Author: Mrs McHarg

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.

 

Rhian, Findlay, Lee and Rowan represented the school at the annual Rotary Club Quiz at Rephad Primary on Thursday afternoon. They put their general knowledge skills to the test and came an impressive 2nd place out of 10 schools, missing out on 1st place by only 1 point! Well done – you did the school proud!

Pupil enjoyed a fab day away today, courtesy of the Community Council. The school was kindly given £500 to take the pupils on an extra trip – so we headed off to Ayr for the day! 

After meeting at the train station at half 8, we made the journey to Ayr, with some pupils playing I Spy to fill the time. 

Once we arrived, we walked to LA Bowl where we had a game of 10-pin bowling. There was some friendly competition between staff and pupils – Mrs Warwick was victorious in her game; but Myles beat Ms Whorlow and Liam beat Mrs Henry! It was a close competition between Mrs McHarg and Ruby – there was only 1 point between them!  

During this, groups were taken out for a game of laser quest. Pupils had a blast running around in the dark – although they targeted the teachers, who didn’t stand a chance! 

After some lunch, we made our way to the park to run off some steam, before heading back home on the train. 

Pupils had a wonderful day – many thanks to the Community Council for making this possible. 

Pupil were outside yesterday and this morning planting trees with Sian Roberts in our playground, to help provide a home for the wildlife and brighten up our playground. The 30 trees are from the Woodland Trust, who were giving them to schools for free to encourage pupils to get involved in planting trees. There are 3 different types of trees, including cherry and silver birch.

Many thanks must go to Sian and helpers who gave up their time to do this.

 

On Friday afternoon, the boys and girls of Portpatrick Primary displayed their wonderful talents to the school to help raise money for Comic Relief. Families were invited in to watch the ‘Portpatrick’s Got Talent’ competition in return for a donation towards the very worthy charity.

Organised by members of the Pupil Council, pupils were asked to apply to take part in the competition. Auditions were then held and 8 acts were selected to go through to the final, held on Red Nose Day.

Entries in the competition included: Livvy singing ‘Little Do You Know’; Lewis and Liam performing magic tricks; Lillie, Alba and Izzy dancing; Ruby singing ‘Don’t Stop Believin’; Findlay playing the flute; Rowan identity 100 flags of the world; and Erin, Holly, Rose and Caroline singing ‘7 Years Old’.

Our judges, Pat, Barbara and Mrs Jean Ross, provided some very thoughtful feedback after each act and had the very difficult decision of selecting 1st to 3rd placed entries.

3rd place was awarded to Rowan Harbottle. In joint 2nd place we had Findlay Thorburn and Lewis McQuillan. The overall winner in 1st place was Ruby Rankin.

A huge well done to everyone who applied, auditioned and competed on the day. What a talented bunch of pupils we have!!

To further raise funds for Comic Relief, we held a non-uniform and crazy hair day. Alba and Izzy also kindly baked and decorated some cupcakes at home which they sold at break time.

We raised a grand total of £128.57 for Comic Relief – thank you to everyone for your donations!

To kick-off the start of the national British Science Week (which runs from 8^th-15^th March), Primary 1-3 pupils held a science afternoon in school which parents were invited to pop along and join in with.

There were several different science activities on offer to participate in, including making a rainbow, a rain cloud, a sycamore helicopter, and a moving car. As we are keen to promote STEM subjects, there were also stations involving K’Nex challenges and the Code ’N’ Go Mouse to develop programming skills.

Pupils loved the make a cloud station, where they had to use shaving foam, water and food colouring to simulate a rain cloud – although half of the shaving foam ended up on pupils’ noses rather than in the jar!!

Thank-you to all the parents who popped in – everyone had a fab afternoon!

As part of Safer Internet Day (SID), our Digital Leaders organised an optional whole school competition: P1-3 were to design a poster all about Smartie the Penguin’s message for staying safe online; P4-7 were to design an internet safety leaflet. Today, the Digital Leaders got together to look at all the entries and vote for the winner. We are delighted to announce that Izzy White’s leaflet won! Well done to everyone who took part, and to Izzy for your fabulously informative leaflet!

Izzy’s leaflet will be copied and sent home to parents along with a ‘Digital Parenting’ magazine, which contains lots of useful tips and articles about keeping children safe online. Look out for these in your child’s school bag!

Today at assembly, all pupils received a small cardboard battery box as part of the Big Battery Hunt. This is a recycling scheme which we have signed up to as part of our Eco Schools work. Pupils should fill the boxes at home with used batteries, before bringing them into school and emptying them into the large plastic containers in the hall. These will then be sent away to be recycled. As long as we arrange for a tub of batteries to be collected before June, our school will be entered into a prize draw to win various goodies including: iPads, £2000 worth of school equipment vouchers, a 2-night trip to a sustainability centre, or a 3-year subscription to ‘MyMaths’ worth £1000.

Please pass on the message that your batteries can be recycled at Portpatrick School! Thank-you in advance for your support in this initiative.

The Pupil Council and Eco Committee would like to say a huge thank-you to the Parent Council for purchasing a new bin for our playground. We hope this will help keep our playground clean and tidy! Thank-you again!

Primary 5-7 pupils from Leswalt, Kirkcolm and Portpatrick Primary Schools headed to Lockerbie Manor on Wednesday for a 3-day outdoor residential trip.

After stopping at Springholm Primary for some lunch and to stretch our legs, we reached Lockerbie Manor early in the afternoon. Everyone was given a tour of the building and grounds by the instructors and got shown to their rooms. After a quickly unpacking, we split into 4 groups and headed to our first activity. Activities included archery, rifle shooting, obstacle course, climbing wall, abseiling, orienteering, fencing, canoeing and kayaking. After activity one, some pupils required a shower as they were caked in mud after army-crawling on their bellies underneath netting! By this time we had worked up quite an appetite, and were served with the most delicious dinner – what a selection on offer! At night time, we had an evening activity before getting all cosy in our jammies and spending time getting to know pupils from the other partnership schools.

Day 2 saw an early morning wake-up call at 7.20am. We had 5 activities spread out over the day, with some pupils getting an early afternoon bath after falling into the lake whilst kayaking! That night, having been exhausted from all the physical activity, pupils were sound asleep before 11pm – much to the staff’s delight!!

On Friday morning, we were up early to get our rooms packed and emptied. Some rooms looked like a bomb had hit them, there were clothes everywhere! We then headed out for our final 2 activities before the bus arrived at 1.30pm to return us to Stranraer. It was a very quiet journey back, with lots of pupils catching some shut-eye!

Everyone had a brilliant time away, making new friends across the partnership and trying new activities.

Photos below from day 3: