Kirkcolm Primary School

This afternoon we were delighted to welcome families into school to celebrate our Scots learning. 🤩 Throughout the month, pupils have been busy perfecting their Scots poems in their neatest handwriting and creating wonderfully imaginative artwork to bring their poems to life. Today we finally got to showcase all their hard work — and announce our winners for this year who were judged earlier in the week by our the lovely Mrs Marie Turtle who is no stranger to Kirkcolm Scots Poetry competition!

In between the announcement of the winners and certificate hand outs audience enjoyed Scots songs from both classes – Marie’s Wedding (P5-7) and If it Wisnae Forr Yer Wellies (P1-4) as well as some highland dancing from our own wee Orla Neil!  Overall, our Scots poetry week was a huge success so well done to all the weans for their effort, creativity, and confidence. And a big thank you to our families for the support and encouragement you give behind the scenes. 🏠! P1-4 winners – Tom, Jamie, Orla and Henry will be heading up to Kirkcolm Hub on Wednesday with Mrs Adams to entertain some of the community members while some winners will be chosen to represent the school at the annual Burns Poetry night at the Ryan Centre!

Oor affa guid winners were..

P1 – Mince and Tatties

Recitation winners:

1. Tom

2. Finn

3. Aila

Illustration winners:

1. Isla

2. Finn

3. Tom

Handwriting winners:

1. Tom

2. Finn

3. Andrew

P2 – Crocodile

Recitation winners:

1. Jamie

2. Frankie

3. Kendall

Illustration winners:

1. Frankie

2. Jamie

3. Arryn S

Handwriting winners:

1. Frankie

2. Arryn S

3. Jamie & Kendall

P3 -The Sair Finger

Recitation winners:

1. Jamie

2. Frankie

3. Kendall

Illustration winners:

1. Orla

2. Parker

3. Harlow

Handwriting winners:

1. Harlow

2. Orla

3. Kaylyn

P4 –  Street Talk

Recitation winners:

1. Henry

2. Sally

3. Ewan

Illustration winners:

1. Sally

2. Ewan

3. Henry & Scott

Handwriting winners:

1. Sally

2. Henry

3. Ewan

P5 – My Auld Buits

Recitation winners:

1. Rory

2. Ross

3. Freddie & Joey

Illustration winners:

1. Ross

2. Ian

3. Rory & Freddie

Handwriting winners:

1. Ross

2. Freddie

3. Joey & Rory

P6 – The Moosies Prayer

Recitation winners:

1. Fallon

2. Rebecca

3. Paige

Illustration winners:

1. Paige

2. Fallon

3. Cameron & Callum

Handwriting winners:

1. Paige

2. Callum

3. Rebecca

P7 –  Anything by Burns

Recitation winners:

1. Lyle

2. Arran

3. Allyssa

Illustration winners:

1. Ruby

2. Arran

3. Allyssa

Handwriting winners:

1. Lyle

2. Ruby

3. Allyssa

Today we had our annual schools Burns supper to celebrate the much loved Rabbie Burns in school! Pupils have been working very hard this entire January at learning their poems, creating their art work and beautiful handwriting and the effort has been fab to see – all shall be revealed on Friday’s assembly at 2:15 so please pop down to see the winners of the recitation, art and handwriting competitions if you are free! 

Today we toasted our cups and ate some haggis, neeps and tatties to celebrate Burns! Random pupils were selected from each class to say their poems out loud for the rest of the school and they all did a wonderful job of this! Both classes sang some traditional Scot’s songs, Orla entertained us all with her Highland dances and we heard some fantastic speeches wrote by the P6 and P7 pupils! 

Meta Skills 

Collaborating Cora

Leading Li

Articles

Article 31 – rest, Play, Culture & Arts 

Today we sent away Lyle and Arran to represent the school at the yearly Rotary Lunch along with Colin and Murray from Leswalt, accompanied by Mrs Kyle!

This is a fantastic opportunity for the pupils to engage with the members of The Rotary Club who consistently do so much for the schools and community of The Rhins. Today they listened to a talk from Bob Bruce about his 30 years serving in the Army, where he was in charge of 8000 soldiers (big responsibility!) Bruce also told them about how he now serves as the councillor of Edinburgh Castle. 

Boys also enjoyed a hearty lunch of fish and chips courtesy of the Castle! 🐟

Meta Skills 

Focusing Fergus

Critical Thinking Chris

Curiosity Carlos 

Articles

Article 17 – Access to Information 

Today we welcomed Millie Craig (Fallon’s big sister) into the class for a little STEM afternoon with the pupils! We are very lucky to have the Millie connection who kindly reached out to us offering to do some STEM work with the pupils. Millie works as a Spacecraft System Engineer after completing her degree Aero Space Engineering. 🔩🔧⚙️

Millie did a wonderful job of explaining an engineers role in society and all their contributions to how our daily lives functions. Especially how ‘system’ engineering means ensuring that all the ‘part’s are working together which was a key element for the pupils task later on… 🔎

We learned all about the different functions and structures of satellites and it went well beyond what we already knew or expected! 🔭

Pupils then got stuck into their Lego satellite manufacturing task and got busy. Split into 3 groups of 5 with each person being allocated a role, they had to create both a company and a construction chain to manufacture miniature satellites which then had to be shown to the ‘Company’ (me) for approval or faults.

📉 Then after their first ‘year’ manufacturing – they were allowed to make changes to their construction chain to try and increase productivity. 📈

Pupils had a great time, but tensions were definitely high! A lot of fast production and yelling definitely occurred during this time but it was a fantastic and it really taught pupils a lesson about how real life companies and construction has to work to be effective! 💡

Thank you again to Millie, our handy STEM Ambassador, for running this session with the pupils! We are super grateful.

Meta Skills 

Focusing Fergus

Critical Thinking Chris

Collaborating Cora

Curiosity Carlos 

Leading 

Initiative Ivy 

Articles

Article 28 – Access to Education 

Article 17 – Access to Information 

We are so happy to welcome back Kathryn Purchase into our classroom for another fab History input for the pupils! Pupils are about to buckle down and learn about WW2 this term for their social studies topic (a highly anticipated topic for them all!) and there is no better way to properly introduce this topic to the pupils. 📝

We learned about how the War started and how this was linked to other events across the world like The Great Depression and a direct consequence of WW1. We understood that The Treaty of Versailles, an outcome of the first World War, was one of the key factors in what started WW2. We looked at how this led to Hitler’s rise to power and the events that followed… 💣💥

The morning talk was very informative – we learned all about key elements from the way; the Blitz, rationing, The Nazi Party, the evacuees and the Holocaust. All things we are going to spend the next few weeks studying in a greater depth! 🔍

After this came the most exciting part – the pupils got to get stuck into all the fantastic props that Kathryn brings along with her to these sessions. There was a variety of costumes, rationing props, gun props that they were allowed to use for roleplay and to immerse themselves in the WW2 experience! 🪖

We finished off the session with a Q&A – as per expected, the pupils had lots and lots of questions to fire at Kathryn and they got their answer every time! 

Thanks for joining us today Kathryn, always a pleasure and until next time… 🙂 Here are some photos below of today’s fun! 

Meta Skills 

Focusing Fergus

Curiosity Carlos 

Sense-Making Samira 

Articles

Article 2 – No Discrimination 

Article 13 – Freedom of Expression 

Article 17 – Access to Information 

Article 19 – Protection from Violence 

Today has been a very festive day indeed! 🎄

Today to celebrate Christmas Lunch Day – pupils all donned their festive apparel to get really into the swing of the Christmas spirit! We all settled in for an early lunch where crackers were pulled, turkey was consumed and paper hats were briefly worn! 

To continue on with the festive theme of today, this afternoon we embarked on a trip to see our friends at Leswalt perform their Christmas Show! They performed ‘Baubles’ for us and it was a spectacular performance and we wish them all the best for their evening performance later today! 

Meta Skills 

Communicating Cate 

Articles

Article 30 – Minority, Culture, Language & Religion 

Article 31 – Rest, Play & Culture 

Wow! A huge thank you to Alan Jenkins for deliver a whoppingly large crate of 36 big bars of yummy Cadburys chocolate to Kirkcolm primary today! This very generous donation came from the Stranraer Development Trust along with The Millenium Centre, as a little Christmas treat for the boys and girls! We are very grateful for all these services provide for our little town and for us! 

Normally, we invite Owain out to our schools to deliver his Scripture Union sessions with the pupils based on learning about the true story of Christmas but today we did one better and both Kirkcolm and Leswalt pupils were able to join Owain and some of his lovely helpers from church in the Baptist Church this year to learn all about Christmas! ✝️

We discussed some of our own Christmas traditions first that we hold special for our families before Owain had the pupils act out in groups the story of the nativity! Pupils did an excellent job of remembering and demonstrating the key aspects of the story before they broke off into their groups and moved around 3 stations to learn about Christ Traditions! 

Such facts as… 

• On a candle wreath there are 5 candles which represent peace, joy, hope, love and the middle candle represents the birth of Jesus 
• The berries on a wreath represent the blood of Jesus 
• A Christingle represents all the gifts Jesus has brought to the world 

When they finished, we recapped our Learning and then we placed a candle on the map for our loved ones who we hope to see this year over the festive holidays! Huge thank to Owain and his lovely helpers for a fab and engaging session – as always! 

Meta Skills 

Curiosity Carlos 

Sense-Making Samira 

Critical Thinking Chris 

Communicating Cate 

Collaborating Cora

Articles

Article 12 – Respect for Children’s Views 

Article 15 – Access to Information 

Article 30 – Minority, Culture, Language & Religion 

Article 31 – Rest, Play & Culture 

Kirkcolm Primary parent council held their annual fundraising Christmas coffee morning on Saturday.

There was delicious home baking, Santat Claus, a wonderful raffle, Christmas crafts and some festive songs from the boys and girls.

In a short space of time over £1400 was raised to help fund projects to support all the boys and girls of Kirkcolm Primary. 

This was further added to with a very generous donation of £2000!  Wow!

Many thanks to all who supported this, helped or donated – what great community spirit!

UNCRC RIGHTS OF CHILD