Our Halloween STEM fun continued today as we got stuck in to a food technology team activity.  We scooped out pumpkin flesh and followed an instruction text recipe to make the American Halloween treat of pumpkin pie. We used a variety of food preparation techniques such as chopping, boiling, blending, mixing and rolling etc.

Robin’s uncle was up at the crack of dawn making short crust pastry, to Gillespies’s secret recipe, for us to use for our pies.  We all agreed the pastry was just delicious.  Thank you so much to Iain!

Many of us had never tasted pumpkin pie and we were keen to try it. We can report that the flavour didn’t disappoint.

Nothing was wasted as we roasted the pumpkin seeds.  We enjoyed eating this nutritious and healthy snack.

The children were in charge of the tasks in the activity.  This included using their technology skills to record our steps with digital photography.  The boys and girls also designed and carved the pumpkin for themselves.

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Halloween has definitely not been cancelled this year at Portpatrick Primary. Today, the boys and girls enjoyed an immersive STEM Day themed on all things Halloween.

Throughout the tasks the children were using and applying  Skills 4.0 as outlined by Education Scotland as promoting skills development for a thriving future for our children and young people.

Bone Bridge Building – Engineering:

The boys and girls were set the challenge of working collaboratively to design and construct a ‘bone bridge’ using cotton bud bones and a range of selected construction materials.  The design criteria was to create and build a bridge that was raised from the surface and that had a span of between 0.5 metres to 1 metre long.

The children were completely focussed on their task; discussing and sharing their ideas.  They quickly adapted and modified designs in light of practical experience to achieve their successful outcome.

Self-Inflating Ghost Heads – Chemistry:

The two classes took turns to combine substances to create a chemical reaction.  We poured 50ml of vinegar into a drink bottle.  We added a heaped teaspoon of bicarbonate of soda into a balloon with a spooky face drawn on it. We then stretched the balloon neck over the neck of the bottle.  When we were ready, we all tipped the balloons upright and watched them inflate.

Maya explained that the two substances reacted together and that the chemical reaction produced carbon dioxide which inflated our balloon ghost heads.

Creature Catchers – Engineering/CDT:

The next challenge was to design a creature catcher web that would be capable of trapping creepy crawlies when lifted up after they had been placed on its surface.  The winning team would be the one that had the least amount of creatures fall through the net and escape the spider’s web.

The most problematic area was how to construct a frame with which to create the net.  Once the children overcame that, they quickly found efficient methods of weaving a network grid to capture the creepy creatures.

To test our creature catchers, we placed 20 creepy crawlies on top of each catcher and lifted it to see how many would fall through.  We had great results with only a quarter falling through on one design and zero falling through on each of the others.  We discussed why more fell through on the one catcher and determined that there were more gaps on that mesh as the weave was only in one direction.  We reviewed and reflected on how to improve the efficiency of that design.  It was a great learning activity for all.

Trick or Treat Toss – Physics:

The final challenge involved imagining a scenario where a shy ghost wanted to find a way to deliver trick or treat sweets to children without having to leave his haunted house.  The children designed and built their own catapults using fulcrums.  We then tested our treat launchers to see which design managed to send a wrapped sweet the farthest distance.  Robin and Alfie managed to toss their sweet an impressive 1.9  metres.

There is more spooky learning & fun planned for tomorrow.  Watch this space!

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Mhwwwhaaahah!

As part of our ongoing commitment to S.T.E.M. (Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths) we got our aprons on today; with food technology and nutrition as our learning focus.

This year, the Royal Horticultural Society’s Big Soup share took a different tack, where organisations were encouraged to share a pot of soup within their social bubbles.  The annual event is to encourage social involvement and highlight the issue of food waste.

The boys and girl picked our home grown sweetcorn  and leeks from our veggie patch.  We brought in a range of vegetables to add to our pot.  We cleaned,  prepped and chopped carrot, pepper, sweetcorn, leek and onion.  The children were given a choice of adding rice, pasta or lentils to our soup.  Rice was the winning choice.

Next, we simmered our soup and enjoyed a tasting session in the afternoon.  The verdict was that soup is a great way to get those veggies eaten in a delicious way.  There were seconds and even thirds served and the pot was scraped empty!

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For our last day of maths week, P4-7 have been learning and revising our knowledge of coordinates.  We introduced our activity by locating the treasure on a pirate’s treasure map by plotting and locating coordinates.

We then went outside to play a game of human battleships.  The children worked out the appropriate size of grid for a fair probability of getting a hit for someone’s position when standing on the grid.  We decided that a 6 x 6 grid would give a probability of 1 in 36 chance of getting a hit for each person standing in a grid location.  We calculated all the possible grid coordinates that we would need to play and created grid cards accordingly.

Next, we split into two teams.  Each member of our ‘ship’ team selected a square to stand in.  The ‘submarine’ team then drew out coordinate cards from a bag.  If the coordinate on the card matched the position that a ‘ship’ (person) was standing in, then they were sunk.

The children were very enthusiastic and had great fun whilst learning in the sunshine.

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P4 – 7 learned about classifying angles today.  We used the angle family to help us group angles in to types: acute, right, obtuse and reflex.

We constructed our own angle classification tools from card and used these to identify angle types found both outdoors and indoors.

We simply moved our slider against the angle we were measuring to find out what segment it fell into to identify the angle type.

Have a look at our active learning.

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P4 -7 have been extending their thinking on 2D and 3D shape following on from our observational walk in the village when we looked and discussed shapes used in building structures.

Today, the children got their architect’s hats on and designed their own structures using software on the computer.  They used a range of 2D and 3D shapes as building blocks to form their structures.

Next, some translated their designs in to physical buildings by using Kapla building block materials.  Other’s used trial and error in the design process.

The task helped develop team working soft skills such as negotiation, cooperation and communicating where critical thinking was at the forefront of their challenge.

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P1-7 had a special treat today as we visited the set of the feature length movie, Kingslayer,  being filmed on location at our local Dunskey Estate.

Mr and Mrs Orr Ewing and the film production team, Stronghold London Limited, kindly invited the pupils to join them to learn a little about how movies are made.  The period film is being directed by Stuart Brennan  who also stars in the movie along with Carolina Carlsson, Ryan Gage and Ellie-Rose Mackinlay.

We all met around the fire pit where we were entertained with a lively talk about life in medieval times by actor and director, Stuart Brennan.  We saw replica weapons and had the opportunity to look at period costume examples. We then got to witness a sword fight and found out how each step is carefully choreographed over a long period of time to get it just right.

Next, we were invited on set, in the woods, to watch an scene being filmed.  We could see the many different people who work in the industry who are required to film scenes and make film production possible.  This experience helps children understand the varied career paths and options that might be available to them in the future.

It was an insightful experience which the children thoroughly enjoyed.  Everyone was given a little memento of the day; a laminated shooting schedule for today’s filming signed by the stars of the film.

Thank you to everyone who made this trip possible.

P4-7 headed up to the woods in the sunshine  today to gather natural materials to create symmetrical pictures.  We had the challenge of finding matching items of similar size and and shape such as leaves, twigs, grasses and pine cones etc.

Back at school, we created a line of symmetry on a large sheet of paper.  The children had to work in pairs using their soft skills of cooperation, idea sharing and negotiation to agree their layout theme.

They carefully selected and placed natural materials to produce symmetrical pictures with similar parts facing each other as a mirror image.

The children have been very creative in combining art with maths today.  Have a look at their lovely symmetrical pictures.

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P4 – 7 kicked off Maths Week by learning about how architects use maths and science in their jobs to design structures.

We looked around our classroom to identify the range of 2D and 3D shapes that were visible.  Despite the drizzle, we extended our observation by going for a walk in the village to see how many other shapes we could identify.  We found a wide range.  The older buildings provided a greater range of shapes in their structures. We made sure to look up to spot the triangular prism shapes of roofs and the triangular structures on dorma windows.

We discussed why the square and rectangular shapes were more common on modern buildings; with their properties of tiling and tessellating easily together.

We created a tally chart of our shape spotting.  We then used technology to plot a graph of our results before we analysed our data by answering a range of questions.  For example; Why do you think this structure has been designed this way?   How does this shape provide structural support?

Have a look the photos of our activity.

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Today P 4- 7 joined Elizabeth Tindal for another outdoor session in the glorious sunshine.  We walked up the steps at the start of the Southern Upland Way path.  As we strolled, we took time to observe the different fauna and flora that grew along the pathway.

We tasted edible leaves, which were a bit nippy on the tongue and discussed salt environment hardy species of flowers such as the pink sea campion.  We learned that this plant  thrives along the coastline.  There were a few butterfly visitors to the flowers as we watched.  As the seed pods were ready, we gathered and scattered some seeds to help the species propagate and support our insect wildlife.

Next, we recycled card with a strip of double sided tape along it. We used this to gather a collection of plant colours and textures as we walked farther along.  We were careful to only pick tiny samples from each of the plants. There was a kaleidoscope of colours to choose from.

We even got to get up close and personal with an insect.  Can you identify it? 😉

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