Kirkcolm Primary School

A very warm welcome to this years pupil council is in order!

Well done to all the boys and girls for applying themselves to take on these extra responsibilities in the school – all for the greater cause of making our school the best it can be!

The council standing altogether…

We can’t wait to see what great things you all achieve this year!

Kirkcolm Primary has yet again been successful in achieving Eco School Status!

In order to achieve our eco-flag renewal, the boys and girls had to demonstrate ecology and sustainability on the elements of Litter, Water and Food & The Environment. Even prolonged periods of remote learning couldn’t hold our pupils back, as they continued to work on these targets with home challenge projects set by Mrs McHarg.

Eco Schools Scotland were particularly impressed with the evidence presented by the children and praised their initiative.  We are very proud of our Eco Heroes.

See below to read extracts from a copy of the letter we received from Eco Schools Scotland:

Congratulations to everyone at Kirkcolm Primary School for achieving your 2nd Eco Schools Scotland Green Flag. I really enjoyed reading your application this morning and it was great to see the fantastic range of evidence that you submitted to support your application – I really liked the fact that you had planned your actions to ensure that they had a clear link to not only your chosen Sustainable Development Goal but also, many others. You have really thought about this and your evidence clearly demonstrates what you have achieved. Your evidence is something that we would be keen to share with other schools as an example of good practice.

I appreciate that it will have been a very challenging year and it was great to see how you adapted your plans to be able to keep working towards renewing your Green Flag.

We also noticed aspects of your work as being examples of good practice. We may use these on our website and social media as case studies to support other schools with their EcoSchools Scotland work. While reviewing your action plan and supporting evidence there are lots of things that have gone very well and that you should be very proud of.

I like the examples you provided of how you carried out your environmental review and then selected you action points, this was a great way to let us see that everyone was involved. I enjoyed the work that the p4-7 class did while they were studying water, the work that the pupils produced looks fantastic and I’m sure will have a very positive impact. I love your rainwater collection system and what a great idea to have pupils keep a water diary. I bet a few people were surprised by their results.

Like many schools you made the decision to add Eco Schools tasks to your home learning activities during lockdown, this is a really great way to keep everyone involved and to have an impact out with the school grounds.

The work that you have taken forward in your food and environment topic is very impressive. Your school garden development looks fantastic and It was great to see that you were also thinking about where the food we consume comes from and the food miles associated with this and then exploring how food could be produced more sustainably. Also, great to see you enjoying your One Planet Picnic.

Our team may use aspects of your work as examples of good practice on our website and social media to support other schools during their applications.

Congratulations once again, on behalf of the whole of the Education and Learning Team, we wish you every success as you move on to your next application.

Daniel Barrie
Keep Scotland Beautiful
Education and Learning Manager
Keep Scotland Beautiful
ecoschools@keepscotlandbeautiful.org

Our pupils will now continue our eco journey by selecting new elements to work on for the next two years.  As part of our commitment to Learning for Sustainability, Global Goals and Articles 12, 13, 15 & 29 of the Rights of the Child, our newly elected Eco Committee will help steer the way forward.

# Effective Contributors & Responsible Citizens

It was the big day this week when we set about electing our House Captains for the year. Quite the big responsibility – these are the individuals in charge of the different houses: Soleburn and Lochnaw. The upper class were over the moon we could put to use all the skills and knowledge we are learning and studying as part of our new class topic on Democracy and how the Government works. What better way to start that forming the government and choosing the leaders of our own school!

House Captains have the challenge ahead of them of planning the big events throughout the year (especially as we can now have some events in schools!) and promoting good behaviour in their houses. All this adds up to Dojos which turn into Merits which turn into prizes for each house – exciting stuff!

Our 5 candidates had good time to prepare and were each ready to deliver a speech, stating their case on why they felt they were the best person for the job to the rest of the school before our secret ballots were cast. All pupils delivered fantastic speeches and really showed how much they care about the school and everyone in it.  It proved for a very tough vote for our pupils. We are very proud of all the P7’s for putting their best foot forward and, regardless what the result was, all of them would make excellent House Captain and leaders. But, like any good democracy, you can only have one winner… 

So… With a very close vote amongst them all, I am very happy to announce that the House Captains are: 

Corsewall – Taylor Smith

Loch Connell – Miley Adams

Congratulations House Captains! I am sure you will do us proud!

Finally – we are allowed visitors!!!

My goodness, it couldn’t of come at a better time. The upper class across both Kirkcolm, Leswalt and Portpatrick have just started their new topic of Scottish Politics – quite the tricky one!

So myself and Mrs Ferguson felt the needs to bring in the big guns… A political expert in the form of the lovely Miss Emma Currie to come and chat to the pupils and explain the inner workings of our Government and how it ranges from our Local Councillors all the way to the Mp’s and Prime Minister down in London!

Emma has been involved in politics from a young age and has down screeds of work from volunteering at her own schools pupil council (inspiring this realisation that we are the tools in our own quest for change!) and this has led to her further involvement and even basing her own university studies around it! A true inspiration for the pupils, both boys and girls!

Emma was an amazing asset, she was able to answer all the pupils questions and get them engaged in realising how important their involvement in politics can be, she told us about how the government is structured, what we mean when we discuss the served issues to the devolved powers to just what our own local council is in charge of.

She let us know all the ways we could get ourselves involved politics from volunteering to the most simple tasks such as just listening to the news and registering yourself to vote when you turn 16.

The boys and girls across both Leswalt and Kirkcolm had lots of great questions prepared to ask Miss Currie and she answered them extremely well and really enforced the idea that politics is something everyone can get passionate about but also that element of respect and respecting the views and opinions of others – something we have touched on a lot through our Health and Well-being lessons!

So, thank you so much Emma for helping us all – both pupils and teachers have learned so much from you and you’ve been a fab inspiration to us all!

Here are some photos of the visit…

Kirkcolm Primary are delighted to welcome our new additions to our school team.  We are joined by:

• Freddie
• Gregor
• Harrison
• Ian
• Ross
• Rory
• Joey

The boys looked very smart in their school uniform, as you can see from the photograph:

From the moment they arrived until they left at Three O’Clock, the boys smiled the whole day!

Miss Douglas had the lovely idea of capturing the ‘move-up’ day moment for all the pupils in her class.  Doesn’t everyone one look great!

The boys enjoyed making new friends with their schoolmates and had a great time doing lots of activities both indoors and outdoors.

Welcome to the Kirkcolm team boys!

Leswalt & Kircolm Primaries held a combined One Planet Picnic in the fresh air today as part of our last day fun.  The theme is ‘Good For You, Good For The Planet‘. This year, we worked very hard on reducing our single use plastic waste and snacking in a more environmentally way.

The initiatives we undertook were:

• We packaged our lunches in recyclable paper bags
• Our healthy fresh fruit offering was unwrapped to reduce waste
• Our milk was supplied with paper straws instead of plastic
• Children bought their reusable water bottles
• Our take-away burger rolls were packed into recyclable paper bags.

Everyone enjoyed the alfresco social time as part of our last day.  There was lots of chatter and smiles from the boys and girls.

The children sorted our waste into three recycling tubs: food, paper and plastic, making sure there was no litter left behind.

The first, smallest bag on the left is food waste to be put on our compost heap, the second largest bag is paper waste to recycle and the third, smaller bag is plastic waste which we can also recycle. You can see from the photographs how little plastic and food waste there was compared to recyclable paper material.

We then placed the waste into the correct bins to be processed by Dumfries and Galloway Council.

# Responsible Citizens

As we wave this school year goodbye, we have our final hurrah – the end of year award ceremony!

This is our opportunity to celebrate the pupils achievements throughout the year and give them the recognition they deserve. While not every pupil may walk away with a certificate on this day, all the pupils of this school have worked incredibly hard. They have made the best of a bad situation dealing with the hardships that have fallen upon them this school year and proved themselves time and time again to be resilient, tough and kind. 

The year prizes go as follow; 

The Award for 100% Attendance – Cameron Clarke in P1! 

We gave out the awards for the Accelerated Reading Star Readers in each year group;

P2 – Sophie McColm 

P3 – Phoebe Manson 

P4 – Danny Dougan 

P5 – OLivia Johnstone 

P6 – Olivia Turtle 

P7 – Zack Ashton 

Responsible Citizen Trophies were awarded to pupils who proved themselves to be responsible and reliable in class 

P1 – Callum Dougan 

P2 – Lyle McCulloch 

P3 – Ivan Turtle 

P4 – Sally Drummond 

P5 – James Turtle 

P6 – Alexander MacPherson 

P7 – Ruth Turtle 

We gave out WH Smith giftcards for the pupils who managed to complete their GOLD Star Awards! This was achieved by Callum Dougan, Rebecca Manson, Phoebe Manson, Arran Farquhar, Ivan Turtle, Danny Dougan & Calder Farquhar 

Mini Walk Medals were given out to the 27 pupils who took part on that day! 

