Draw contest between two illustrators.

In Digital Literacy we have been using the My World of Work website.  We have been up-levelling our writing onto a word document and recording our learning.  We are using Microsoft Teams and our Glow email to access and complete our homework.  We have looked at how to stay safe online.

We have been creating friendship board games with Mrs Woods as part of Health and Well Being.  We have designed and created them and are hoping the P2 class will have a go at playing them.  During our work on friendships we have discussed different scenarios involving issues which can occur in friendships.

October 2020 Newsletter

What a busy first term!

A small peek at some of our outdoor and indoor learning as well us enjoying our school lunches.

We have been working very hard during our first term in Primary 7.

Since the holidays ended and we returned to school we have been developing our skills in maths, literacy, health and well being and art.

Interestingly we have been working on multiplying by 2 digit numbers while learning the formal method and the bar modelling method.

Also in P7 we have been identifying different types of angles within the classroom and in our outdoor learning. We have been developing our skills when rounding to significant figures and using this to estimate calculations. During Maths Week Scotland we worked on a variety of problem solving activities and completed different daily challenges. Spectacularly we came 44th in the National Sumdog competition for Maths Week Scotland!

We have been learning how to up-level our descriptive writing by adding adverbs, adjectives, connectives and sophisticated vocabulary.

Reading this term is based on a book set during the war called ‘Goodnight Mr Tom’. We have completed many activities based on this book including questioner, clarifier and visualiser.

We practise different spelling each week so we can get full marks in our spelling tests. We are all trying to improve our minutes in our reading by reading more of our accelerated reading books at home.

During P.E we took part in different orienteering tasks as well as that we have been learning how to read a map. Recently in P.E we have been working on football while practicing ball control among other skills. Energetically we have been developing our stamina while trying to run continuously for 15 minutes.

On Tuesdays Colin from the Oasis Centre comes to work with us to develop our mental wellbeing. He is teaching us skills in resilience and how to relax our mind.

On a Friday Mrs McNay has been teaching us about different nutritional requirements.

Enjoyably we have developed our artistic skills when creating our tree art. We had to develop our blending skills when creating a stunning background. We have also linked our art with our outdoor learning when creating a sunburst through weaving and pressing flowers to create our own bookmarks.

During ICT we have been looking at our personal Blogs and how to develop these.

It has been a very busy term but an enjoyable one where P7 have worked very hard!

Teacher Awards

Star Writer

Pupil Awards

During our first few weeks of school we have been doing all different things. As part of Outdoor Learning we have made kites. We went outside to see if we could get them to fly. We have been practising our spelling words outside too.

We also have been learning some Maths outside.  We had to answer questions and find the answers to them by moving around in a large circle.  We all had some must fun doing it.  We went on an angle hunt and have been measuring objects in the playground and round the measurements to the nearest cm.

In Health and Well Being with Mrs Woods we have made posters about how to be a good friend. We had to put what the ingredients are to be a good friend and how to make your friend.

With Mrs Boyd we have been creating self portraits. On one side we drew our face and on the other side we filled the outline of our head with images of what is important to us.

In literacy we are busy reading a book called Oranges in No Mans Land.  It is based in Beirut and is set during the civil war there.  Also in literacy we have been writing descriptions and information reports.

0108-20 Heathhall School Uniform Leaflet