Kirkcolm Primary School

On Wednesday our P7 pupils flocked for their first taste of the Academy at the P7 Snowball.

This gave them a chance to socialise with P7 pupils from all the schools in the Stranraer Academy cluster since these will be their future peers for the next 5 or 6 years!

The boys and girls had a lovely night and as you can see – they scrub up well!

The boys and girls got dressed in their festive finery on Thursday afternoon for their annual Christmas Party! It all kicked off at 1pm with a delicious buffet, kindly made by Anne-Marie.

We then moved onto the party games, which were all planned, organised and ran by our very capable House Captains – Danny and Abbie. We enjoyed playing games such as: Christmas Corners, a Balloon Race, Pass the Present, Pin the Nose on Rudolph and Musical Statues. Pupils had also been busy learning some dances over the last few weeks in preparation for the party – they had a go at the Gay Gordons, Canadian Barn Dance and the Military Two-Step.

At half past 2, a special visitor arrived to a chorus of Jingle Bells to surprise the boys and girls – Santa came with a present for everyone who was on the nice list, which was all of them thankfully!!

We all had a wonderful afternoon! Have a look at the photos of our festive fun below!

Today, to celebrate Christmas fast approaching, the boys and girls of Kirkcolm dawned their Christmas Jumpers and sat down to a delicious Christmas dinner served by Anne Marie! Between some delicious turkey, crispy roast potatoes and tasty gingerbread themed deserts – the boys and girls (and staff!) have been well and truly spoilt today. Many a cracker was pulled and there was smiles all around as we are all feeling the festive cheer!

Here is a photo of some of the fabulous Christmas jumpers the boys and girls had on today;

Many thanks team Kirkcolm for all of the effort by parents, pupils and staff in organising and helping out with the Coffee morning on Saturday. It was a real team effort with support from all sides. It was very ably led and co-ordinated by Becky Richardson.

Becky has spent a great deal of time counting the money, working out the costs and has now reached the grand total of……..drum roll please………… £1188.17 in profit!! This is tremendous – thank you one and all. £200 of this money will go to the Nursery, with the rest being ear-marked for the school.

Here are some photos of the pupils singing their hymns on the day;

Today  all the boys and girls from Kirkcolm were paid a visit by the councils Compass program. Compass specialise in looking after our health and well-being and our heads in particular and work with adults who have suffered brain injuries. Leanne kindly came in and spoke to the boys and girls of Kirkcolm about how important it is to look after our heads and to always war a helmet when necessary!

We were a bit shocked to see there are definitely some guilty parties when it comes to wearing our helmets regularly so we talked about why it is so important. From looking at dangerous jobs which require us to keep us heads protected (builders, Policemen… miners!?) and finding out that simply wearing a helmet reduces your chances of getting a serious brain or head injury by a staggering 80%!? 

We looked at how helmets protect our heads by taking the blow and acting like an external skull to protect our brains! We got to get to grips with what a brain feels like in a jellied form (don’t worry – it was literally jelly!), feeling the weight of an average human brain and dropping an egg within a helmet to see the impact! We realised now just how delicate our brains are and why they need so much protection especially considering the hugely important job they do of running us 24/7.

Some interesting brain facts for you all include; 

• the average brain weights the same as half a bag of sugar 
• there are over 100 billion neurons firing through our brain and it would take us approximately 3000 years to count them all!?
• a jelly fish literally has no brain
• brains stop growing and developing at 25 (everybody was quick to point out that Miss McNicoll has officially had it now!) 🙁 
• The best way to look after yer noggin’ is to; eat well (lots of veg!), sleep regularly, get lot’s of fresh air and stay hydrated!!

Finally, we watched the story of Joe which was a remake of a real life story about a boy who fell on his bike and developed a serious brain injury from hitting his head due to no helmet and how he is still feeling the effects of it to this day and having to relearn everything. 

