I hope everyone had a wonderful Bank Holiday weekend and enjoyed the glorious sunshine.

I can’t believe we are coming into June and the final month of Primary 6. This month is going to be busy. Below is information for parents and carers.

Buddying

We are hopeful that buddying will be able to go ahead in August. Thank you to all the parents and carers who signed the forms allowing the pupils to record videos for their P1 buddies. This week Primary 6 will find out the name of their P1 buddy and will record their ‘Hello’ videos introducing themselves.

God’s Loving Plan

This week we will be commencing our God’s Loving Plan unit. Primary 6 have been notified that this will be happening and have been encouraged to let their parents and carers know. Primary 6 are aware of what is expected of them during this unit. Please be prepared to discuss sensitive issues at home with your child.

Lastly, if the weather stays as it has been this weekend we will be spending a lot more time outdoors. Please ensure children apply suncream before coming to school.

Thank you,

Miss Mudge

A reminder that Monday is a Bank Holiday and the children are on holiday.

Next week we are told that the weather should be nice.  Please remember to apply sun lotion before children come to school and send them with water.

From Hairdressers to Vets and everything in between…..the infant department had a great day time on World of Work Day!

Have a look at our slideshow gallery:

Please remember Rag Bag collection will be on 7th June. If  you have any unwanted items of clothing, please fill the bag and return to the school before this date.

Thank you.

We would like to say a huge “Thank You” to all the parents and carers who very kindly took the time to send in their World of Work videos for the children to watch.

They were all very interesting and the teachers and children enjoyed watching and discussing them on Friday .

Please make sure your child has a mask with them for Mass days. Thank you

A reminder to parents that we will be commencing our God’s Loving Plan unit this week.  Please be prepared to discuss sensitive issues with your child.

We will also be visiting the church on Tuesday for a mass, so please ensure your child has a face mask.

Thank you.

Mr Bertoncini

A quick reminder that currently on Parentpay are the following “live” payment items:

Magic Mount Carmel Fun Day – a donation of between £1 and £10                                                                                                 (all pupils)

Primary 7 Activity Week – £40 per child -(P7 pupils only) due 11th June

Can children please bring a suitable jacket with them to school, preferably with a hood, as they will be outside playing at break and lunch even if the weather is inclement.

Thank you for your co-operation.

Friday 21st May 

A reminder that tomorrow is our World of Work Day !

We are looking forward to seeing all the children dressed as what they would like to be when they are older.

Just a reminder about the Parent/Carer videos for World of Work Day to be sent in by today please to :

andrea.fergusson@eastayrshire.org.uk

The children will be attending Mass next week and again in June, before the end of term.  Here are the days each class will be attending:

• Monday 24th May -P1-3 and P4&5
• Tuesday 25th May -P6&7
• Monday 21st June – P1-3 and P4&5
• Tuesday 22nd June – P6&7

Can all children please bring a face mask with them for attending Mass . Thank you

Primary 3 – Curricular Overview

Welcome back to Primary 3’s Learning Blog. Here is an update of what the children in primary 3 will be working on and what our learning expectations will be until the summer holidays.

Numeracy

Recap – In class we have been learning about Place Value with up to 3 digit numbers. We have practised partitioning numbers into hundreds, tens and units and rounding numbers to the nearest 10 or 100.  We have also talked about if a number is odd or even and how we can recognise this.

We have been learning how to add and subtract 2 digit numbers with borrowing and exchanging. We introduced different Number Talk strategies that we could use to help us to add and subtract.  Pupils are becoming more confident using their ‘Thinking it Through’ jotters to help them to solve calculations.

In term 4 we are now working hard to learn our times tables.  We are also going to look at how multiplication and division are inverse operations.  This term we will have a big focus on learning how to multiply a number and then linking this with division. We will look at this when finding the fractions a half and a quarter.

In beyond number we will be learning about measurement.  We will continue to build on our mental maths strategies and revisit skills we have previously learned.

Please make sure your child spends 20 minutes on Sumdog to improve their mental maths.  We also encourage some games on topmarks and YouTube times table songs.

