Portpatrick Primary

What a fabulous start to our long awaited Lockerbie Manor residential trip!

The children arrived at school excited and eager for it all to begin. Everyone has settled in together so quickly and are having an absolute ball.

Day 1’s itinerary was:

• Rifle shooting
• Archery
• Climbing
• Obstacle
• Abseiling

Check out the photographs to see the super active, fun-packed time your wee toots are having:

Setting Off:

Abseiling:

Rifle Shooting

Archery

Having fun

 

Settling down for the night

Even more photos from yesterday:

 

And all that in just one day!

 

Dumfries and Galloway Council have just published their COP26 DG School Report on Learning for Sustainability which showcases learning activities that took place during COP26 across the region.  Our North Rhins Partnership is featured.  Why not have a read and see how our environmentally responsible children engaged with this event.

D&G COP26 Report Final

 

Following on from our Burns Supper celebration on the 25th of January, Mr Alec Ross arrived today to judge our annual poetry competition for the children.  He came dressed for the occasion in a dashing pair of tartan trews and many of the children also got into the spirit of the day with splashes of tartan and plaid being worn.

 

 

 

 

 

There were three categories to our event:

• Poetry handwriting
• Poetry recitation
• Poetry artwork

It was very clear to see that all of the children have worked very hard to learn their poems and use expression and action to bring them alive in an entertaining performance.  The level of creativity in this year’s artwork was very high, with great imagination demonstrated by all.

It was quite a challenge to select winners from each primary as the standard was so high.  Here are this year’s results:

Portpatrick Primary Scots Celebration Competition Results – January 2022
Primary	Poem	Recitation Winner	Artwork Winner		Handwriting Winner
1
2	The Elephant	1.      Harry 2.      Arran 3.      Freya/Adam	1.       Arran 2.       Freya 3.       Harry		1.       Harry 2.       Adam 3.       Arran
3	Tae a Thistle	1.       Rebecca	1.       Rebecca		1.       Rebecca
4	Beasties	1.       Carter 2.       Louise 3.       Erin	1.       Erin 2.       Carter 3.       Louise		1.       Lacey 2.       Carter 3.       Erin
5	The Auld Troot	1.       Cameron 2.       Atticus 3.       Max	1.       Max 2.       Cameron 3.       Tilly		1.       Lewis 2.       Connor 3.       Tilly
6	The Moosie’s Prayer	1.       Katie 2.       Jack	1.       Katie 2.       Jack		1.       Katie 2.       Jack
7	Robert Burns Poems	1.       Maya 2.       Ava Lily 3.       Ruby	1.       Izzy 2.       Ruby 3.       Ava Lily		1.       Ruby 2.       Izzy 3.       Alba
Highly Commended Across All 3 Categories		Class 1 ·      Stephen ·      Jenna		Class 2 ·         Scott ·         Lilly

Regardless of results, everyone can be very proud of their achievement in being successful learners and confident individuals.

Sláinte

 

As part of our Eco Schools biodiversity targets, the whole school participated in this year’s RSPB Big School Birdwatch on Friday.

Armed with our bird spotter guides, we conducted our survey at three sites.  We took a walk to the woods at the church and continued up to Dunskey woods, and spent some time in our school grounds. On our way past, we noticed that Tilly’s Grandparents garden was a big hit with the local sparrows visiting their feeders.

We applied our maths skills to the task by taking tallies of each type of bird spotted.  We then submitted our results online and produced a graphical representation of our findings.  Not surprising for our location, crows and gulls were the most common birds we saw.

 

 

It is that time of year again where we celebrate our proud Scottish heritage.  Everyone came together today to enjoy a social Burns Supper served by our Lovely Laura.

Our House Captains organised the seating plans, naming each table after  famous Scots poems.  The children also created flag banners and a thistle centre pieces to decorate the tables.   There was a wee show of tartan here an there in our attire today too.

In time honoured tradition, everyone stood as the haggis was piped in. Stephen presented the haggis to Mrs Henry, who wonderfully addressed the haggis for everyone’s entertainment.  The children were enthralled by her rousing performance of this classic Burns poem.

 

Next in the proceedings was the Selkirk Grace given by Lily.  Laura then served a delicious meal of haggis, neeps and tatties followed by shortbread and butterscotch mousse, which everyone very much enjoyed.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Once the meal was over, Atticus, Conor and Max gave the Toast to the Lassies, with a little bit of tongue-in-cheek teasing.  Izzy and Alba responded in kind with their Reply to the Laddies. The vote of thanks was delivered by Ruby and Lily. Everyone did extremely well, particularly those who had stepped in at the last minute due to some absences.

In further entertainment, Primary 1 – 4 sung The Three Craws.  Primary 5 – 7 sung The Jelly Piece Song.  To bring the event to close, everyone came together to sing Auld Lang’s Syne.

