Kirkcolm Primary School

Mrs Hall kindly came out to join us today to deliver the good news from the make It Appen competition which took place earlier in the school year. Pupils were charged with coming up with an idea for their own app with the best ideas getting made and published on the Make it Appen website! 

The winner of this was a pupil at Leswalt Primary but we were lucky enough to have Olivia Johnstone as a runner up! Well done Olivia – your idea was fab!

Mrs Hall also had certificates for some of the other pupils in school whose apps, while not placing, got recognition for their great ideas and this included Blaze, Ivan, Alistair, Paige Calum, Rory and young Henry! 

Well done troops – great effort all round!  

Have a look at some of the amazing app ideas pupils have came up with here; Make It Happen Club

We are so happy to welcome back Kathryn Purchase into our classroom for another fab History input for the pupils! Pupils have been working hard studying WW1 ad WW2 this term, we had made a good bit of headway through the topic but nothing compares to Kathryn’s expert knowledge which provides an insight that we cannot get anywhere else! 

We learned about how the War started and how this was linked to other events across the world like The Great Depression. 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 – so much information that the pupils seemed to soak up like a sponge! Then the fun really began for their eager eyes, they got to get hands on with all that fantastic props that Kathryn brings along with her – with WW2 being her most heavily stocked history topic! 

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! 

All the hands up!

We were very thankful to start off the learning with Emily Conroy coming in to speak to the pupils about how to keep safe online. PC Conroy asked pupils who had phones and which different apps they used with Snapchat and Tik Tok being a firm fan favourite among the pupils! 

We discussed the terms of use for these apps and how to keep ourselves safe online and use these apps wisely if we have them. Tips included; 

• Keeping accounts private 
• Be careful online with the information you share 
• Don’t speak to people you don’t know
• Block or ban anybody who is speaking to you if you don’t want them too 

We also discussed the dangers that come with these apps;

• Pop ups and viruses 
• Possible fraud 
• Potentially bad people out there
• Any inappropriate images or content that could come up 

We finished off the sessions with a Q&A where pupils piled poor PC Conroy with a wide variety of questions! But, by the end they firmly knew the message and understood how to keep themselves safe online. We finished off the session with a short clip.

As well as that we watched yesterday’s Internet Safety Day Live Lesson on BBC Teach this afternoon and had a go at some of the activities surrounding it! Finally, we finished off the day with a quiz from the Digital Leaders 🙂

I think we are all Internet Safety Savvy now! 

Why not check our our Sway and select play to see our activity across our partnership.

Pupils in P5-7 at Kirkcolm, Leswalt and Portpatrick Primary Schools headed off to Abernethy Barcaple Outdoor Centre on Monday for an overnight residential stay.

The boys and girls participated in a range of activities whilst there including archery, abseiling, a challenge course, climbing wall, and team problem solving challenges. Pupils overcame fears and developed their team-working skills throughout the course of our trip. 

After a fun-filled day of activities, everyone enjoyed an evening game of hide and seek in the dark – at which point the staff watched as 50 children ran off into the darkness at a location they had never been before; cue panicking teachers! But thankfully all returned safe and sound, and no one was left to spend the night in the great outdoors! 

We then headed to our rooms to settle down for the night – and despite a lot of sugar being consumed, everyone was asleep by midnight much to the staff’s relief! 

The next day started bright and early with some pupils rising at 6.30am. After breakfast, we finished our final group activities and hopped onto the bus just after lunch time. It was a very quiet journey home with lots of tired little people catching 40 winks to make up for the lack of sleep the night before! 

Everyone had a brilliant time away and enjoyed mixing with pupils from all of our trio schools. 

We are very grateful that Ross McColm (parent of Sophie and Gregor) took time out of his break home to come in and have a chat with the pupils. Ross knew the boys and girls had been doing farming as their topic recently and he had some experience in that field himself! 

Ross spoke about how he works away for a company which builds gigantic industrial farming buildings in Saudi Arabia and has helped create the largest chicken farm in the world! 

This also served as a great cultural experience for the boys and girls to learn about a culture so completely different from our own and Ross was able to offer that experience to them. The afternoon was finished off with some Arabic sweet treats for the pupils to enjoy. 

Thank you very much for your time Ross and from the chatter today, it seems they enjoyed their afternoon! 

Kirkcolm Primary have been busy throughout the month of January celebrating all things Scots!

Mrs Mary Buchanan visited Kirkcolm on Wednesday to judge our recital, handwriting and artwork competition. She had the unenviable task of deciding the winners for each year group, the results of which were then shared to a packed-out hall of parents and relatives at our Scots Showcase assembly on Friday. The winners entertained the audience with recitals and Scots songs were performed by both classes. It was lovely to all come together to share in our pupils’ successes.