Literacy  

Spelling –

This term pupils will continue to have a different phoneme focus each week.  They will also learn common words that we use frequently in our writing (for example words like: friend, because, cousin etc.).  They will learn different spelling words related to the phoneme focus and take part in activities in class to help reinforce these words.  At home they are expected to practise these words for homework and take part in a spelling test on a Friday.   Pupils are being introduced to using ELKONIN boxes, when spelling words with joined phonemes.

Reading –

Pupils are currently reading different books in class using the core resource Bug Club.  They work in different reading groups and complete comprehension tasks related to the texts.  They are encouraged to read, discuss and answer different types of questions.   Pupils are expected to spend at least 20 minutes a week reading at home. Books are assigned to their Bug Club accounts along with comprehension questions. I can see lots of pupils are doing this, so keep up the good work!

Writing –

This term we will continue with our weekly writing lessons.  Pupils continue to write personal recounts in their news jotter.  Pupils will write stories using a range of different genres we have just finished learning about instructions and will now focus on imaginative writing. We will continue to build on our use of punctuation.  Also considering connectives, openers and vocabulary to help expand our writing.   Children will be encouraged to write neatly, with finger spaces, full stops and capital letters.  They are encouraged to use strategies when writing such as sounding out their words, using their personal dictionary and school dictionary. Pupils are also encouraged to start to use commas, exclamation marks and question marks when possible.

ICT

Most pupils are now able to confidently log into the school computers. They are able to log into websites such as Glow, Sumdog and Bugclub. We will continue to build on these skills. Pupils are starting to learn how to create their own PowerPoints related to our class learning.

Interdisciplinary Learning

We are currently working on our class history topic ‘The Romans in Scotland’. We are looking at reasons that the Romans would want to invade Scotland and what life was like back then.

Religious Education

In R.E. we are learning about Mary, Mother of God.  We are learning about some of the Joyful Mysteries and revising the prayer Hail Mary. We will then be working on God’s Loving Plan and looking at bible stories more closely such as the Good Samaritan.

Health and Wellbeing

Primary 3 loved taking part in Health week. A big thank you to Mrs McGowan and primary 5 for organising!   In P.E. this term pupils have been taking part in basketball lessons. We will now be moving onto athletics.  Our P.E. days are normally a Monday or Friday.  However, these can change dependant on the weather outside.

In Health pupils will continue taking part in PATHS lessons, Pupils enjoy being Pupil of the Day and giving each other compliments.  In Paths we continue to identify emotions, strategies we can use to solve problems and recognising how to a be a good friend and transferring this in the playground and in the classroom.

We look forward to a fun term 4 in primary 3 and are excited for fun school activities such as World of Work Day and another walk to the Dean Park with our friends!

I can’t believe we’re into the summer term already!  I was delighted to see all the children back at school safe and well after Easter.  P6/7 have had a busy time since our return to school following lockdown restrictions.  Below is an overview of the teaching and learning for the final term.  

Literacy

Children will continue to use Bug Club resources for reading.  We will  be focusing on fully justifying answers using the Point, Evidence, Explanation method.  Spelling activities will continue with children focusing on their identified root words, phonemes, suffixes and prefixes.   We will also access Giglets texts to focus on higher order thinking skills.

In writing, the focus for this term will be narrative with a focus on dialogue to advance the story.  We will also look at direct and indirect speech.

Numeracy

For the Circles, our focus in maths this term is time, data handling and beginning to tackle algebra.  The Rectangles will develop their understanding of percentages and the relationship between fractions, decimals.  They will also look at different forms of measurement.  Squares will be investigating  2D and 3D shape as well as division.  The Triangles will continue to work on subtraction and identify properties of 2D and 3D shape.

HWB

We will continue to follow the PATHS programme and all children have had experience of being Pupil of the Day.  We have had many good learning discussions about how to resolve conflicts with others, make friends and improve self esteem – skills which will stand them in good stead as they progress and grow.

