Portpatrick Primary

P4-7 have donned their movie maker caps to produce a short film on William Wallace.  This is part of a Dumfries and Galloway collaborative video challenge, and also fits perfectly with developing the children’s digital technology skills.

To mark the 150th anniversary of the Wallace Monument, and the introduction to heroines to the Hall of Heroes for the first time, schools across the region have been invited to make a 60 second video on our Scottish heroes.  We were quick to grab William Wallace from the list of famous people from our history, having learned about his life in the past.

The children self-managed presenting, videoing, lighting and editing our video.  The design of the film is through personal selection and choice. We did have credits, but had to remove them for splicing with other school’s contributions.

We are proud of the finished product and have already been told it will be showcased across the STEM yammer group to promote and encourage participation in this worthy activity.

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We would like to say a big ‘thank you!’ to all of our pupils and families who participated in the annual Kirkcolm sponsored walk on Saturday.  All funds raised by Portpatrick pupils will go directly to our school.

There were many smiles and determined faces as everyone made their way around the 7 mile route to completion.  Our thanks also go to the many people who supported the event through marshalling, offering refreshments and encouragement etc.  Well done to Isabella who was the first Portpatrick pupil to complete all 7 miles!

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As part of Digital Learning Week, we have been sharing and developing our digital technology skills in our ICT Lunch Time Club. The sessions have been organised and supported by both our digital leaders and by those who wished to share their abilities.

All of the activities have been well attended and the pupils have cooperated, supported and shared wonderfully well.

Throughout the week our pupils have engaged in the following:

• Dance Mat Typing – developing keyboard skills
• Coding – developing programming skills
• Digital Photography
• Webcams
• Animation
• Green screen and movie making
• Symmetry software

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P4-7 received specialist Green Screen and movie making input from Miss Karen Creighton today.  She is one of our very skilled D & G RAISE team members (Raising Aspirations in Science and Technology).

The pupils were guided through green screen technology.  We then used Serif Movie Plus to overlay and edit our green screen images over volcanoes from around the world.  The children applied sequencing, ‘chroma-key’ functions and credits etc. to inform and entertain with their animated videos.  We are using digital skills in creative ways to enhance our learning across the curriculum.

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P5 -7 participated in the cluster’s annual cross country event at Green Valley today.  The children gave it their all to run either a full mile or half a mile over soft ground.  They also took part in a series of relay races of mixed ages.  Everyone demonstrated resilience and determination by completing their individual and team challenges with ‘puffed out’ smiles 🙂

Our digital leaders captured action using a digital camera.

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Our partnership schools are always pleased to celebrate the achievements of our pupils in developing their digital skills for learning and life.

P4-7 at Portpatrick have been working hard to learn about creating and using digital images;  saving and retrieving them for a purpose.  The children have also been sharing their knowledge using software such as Movie Maker.  We are a sharing team!

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The children have use the skills that they have learned from their amazing trip to Logan Botanic Garden to take magnificent photos of their favourite part of nature in the school playground and also at Logan Botanic Garden.

I’m sure you will agree that there are some very pleasing images achieved using Digital Technology

 

Written by Findlay Thorburn P6 – Digital Leader

Portpatricks trip to Logan Botanic Gardens 

Blog excerpt written by Digital Leader Findlay Thorburn 

On the 30th of April 2019, Portpatrick school went to Logan Botanic Gardens.

P4-7 were learning about how to take digital photos of nature and P1-3 were learning about animals as part of a Teddy Bear’s Picnic.

The older children were learning about the different ways to take a digital picture and what they should do to get a perfect picture by using what we can see around us.

The little class were learning what animals need to survive in the outdoors.  They had to make a little place for their animal to survive with natural items that they found around the garden.  They took their teddy bears along with them.

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Photographs from P1-3 to follow

 

P4-7 pupils headed to the Ryan Centre along with other local primary schools on Friday afternoon, to be entertained by the brilliantly talented ‘Music for All’ musicians – “Trio Ecossaise.”

Between performing as a trio, the musicians took it in turns to explain to the audience a bit about their particular instrument (clarinet, piano and cello) and then performed a piece of music so we could hear how it sounds. Pupils were encouraged to consider how the music made them feel as they listened and picked an Emoji to represent this.

Pupils learned lots about the various instrument and had a thoroughly enjoyable afternoon at this musical extravaganza!

 

The boys and girls headed up to Dunskey estate on Friday morning, by kind invitation of the Orr-Ewing family. We were greeted by Chris, Verena and Aggie who took us foraging in the grounds for wild garlic (minus some adults who managed to get lost!!). Many pupils were surprised at what wild garlic looked like – lots of us had never seen it before, even the adults! Although there was no mistaking it – we could smell the garlic before we saw it!  The children learned about natural plants that are edible.

After we had each filled our tubs with garlic, we headed back to the house and split into groups in the kitchen. We had to work together to wash the garlic, tear it up and grind it down to a paste using a mortar and pestle – this really got our muscles working as it was no easy job!! We then added pine nuts, oil, parmesan, salt & pepper, and some lemon juice and continued to grind it altogether until it was smooth.

Chris had cooked some pasta which he mixed with our pesto and we all got a little bowl to taste – there were lots of thumbs up and only a few thumbs down!

We then had some time to have a run about in the garden, before the buses arrived to take us back to school (along with the lingering smell of garlic, which has followed us around all day!).

Many thanks must go to the Orr-Ewing family and the staff at Dunskey for providing the pupils with this experience.