Below are the winners of our competitions –

Primary 1

Poem – Ode tae a Spider

Recitation winners:

1. Sally
2. Henry
3. James

Illustration winners:

1. Sally
2. Ewan
3. Vladislav

Handwriting winners:

1. James
2. Sally
3. Vladislav

Primary 2

Poem – Furry Hat

Recitation winners:

1. Rory
2. Ross
3. Joey

Illustration winners:

1. Rory
2. Harrison
3. Ross

Handwriting winners:

1. Rory
2. Freddie
3. Harrison

Primary 3

Poem – Jock & Jean

Recitation winners:

1. Rebecca
2. Paige
3. Callum

Illustration winners:

1. Rebecca
2. Cameron
3. Jessica

Handwriting winners:

1. Paige
2. Callum
3. Jessica

Primary 4

Poem – Miss McCurdie

Recitation winners:

1. Lyle
2. Ruby
3. Marley

Illustration winners:

1. Lyle
2. Sophie

Handwriting winners:

1. Ruby
2. Lyle
3. Marley

Primary 5

Poem – Harry

Recitation winners:

1. Phoebe
2. Archie
3. Ivan

Illustration winners:

1. Archie
2. Ivan
3. Phoebe

Handwriting winners:

1. Alistair
2. Ivan
3. Archie

Primary 6

Poem – King o’ the Midden

Recitation winners:

1. Danny
2. Jack
3. Havana

Illustration winners:

1. Lydia
2. Alfie
3. Steven

Handwriting winners:

1. Danny
2. Lydia
3. Sally

Primary 7

Poem – Anything by Burns

Recitation winners:

1. James
2. Noah
3. Olivia

Illustration winners:

1. Olivia
2. Noah
3. James

Handwriting winners:

1. Blaze
2. Olivia
3. James & Noah

Have a keek at the photos of our wonderful winners below!

The final Feis Ros show! (this year anyway…) 

What a treat today was to get to see P1-4 and their hard work in action. They have been working hard during their Feis Ros sessions this past term and one previously, and today it finally culminated in their performance. The rest of the school and many parents gathered in the hall to witness this! 

During their Clan gathering, we got to see the pupils lovely singing of songs, the different games they have been playing to help them learn Gaelic, the big dances they put together with the Feis Ros team and finally, in the true nature of ceilidh, we had a talent show at the end! 

Wow – what a performance from Ross, Rory and Emily singing Shotgun, Sally and her tap dancing, henry and his magic tricks and finally, who could forget Cameron and his puppet show play! 

Well done P1-4 – we are all so proud of your hard work and thank you to Feis Ros in their hand putting this together. 

Our boys and girls put on their ornithologist hats this Friday to take part in this year’s Big School Bird Watch.  This fits with our Eco Schools action plan for biodiversity.

The children got stuck into some outdoor learning combined with data handling to monitor how many different birds visited our school grounds within an hour’s timeslot.  The children used tally charts to log the birds they saw.

This was a real exercise in the pupils abilities to be sneaky and silent as not to scare away the birds and I think we all came away really surprised at the variety we managed to spot on our own home turf! 

If you would like to take part in the Big Garden Watch 2023 which takes place between the  27- 29th of January, click on the link here to register.

Well as I am sure you all know, today is Burns Day! Pupils have been working hard since they came back to school and got their poems home to get memorising! Wow – some of them sure delivered. 

First we had our wave of beautiful handwritten poems with such diligent care and effort, and then the art was handed in and wow, once again I have been blown away by the artistic efforts of the pupils in this school! Finally, the poem recital came today as pupils said their poems to Burns expert, Mrs Buchanan and she made the final call on our winners! 

Winners are to be announced at the Burns Assembly at 2pm Friday afternoon so hope to see as many faces there as possible for some poetry efforts and singing!

The Burns lunch today was a roaring success once again, we had the wonderful Olivia as Master of Ceremonies and we all enjoyed our haggis, neeps and tatties as we enjoyed the wonderful toast the older pupils worked so hard on. Pupils from both classes got to practise their songs before their big debut on Friday to parents and family alike! 

Here are some photos of the events of the day: 

Today, after a couple of visits from Norval Dampney of Incredible Edible, the time finally came for the pupils to plant their fruit trees. Eco Committee with the help of Miss Whorlow have chosen the fruit trees they wish to plant in the orchard and chosen a fitting location for the orchard with the help and guidance of Mrs Richardson, and now they have successfully planted their fruit orchard!

They worked hard and got their graft on, they had a little help from Norval, Sue and Cliff from Incredible Edible and 2 kind gentlemen from the council, Chris and Kevin, came out to pre dig the wholes for them and lift the turf good to go! 

We learned all about the proper care of the fruit trees, how to plant them successfully so they will grow big and strong and the uses for the different fruits beyond helping to promote biodiversity in the school! It was a great hands on, muddy experience for the pupils and they loved every minute of it – from the caked shoes to the worms! 

We will see the Incredible Edible team again come Spring and they help us to learn how to care for our Orchard!