We will also look at the world of work, creating skills profiles and identifying careers and setting goals for the future.  They will also participate in mock interviews for jobs.

For PE, we have been focusing on team work and playing a variety of games and activities to demonstrate the skills.  We will also be playing outdoor field games and begin to look at orienteering.

RE

This term P6/7 have looked closer at the Passion of Christ.  In particular, The Stations of the Cross and the role Pontius Pilate played in the fate of Jesus,  As May is the month of Mary, we will also recite The Rosary.

We will also be coming on to discuss sensitive issues in God’s Loving Plan.

Topic

The last topic for this term is Politics.  Children will identify the key party leaders,  investigate how laws are made and discover how to become a politician.  We plan to have mini debates within class and have a democratic vote to decide a winner!

If any parents/carers still have pre-election flyers, I would be grateful if you could send them into school.

Thank you very much for your continued support.

Mr Bertoncini

Primary 1/2 Curriculum Overview Term 4 2021 (Apr-June)

Welcome back to the Primary 1/2 blog where you can watch as the children grow and develop throughout this final term.

Literacy

Primary 1

Primary 1 have become more and more confident when using initial sounds to word build. They will continue to work on word building this term, however, they will now focus on building CVCC as well as CCVC words (4 letters). Primary 1 will continue to use the Active Literacy strategy “say, make, break, read and write” to support them with this new learning. In addition to this, Primary 1 will continue to learn new common words every week until they have learned all common words within stage 1. Primary 1 will continue to have lots of opportunities to practice word building and common words in a range of active ways in line with the Active Literacy approach to learning. A focus for Primary 1 during this last term will be using their knowledge of word building and common words to build sentences independently. The children in Primary 1 will have many opportunities to develop their independent writing skills this term through weekly news, free writing and sentence tasks linked to their spelling sounds. To support this new learning, Primary 1 will also apply their reading skills when writing. The children will have sentence building tasks linked to their reading books each week; this will ensure appropriate differentiation. In addition to this, Primary 1 will focus on description writing this term, they will describe different objects in relation to their Spring topic as well as characters and objects from familiar stories. Primary 1 will focus on describing number, colour, texture and size.

Primary 1 will continue to develop their talking and listening skills; understanding when to listen and when to respond, taking turns and communicating with others. They will also continue to develop their letter formation through regular handwriting lessons/activities.

Primary 2

Reading – This term, Primary 2 will be continuing to develop their reading skills particularly focusing on comprehension questions, using the questions to begin to form their answers. Primary 2 will access both fiction and non-fiction texts to develop their comprehension skills. They will apply their knowledge of skimming and scanning to find and use information within different texts as well as learn how to pinpoint exactly what the question is asking by using the words within the question to form an answer. Primary 2 will mainly use their Bug Club guided reading texts to develop this ne learning, this will allow the task to be differentiated appropriately.

Writing – Primary 2 will develop their description skills this term. They will write to describe a range of objects and characters. The children will describe objects in relation to the Spring topic including a chick, a sunflower and a butterfly. Primary 2 will think about number, colour, size, shape, texture, position and doing as they write their descriptions. The children will also learn about nouns and pronouns to support their writing. They will use this knowledge to structure their writing. Primary 2 will also learn about report writing this term. They will learn about fact files and the key features. The children will create fact files which link to their topic “Our Local Area” as well as “Energy Around Us”. Primary 2 will continue to focus on developing their independent writing this term. They will have many opportunities for “daily writing”, e.g., news. The children will be encouraged to use their knowledge of known phonemes as well as common words to write independent pieces. Primary 2 will also be encouraged to begin to use connectives, such as “and, but, because” within their daily writing to extend and develop more interesting pieces.

Spelling – Primary 2 will continue to learn new phonemes in accordance with the Active Literacy programme. They will learn a new joined phoneme as well as new common words each week. Primary 2 will continue to develop their knowledge of phonemes and spelling strategies through an active approach. They will continue to apply this knowledge alongside the development of their sentence structure skills. Primary 2 will continue to use the Phonic Bug resource to support and enhance their knowledge of new phonemes.