These were Emilie, Cameron, Callum, Jessica, Rebecca, Arran, Lyle, Phoebe, Ivan, Lydia, Danny, Sally, Jack, Olivia J, James, Miley, Oliver, Luke, Emma, Calder, George, Alexander, Olivia T, Daniel, Zack, Arla, Ruth

The Mini Walk Shields had been engraved and awarded to George Keith and Ruth Turtle for coming first in the mini walk and the runners up in Olivia Turtle and Danny Dougan were also given certificates for their efforts! 

Then we had the Sports Day Champions! These are the pupils who raked up the most points in their respected age group in the sports day races! 

P1 – Paige Neill

P2- Lyle McCulloch

P3 – Ivan Turtle 

P4 – Sally Drummond 

P5 – James Turtle 

P6 – Miley Adams 

P7 – Arla McCulloch & Daniel Hall 

Certificates were awards to the pupils who managed to pass all of their Rainbow Spelling… Well done to Alexander MacPherson, James Turtle & Ivan Turtle

…and Rainbow Tables! Well done Emma Drummond, Ivan Turtle, Calder Farquhar and James Turtle 

The Literacy Awards were given to pupils who had shown great achievements and progress in their Literacy work… This was Havana Diyani in P1-4 and Olivia Johnstone in P4-7 

The Numeracy award for great achievement and progress in Numeracy over the past year… This was awarded to Lydia Adams for P1-4 and Luke Butler for P4-7…

The Health and Wellbeing Award was given to pupils who displayed all aspects of Health and Wellbeing to a high standard! This was given to Sophie McColm in P1-4 and Olivia Turtle in P4-7. 

Finally, the REACH Award celebrating achievements with our School Ethos! This was awarded to Phoebe Manson in P1-4 and Miley Adams in P4-7 for all their hard work during remote learning. 

The final thing left to do was say out goodbyes to our P7’s – Arla, Daniel, Ruth and Zack are going to be leaving us for the Academy so we saw them out as we saw fit, with some lovely leavers hoodies and a year book to remind them of their time here at Kirkcolm Primary so they remember us! Some heartfelt speeches were made, perhaps some tears shed, perhaps some held back!? 

#

Finally, we ended the day with a Photostory so we could all have a good giggle at their transformation from wee baby P1 pupils to big bad P7’s ready for the next steps! (I kid, not a bad bone in any of their bodies!) 

With that, we wish our P7 leavers the best of luck and all of you a great summer holidays! Can’t wait to see you back in August, refreshed and recharged and (Hopefully!) with a nice, normal year ahead of us… 

It finally happened! We got to go away on a trip! The excitement leading up was like no other with the frantic trips to the toilets and head counts to make sure we were good to go before we finally ascended onto our bus with a good  drive ahead of us…

Finally, we arrived at Mabie after a very painless journey filled with silly games and chatter amongst all. We separated into our groups and went on to explore using our map and the teachers excellent (ahem) directional abilities to guide us!

We got stuck in to a whole host of the activities available to us there! There was grass sledging, regular sledging, big sack slides and a gigantic play park like no other for us to run about on. Naturally we also had to give the gigantic bouncing pillows a good workout…

Not to mention the main highlight for many of us, getting to see the animals! Our hearts melted at the sight of the tiny piglets and our hands tickled from the licks of many a greedy goat. We got to stroke donkeys and miniature Shetland ponies (a certain Drummond was keeping me right on whats what!) and we even cowered in fear slightly at a rather intense alpaca. We paid a visit to the little and large roosters and chickens in their coops and saw some very chilled out rabbits.

In between all of this frantic fun we obviously had to have a wee wet bottom picnic in the park before the weather really perked up for us, at which point there almost certainly had to be an ice cream on the cards… (I’m sure this will be very clear from the wee white mouths you see in the photos!)

Once we were well fed and watered, we went on to take in the final fun Mabie had to offer us which included a rather bumpy ride on a ‘train’ which the boys and girls were absolutely loving! As well as a wee jaunt on a pedalo boat where myself and Miss Douglas proved our excellent boating skills while some others were just careening in circles in the small loch! (You know who you are…!)

Overall, what an amazing day had by all! We went back onto our bus absolutely shattered from the day of fun and feeling very content that we had, what felt like, such a day of total normality – much overdue!

We were sad we couldn’t invite any parents/guardians to join us in this but we took lots of photos so you can see just how much of a good time we had there. Until next time! 🙂

P4 – 7 made full use of Fresh Air Friday today.  The boys and girls worked together in small groups to plan and design chalk obstacle courses with sequential activity steps.