 

Judging of our poetry recitations and artwork will now be held on Wednesday 2nd of February.

Today we had the joy of giving the fabulous Kim a little surprise birthday treat. Kim was celebrating her 40^th birthday in school today and of course it couldn’t go unnoticed. It was a difficult secret to keep, with all children and staff trying not to acknowledge her birthday until later in the afternoon. Kim being Kim, got on with her day, and pretended like it was just another Friday at work.

Without knowing, the staff had organised for a surprise staff lunch (supplied by Connors Restaurant) and a beautiful big birthday cake. The children all made her a beautiful card and sang Happy Birthday on their way to lunch.

We wish you many happy returns from everyone at Portpatrick Primary. Forty and Fabulous!

The children at Portpatrick Primary are delighted to start the new term with some new features to the playground. Thank you to the parent council for organising the addition of our new goal posts to our ever expanding playground. Special thank you must go to the volunteers who put them together during the school holidays. We are very grateful!

Below are some photos of the children enjoying the new goal posts.

The children of Portpatrick Primary enjoyed a walk down to the Harbour hub today to enjoy a virtual pantomime – oh yes they did!   They snuggled up inside and  enjoyed watching “Lost in Pantoland”

On return to school the children enjoyed some strawberry Santas, kindly provided by Connor’s restaurant.  John Connor handed in the strawberries along with some amazing Rudolph cupcakes and Christmas cookies for the children to enjoy at their party tomorrow, or take home in a goody bag.

Many thanks for thinking of the school.  The strawberries were enjoyed by all!

World Kindness day was recently and the pupils in p5-7 took some time to reflect with Miss Hayes on what it means to be kind.  The class decided to write some letters and be kind to others in Thorneycroft. The children wrote and told them all about themselves and their lives .

Today the class were delighted to see their box returned to school , full of replies from residents. Each pupil got a lovely letter  from someone different in Thorneycroft. We read the letters out and were very grateful for the kindness shown back to Portpatrick Primary pupils

It was a lovely inter generational activity, which all really appreciated .

Portpatrick Primary is forever grateful to the local community throughout the year for their continued support. We are always astounded by the generosity of those around us and this year has been no different. Quite simply, we wouldn’t be who we are without you all.  Below is a quick summary of some of the things that have been happening in Portpatrick School in the month of December. Thank you so much to all involved both this month and every month of the year. We wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year when it comes.

Downshire
As many of you may already know, the children created some lovely Christmas pictures which have been on display in The Downshire throughout the Christmas period. If you haven’t already seen them, be sure to have a quick look next time you are passing. On Christmas Jumper Day The Downshire Staff made their way up to the school grounds to kindly give the children a selection box gift and wish them a Merry Christmas. Thank you so much, the children were delighted!

Mount Stewart
A huge thank you to the Mount Stewart for helping us with our Christmas Video and also for inviting Santa before his isolation period to visit the boys and girls and give them a little gift. The Children were delighted with the special surprise and were equally as delighted with Santa’s generous gifts. All made better by the wonderful snow.

Scarlett Visuals
The children were very curious during the making of the video to learn about how to use a drone professionally. The children watched as Mark (The drone pilot) showed children how he operated the drone, the importance of having a licence for the drone and then gave a quick preview of the finished result. Massive thanks to Mark for giving up his time and generously helping us out with our Christmas video extravaganza. If you haven’t seen the video yet be sure to have a look. The end footage of our wonderful village is absolutely spectacular.

Portpatrick Primary 2021 Christmas Video – YouTube

Connors Restaurant
During our filming week we were lucky enough to do a short clip inside Connors restaurant. Thank you to John and Kirstin Connor who gave the children a lovely cookie treat to enjoy. It was very yummy and definitely helped to keep our energy up during filming.

Christingle
Many thanks to St Ninians Church of Portpatrick who dropped off a charitable festive activity for the children to take part in. Children learnt about the tradition of Christingle which aims to raise money for young people in need. We created Christingles and recognised the symbols within it. The orange representing the world, the red ribbon symbolising the love of Christ, the sweets and dried fruit representing all of god’s creations and the lit candle representing Jesus’s light in the world, bringing hope to people living in darkness.

Christmas Dinner
Served on Christmas jumper day and with lots of festive cheer, the children enjoyed a delicious Christmas Dinner delivered up by our wonderful Laura. Pupils had lots of fun taking selfies, pulling crackers (and faces) before telling jokes and donning the traditional party hats.

Mrs Cain and the Loreburn Community Garden, Portpatrick
Thank you to Mrs Cain and the Loreburn Community garden who have kindly donated some selection boxes to the children for Christmas. Again, we are very grateful for your generosity and the children will be delighted when these are distributed on Wednesday.