Grammar – Primary 2 will continue to focus on extending their sentences through use of connectives including “and”, “but” and “because”. In addition to this, Primary 2 will learn about adjectives. They will develop their vocabulary through focused grammar lessons and have opportunities to put their learning into practice through regular writing opportunities.

Numeracy and Mathematics

Primary 1

Numeracy -This term, Primary 1 will consolidate their understanding of the concept of addition within 10. They will focus on increasing their mental accuracy of number bonds to 10. The children will have many opportunities to develop their mental accuracy through mental math quizzes, fast 10 and Big Math Beat That. In addition to this, Primary 1 will apply their knowledge of addition within 10 when working on missing number calculations as well as word problems. When Primary 1 are confident in their addition skills they will begin to focus on subtraction within 10. The children will transfer their skills to answer subtraction calculations and word problems. In addition to this, Primary 1 will consolidate their knowledge of numbers to 20 and beyond.

Primary 2

Numeracy – This term primary 2 will combine their knowledge of addition and subtraction as well as their knowledge of numbers to 100 and place value to add and subtract within 100. Primary 2 will learn the formal notation strategy and apply their knowledge of tens and units when adding and taking away. New learning for Primary 2 will be the concept of multiplication and division. The children in Primary 2 will develop their understanding of multiplying before learning about division. They will use concrete resources, e.g., unifix cubes and numicon to support their learning. The children will focus on arrays as well as sharing. In addition to this, Primary 2 will continue to have many opportunities to develop their mental accuracy through mental math quizzes, fast 10 and Big Math Beat That.

Primary 1/2

Mathematics – Primary 1/2’s beyond number focus this term will be money. Primary 1/2 will learn to recognise and identify coins (up to £2) as well as notes (up to £50). They will also learn to differentiate between and use the language “pence” and “pound”. The children will use their knowledge of addition and subtraction to add to find totals (P2 within 50p and P1 within 10p) as well as subtract to find change. In addition to this, Primary 1/2 will learn to make totals using the smallest number of coins, e.g., 7p = 5p + 2p. Primary 1/2 will also learn about fractions this term. Primary 2 will apply their knowledge of division whilst Primary 1 will focus on the concept of sharing. Primary 1/2 will learn about measurement this term with Mrs McIntyre. They will work on developing their knowledge of length, capacity and volume. Primary 1/2 will develop this new learning through a hands-on approach.

Health and Wellbeing

Primary 1/2 will continue to develop their social and emotional skills through our whole school PATHS programme. The children continue to enjoy engaging with the puppets and love it when they visit our classroom. Primary 1/2 love giving and receiving compliments each day as part of “Pupil of the Day”. Primary 1/2 will continue to learn about their emotions through a range of activities and stories based around the PATHS puppets. The children in Primary 1/2 continue to engage enthusiastically with this programme.

In addition to this, Primary 1/2 will learn about how to keep themselves safe including what is meant by medicines and harmful substances. Primary 1/2 will learn to identify which substances may be helpful and which may be harmful in given situations as well as suggest ways to get help in unsafe and emergency situations, such as seeking out an adult and calling the emergency services. Furthermore, Primary 1/2 will learn about personal hygiene including hand washing through God’s Loving Plan.

Physical Education

This term Primary 1/2 will focus on athletics and orienteering. The children will practice running, jumping, and throwing both independently as well as part of a team. Once Primary 1/2 have developed their running, jumping, and throwing skills they will compete against each other in friendly relay races. In addition to this, Primary 1/2 will apply their ability to follow instructions within the classroom to giving and following instructions within the outdoor environment.

P.E. days will continue to be Tuesday and Friday. Please ensure your child comes to school dressed appropriately with either joggers or leggings and trainers. Your child must continue to wear their school jumper as part of their uniform on PE days.

Religious Education

This term Primary 1/2 will think about Our Lady. The children will reflect on Mary as the mother of Jesus and the Mother of all of us. They will revise the nativity story as well as the Easter story to support their thinking. Primary 1/2 will also learn to pray the “Hail Mary”. Furthermore, Primary 1/2 will learn about personal hygiene including hand washing through God’s Loving Plan.