On a more cheery note – Compass are committed to ensuring every child in Dumfries and Galloway has a helmet to wear to keep them safe. So, if you find yourself in a sticky situation without a helmet (or with one you have perhaps out grown now) please get in contact with the school and we can see about having Leanne back to supply you with your own helmet!

Pupil Comments:

Zack – “I liked watching the video to see the impact of wearing helmets.”

Emma – “I learned to always wear helmets”

Abbie – “I now know  to always wear a helmet.”

These past 12 weeks, Wendy and Kate from Feis Ros have been coming to Kirkcolm’s upper class to teach P5-7 all about Scottish music, the children have learned a variety of Scottish songs and even a touch of Gaelic (to add a fourth language into the mix!) and the pupils have worked extremely hard and have been attentive learners in practising the tin whistle. 

Pupils learned a variety of songs and showcased their best ones in an open afternoon where all were invited to come and see. There is no doubt the boys and girls exceeded expectations beyond belief and put on an incredible show and made us all so proud of them! 

We could not extend a bigger thank you to the lovely ladies of Feis Ros for their hard work in this too, teaching the pupils such engaging and fun songs and making it all the more meaningful by explaining their origins and the meaning behind certain Scottish songs we all know and love. 

As an early Christmas treat, the boys and girls were able to take their tin whistles home so they could continue the practise if they wish to show off to whoever is willing to listen! 

Well done P5-7! 🙂 

Here are some photos of the performance today; 

On the 26th of November, P.5-7 got a visit from Lauren  who works to keep bridges maintained and secure for the D&G council. She also designs bridges and the children had a go of their own.

They  designed their bridges in groups of 4/5 and then had a go at building their own with paper straws. The bridges were tested with a full water-bottle. some of them worked, while others not so much!

Overall the children thoroughly enjoyed the experience and would happily do it again!

By Olivia Turtle (P.5), and Ivy Richardson (P.7)

The pupils also learned about the different types of bridges and what purposes they served, how strong they were and whereabouts in Scotland they could be found. Some of these included Beam, Trussel, Arch, Tiled, Suspension and Cable bridges.

Pupils were limited in their design too – they had to be sustainable and try and use as little materials as possible and figure out how to combine their materials to make their bridge as structurally sound as possible!

Here are some photos of the day;

I am delighted to say that following a process which we have been undertaking over the last 2 years, as part of our School improvement plan, our partnership of trio schools has achieved National recognition in the Digital Skills Scotland awards.

Today, in honour of Book Week Scotland, the boys and girls of Kirkcolm came together to enjoy a Live Authors session of The Gruffalo!

The pupils were able to listen to James Robertson and Catriona Lexy Campbell read out renditions of The Gruffalo in both Scots and Gaelic as well as listening to proper Scots and Gaelic words from all over the country.

It was amazing to see such great Scottish Culture embraced in this session and the boys and girls were over the moon to add some fab Scottish Vocabulary to their word bank – ‘Bahooky’ was a real fan favourite!

To launch the start of Book Week Scotland (which runs from 18^th-24^th November), P1-3 parents were invited into school this afternoon as part of the Bookbug (P1) / Read, Write, Count (P2-3) initiatives. Parents spent time exploring the contents of the bags and discussing ways in which the resources could be used to develop pupils’ literacy and numeracy at home. We also had a look at the ‘Parent Club’ website which gives further examples of activities to do at home using the resources.

An excited bunch of P1-3 pupils then joined us and were gifted with their bags. Pupils were desperate to get into their bags and see what it contained! Having sat patiently, we then headed to the classroom where pupils explored the goodies they were given – some were reading books; others were playing games of rockets & meteors or top trumps; and some were using story cubes to create imaginative silly stories!

Later in the week to continue the Book Week Scotland celebrations, P4-7 pupils will be doing some paired reading with P1-3, as suggested by the Pupil Council, and some pupils will be watching the Authors Live event which tells the story of the Gruffalo in Scots. We are all looking forward to getting together to enjoy some stories and share in our love of reading!