They put their plans into action by chalking out their crazy challenge courses and demonstrating their use to others before everyone got stuck in for a go.  It was great fun, albeit with a few dizzy heads on the spinning instruction stages.

There were many competencies embedded in this activity; namely the  Employability Skills of:

• Communicating
• teamwork
• negotiating
• problem solving
• organisation
• initiative & creativity

Have a look at the fun they had whilst developing their skills:

They’re here! Please keep in mind the pupils were racing against Leswalt Primary to help ‘up’ the numbers as well as occasionally having to race in whole Primary heats (P1) and combination of Primaries (P5/6 girls together) so there will be the odd wee combination of names as you cast your eyes across the results.

Regardless of the results the effort alone on Monday was phenomenal and everybody gave it their absolute all but congratulations to the pupils who managed to win the best in their heats!

Sprint

P1 all                      1^st – Paige Neill, 2^nd – Cameron Clarke, 3^rd – Callum Dougan

P2 all                      1^st –Murray Reid, 2^nd – Lyle McCulloch, 3^rd – Arran Farquhar

P3 girls                  1^st – Ela Chang, 2^nd – Ellie Bennewith, 3^rd – Holly Santangeli

P3 boys                1^st – Ivan Turtle, 2^nd – Sean McCredie, 3^rd – Hamish Scott

P4 girls                  1^st – Sally Drummond, 2^nd – Cara jamieson, 3^rd – Carys McHallum

P4 boys                1^st – Jack Howie, 2^nd – Danny Dougan, 3^rd – Mark Drummond

P5 boys                1^st – Fraser Reid, 2^nd – Tristan Millar, 3^rd – Struan Scott

P5/6 girls              1^st – Miley Adams, 2^nd –Breagh Kirkpatrick, 3^rd – Emma Drummond

P 6 boys               1^{st –} Calder Farquhar, 2^nd – Tylor Alexander, 3^rd – Oliver Brown

P7 girls                  1^st – Arla McCulloch, 2^nd – Ruth Turtle, 3^rd – Chloe Kennedy

P7 boys                                1^st – Gregor Reid, 2^nd – Jack Cloy, 3^rd – Daniel Hall

Skipping

P1 all                      1^st – Rebecca Manson, 2^nd – Emilie Brown, 3^rd – Jessica Johnstone

P2 all                      1^st –Lyle McCulloch, 2^nd – Ruby McMillan, 3^rd – Arran Johnstone

P3 girls                  1^st – Phoebe Manson, 2^nd – Isla Kirkpatrick, 3^rd – Ellie Bennewith

P3 boys                1^st – Ivan Turtle, 2^nd – Archie Ashton, 3^rd – Ewan Clark

P4 girls                  1^st – Sally Drummond, 2^nd – Cara Jamieson, 3^rd – Havana Diyana

P4 boys                1^st – Mark Drummond, 2^nd – Danny Dougan, 3^rd – Jack Howie

P5 boys                1^st – Fraser Reid, 2^nd – Oscar Storey, 3^rd – Struan Scott

P5/6 girls              1^st –  Miley Adams, 2^nd –Breagh Kirkpatrick, 3^rd – Rose Santangeli

P 6 boys               1^{st –} Murray Williams, 2^nd – Calder Farquhar, 3^rd – Luke Butler

P7 girls                  1^st – Chloe Kennedy, 2^nd – Ruth Turtle, 3^rd – Arla McCulloch

P7 boys                                1^st – Gregor Reid, 2^nd – Jack Cloy, 3^rd – Andrew Brown

Sack

P1 all                      1^st – Callum Dougan, 2^nd – Cameron Clarke, 3^rd – Paige Neill

P2 all                      1^st –Lyle McCulloch, 2^nd – Murray Reid, 3^rd – Rachael Drummond

P3 girls                  1^st – Phoebe Manson 2^nd – Ellie Bennewith, 3^rd – Holly Santangeli

P3 boys                1^st – Ivan Turtle, 2^nd – Alistair Swan, 3^rd – Archie Ashton

P4 girls                  1^st – Sally Drummond, 2^nd – Lydia Adams, 3^rd – Cara Jamieson

P4 boys                1^st – Mark Drummond, 2^nd – Danny Dougan, 3^rd – Jack Howie

P5 boys                1^st – Tristan Millar, 2^nd – Fraser Reid, 3^rd – James Turtle/Oscar Storey

P5/6 girls              1^st – Olivia Johnstone, 2^nd –Breagh Kirkpatrick, 3^rd – Miley Adams

P 6 boys               1^{st –} Tyler Alexander/Murray Reid, 2^nd – George Keith 3^rd – Calder Farquhar

P7 girls                  1^st – Chloe Kennedy, 2^nd – Arla McCulloch, 3^rd – Ruth Turtle

P7 boys                                1^st – Gregor Reid, 2^nd – Daniel Hall, 3^rd – Joshua Obonyo

Egg & spoon

P1 all                      1^st – Paige Neill, 2^nd – Emilie Brown, 3^rd – Rebecca Manson

P2 all                      1^st –Murray Reid, 2^nd – Lyle McCulloch, 3^rd – Ruby McMillan

P3 girls                  1^st – Holly Santangeli, 2^nd – Isla Kirkpatrick, 3^rd – Ela Chang

P3 boys                1^st – Hamish Scott, 2^nd – Sean McCredie/Alistair Swan, 3^rd – Ewan Clark

P4 girls                  1^st – Cara Jamieson, 2^nd – Sally Drummond, 3^rd – Lydia Adams

P4 boys                1^st – Hamish McGregor, 2^nd – Danny Dougan, 3^rd – Mark Drummond

P5 boys                1^st – Tristan Millar, 2^nd – Oscar Storey, 3^rd – Thomas Agnew

P5/6 girls              1^st – Taylor Smith, 2^nd –Olivia Turtle, 3^rd – Miley Adams

P 6 boys               1^{st –} Murray Williams, 2^nd – Tyler Alexander, 3^rd – Luke Butler

P7 girls                  1^st – Ruth Turtle, 2^nd – Arla McCulloch, 3^rd – Chloe Kennedy

P7 boys                                1^st – Jack Cloy, 2^nd – Daniel Hall, 3^rd – Joshua Obonyo

Distance

P1 all                      1^st – Paige Neill, 2^nd – Rebecca Manson, 3^rd – Callum Dougan

P2 all                      1^st –Sophie McColm, 2^nd – Arran Farquhar, 3^rd – Lyle McCulloch

P3 girls                  1^st – Ela Chang, 2^nd – Phoebe Manson, 3^rd – Holly Santangeli/Amelia McHallum

P3 boys                1^st – Ivan Turtle, 2^nd – Hamish Scott, 3^rd – Sean McCredie

P4 girls                  1^st – Sally Drummond, 2^nd – Lydia Adams, 3^rd – Cara Jamieson

P4 boys                1^st – Jack Howie, 2^nd – Mark Drummond/Danny Dougan, 3^rd – Hamish McGregor

P5 boys                1^st – Fraser Reid, 2^nd – Struan Scott, 3^rd – Tristan Millar/Alexander Clark/James Turtle

P5/6 girls              1^st – Miley Adams, 2^nd – Olivia Turtle, 3^rd – Breagh Kirkpatrick

P 6 boys               1^{st –} George Keith, 2^nd – Calder Farquhar, 3^rd – Oliver Brown

P7 girls                  1^st – Arla McCulloch, 2^nd – Ruth Turtle, 3^rd – Chloe Kennedy

P7 boys                                1^st – Gregor Reid, 2^nd – Jack Cloy, 3^rd – Andrew Brown

Beanbag

P1 all                      1^st – Rebecca Manson, 2^nd – Emilie Brown, 3^rd – Lily Bennewith

P2 all                      1^st –Arran Farquhar, 2^nd – Ben Thompson, 3^rd – Roman Haver

P3 girls                  1^st – Holly Santangeli, 2^nd – Isla Kirkpatrick, 3^rd – Phoebe Manson

P3 boys                1^st – Ivan Turtle, 2^nd – Hamish Scott, 3^rd – Sean McCredie

P4 girls                  1^st – Sally Drummond, 2^nd – Cara Jamieson/Havana Diyani, 3^rd – Faye Adams

P4 boys                1^st – Mark Drummond, 2^nd – Brandon Millar, 3^rd – Jack Howie

P5 boys                1^st – Alexander Clark, 2^nd – Tristan Millar, 3^rd – Noah McGrory-Thompson

P5/6 girls              1^st – Olivia Turtle, 2^nd –Emma Drummond, 3^rd – Rose Santangeli

P 6 boys               1^{st –} Murray Reid, 2^nd – Aidan Adams, 3^rd – Oliver Brown

P7 girls                  1^st – Chloe Kennedy, 2^nd – Arla McCulloch, 3^rd – Ruth Turtle

P7 boys                                1^st – Daniel Hall, 2^nd – Andrew Brown, 3^rd – Jack Cloy