IDL

This term, Primary 1/2 will be learning about their local area through the “My Local Area” topic. The children will look at maps of the local area (Kilmarnock) pinpointing key buildings/sites. Primary 1/2 will learn how to read a map and use appropriate language to describe, follow and record directions in relation to a local map including turn, left, right, straight ahead, NESW. The children will also apply what they know about information handling to collect information about favourite places to go and favourite things to do in the local area. As Primary 1/2’s knowledge of the local area increases, the children will make a 3D map of the local area surrounding the school. Furthermore, Primary 1/2 will learn about energy this term. They will learn about food energy as well as gain a basic understanding of electrical circuits and conservation.

Reminder

Please ensure that your child brings in appropriate outdoor learning clothes. This will allow your child to fully engage with any outdoor learning experiences.

Please ensure that you write your child’s name on any items of clothing they may take off throughout the school day, e.g., jumpers. This will help to ensure your child does not lose any items of clothing.

Thank you for visiting the Primary 1/2 blog, keep a look out for any further updates as term 4 progresses!

Thank you,

Mrs Dunsmore.

Curriculum Update Primary 5 May – June 2021

The children have been wonderful settling back into school life. They have adapted well again to the new rules and handwashing/sanitising throughout the day.
Here is an update on our learning that will take place in term 4.

Literacy
The class will be focusing on explanation writing as part of our literacy tasks. Key features
of the genre are chronological order, note-taking and structure.
Children will continue to access Bug Club as our school reading resource using texts to enhance their comprehension. I will allocate independent readers onto each child’s Bug Club
account to help with further reading to improve their fluency and expression.

Spelling
Groups will continue to experience the active literacy spelling programme; this will introduce common words and focus on phonemes pertinent to their stage.

Numeracy
This term the children will experience time and shape as their beyond number topics.
Our number process topics will be division and fractions for the circles, rectangles will focus
on multiplication then progress to division and begin to look at fractions. The squares groups
will look at multiplication and begin to look at division. All groups will focus on recalling the 2,3,4,5,6, 7,8, 9- and 10-times tables. The triangle group will work on repeated addition progressing onto multiplication using SHM 2.
At home children will benefit from timetables revision and looking at analogue clocks at home.

Health & Wellbeing
The PATHS programme will continue to shape our HWB learning. P5 have been picking a ‘pupil of the day’ since we returned in August giving compliments to their classmates daily.
We have had excellent discussions about feelings and emotions and how we can manage them. P5 will look at friendship as well as mental and emotional wellbeing appropriate to
their age and stage.

PE
Our focus on PE this term will be Tennis the children will participate in this non-contact sport
outside.RE
This term the class will focus on Mary during the month of May. We will be learning new
prayers – Glory be to the Father, The Angelus, The Joyful Mysteries, The Sorrowful
Mysteries and Eternal Rest. We will look at the Rosary including how to use a Rosary bead.
Homework will continue to be issued online every Monday and returned every Thursday via
email. Please contact us if you require any support with this.
As always, thank you for your ongoing support.
Mrs McGowan

TERM 3 – APRIL TO JUNE OVERVIEW  

Welcome back to our summer term. I was delighted to see all the Primary 6 back at school safe and well. I can’t believe we are on the countdown to summer already. It was lovely speaking to the parents and carers of Primary 6 during the pupil progress phone calls. I was delighted in the engagement of Primary 6 during the last period of online learning. Below is an overview of the teaching and learning for the final term.  

Literacy   

Reading  

We will be using the Bug Club core readers to aid and build on our active comprehension skills. Pupils will focus on a chapter each week and work on tasks around the chapters they have read. Pupils will also work on specific skills such as notetaking, differentiating between fact and opinion, and for some reading groups using quotes to justify comprehension answers.  

Writing  

This term Primary 6 will focus on Persuasive writing and creating persuasion texts with a one-sided argument. We will focus on a different aspect of grammar/punctuation each week. Our writing day will be on Thursday. However, this term we won’t be writing every week. Some weeks we will be looking at model persuasion texts and focussing on the structure and content to support the creation of our own persuasion texts. 

Spelling  

The spelling groups will continue to experience the Active Literacy spelling program, this will introduce common words and focus phonemes pertinent to their stage. The pupils will revise the Active Spelling strategies throughout the term. 

Numeracy  

This term we will be focusing on function machines, complex patterns of numbers, percentages, decimals, and fractions. Some groups will explore BODMAS.  Our Beyond Number topics are Information Handling and Position and Movement. The pupils will experience activities at their stage and level. The revision of multiplication tables will be encouraged across all groups. Sumdog and Topmarks games can help with the rigor of x-tables at home.   

Health and Wellbeing  

Thank you to Mrs McGowan (P5) for organising a fantastic range of activities for Health Week. This term our health and wellbeing topics are Food Safety and The world of work. Through the Food Safety topic, P6 will discuss the importance of hygiene, proper storage of food products, and illnesses because of poor food safety. The world of work topic will provide P6 with the opportunity to think about their current skills and what type of career they might like to have in the future. Through this topic, we will explore creating CV’s and filling in application forms which links in nicely with P1 Buddying and House Captain applications.  

 The PATHS lessons will focus on social and emotional lessons. The pupils enjoy ‘Pupil of the Day’ and are great at giving each other lovely compliments.  

Our PE days are Tuesday and Thursday this term. On these days pupils can come into school wearing suitable PE attire on their bottom half, school jumpers/polo shirts must be worn.   

Topics  

Our class topics this term are Scottish Politics and The Sensory Organs. A home project will be given for both these topics. Pupils will be given two weeks to complete their project before handing it in.  

RME  

Throughout Primary 6 the pupils will listen to and engage with stories from the Gospel of Matthew. As May is the Month of Mary P6 will discuss Our Lady and Marian prayers. P6 will be completing evidence for their Pope Francis Faith Award. They will continue collecting evidence into Primary 7.    

The pupils are also working hard to gain individual reward cards for Amazing Attitude, Wonderful Work, and being a Superstar. When the pupils gain five reward cards, they can trade them in for an individual prize or keep them until everyone gets five cards each for a whole class reward 😊   

Thank you for your continued support.  

Miss Mudge 😊   

Does anyone recognise this set of keys?.

They were found near Mount Carmel Church a couple of weeks ago but have just been handed in to our janitor . We have checked with Father Martin but they do not appear to belong to the church……

We are looking for help from our Parents/Carers for World of Work Day on Friday 21st May . We would like you to make a short video clip outlining what your job is and a little bit about what it entails.

Please send your video clips by Thursday 20th May to :

andrea.fergusson@eastayrshire.org.uk

Thank you.

 What do you want to be when you grow up?

There are so many wonderful jobs out there to choose from , so on Friday 21st May, we would love to see all the boys and girls dressed as up as what they would like to be when they are older. By doing this we would like to kindly ask for donations towards a Mega Magic Mount Carmel end of term fun day for the whole school!!

We are sure you will agree that all the children  deserve a very special treat after everything that has happened this year and how well each and every one of them have coped! So please help us to make this possible by donating what you can. Thank you!

**Parentpay will be open for donations as of today.**

Please check your child/children’s hair for any “unwanted visitors”. 

Thank You.

                                    Free Reading Books

We have an excess of reading books left over from a reading scheme that the school no longer uses.

We will be putting these books in the outside foyer of the school between 9am and 3pm tomorrow for anyone who is interested in taking some home for their child/children. There are several different titles to choose from, so please feel free help yourself. 

If a child is absent from school , it is the responsibility of the Parent/Carer to inform the school by 9.30am at the latest. Please do this in the first instance by phoning the school on 01563 525897 and either speaking to a member of staff or if outwith normal school office hours, by leaving an absence message on our answering service.

Thank you for your co-operation.