Happy Book Week Scotland from all of us at Primary 4! 📚✨

Wider Achievements 

At Mount Carmel Primary School we want to showcase and recognise all of our achievements.  This includes items that children take part outside of school such as dancing, football, gymnastics, swimming – the list is endless.  Please take some time to detail some of the activities your child takes part in out of school and any special awards they might have received recently as part of this.  In order for us to share these achievements and recognise them at our special Wider Achievements Assembly on Friday 22nd November. If you have any photographs that you would like to share please email these to eamountcarmel.ps@eastayrshire.org.uk before Wednesday 20th November.

Thankyou

Dear Parents and Carers,

It has come to our attention that there are two dates on the newsletter for our book gifting event, one of which being tomorrow. Please be advised that the book gifting event will take place on the 19th November. The children are invited to wear their pyjamas to school and bring in a soft toy on this date for this event. We apologise for any confusion and thank you for your understanding .

We hope you enjoyed seeing the photos of us out in the community and look forward to sharing more of our activities in the next few weeks.

Welcome back! What a great first term Primary 4 have had; the children have settled well into their new class and routine and are making good progress. We are looking forward to another fun filled term with lots of fabulous learning taking place.

Here is an update on the upcoming term.

Literacy

For our reading focus, we will continue to build on the use of our reading comprehension skills, such as prediction, visualisation, metalinguistic and summarising. The children will engage with a variety of fiction and non-fiction texts which include their Bug Club readers and our class novel, ‘There’s a Viking in My Bed’ which is linked to our Viking Voyagers topic.

During writing, we will continue to build on the skills developed during our descriptive block and we will now focus on narrative writing. The children will explore the features of narrative writing and will create their own narrative pieces.

Spelling will take the form of active spelling activities, and the children will experience phonemes and blends at their working level and will continue to practise their spelling strategies.

We will continue to build on our knowledge of various elements of grammar, linking this to our reading and writing tasks.

Numeracy & Maths

The children will continue with a daily number talk, to develop a range of mental maths strategies. We have been looking at various strategies for solving addition problems and will move on to subtraction problems. With Mrs McIntyre, the children will be working on telling the time at different intervals, as well as looking at 24hr time and durations. We will also be focusing on word problems and times tables weekly

Health and Wellbeing

We will be continuing with our PATHs programme focussing on making good choices and working effectively with others. We have been following the Do Be Mindful programme focussing on mindful attention, we will continue with this as well as our various daily mindful tasks. This term, P4 are delighted to be taking part in a range of intergenerational activities with the residents at Crossgate’s Care Home. As a class we have discussed various ideas that we think they would like such as arts and crafts, reading, singing, board games and bingo.

PE

PE is on a Wednesday and Friday. This term we will be covering social dancing, hockey and gymnastics. Please make sure your child has a full PE kit with them (includes suitable indoor shoes), this can remain on their peg within school.

Thank you for making sure that no jewellery is worn on PE days.

French 

We will be continuing with our French conversational skills and greetings. We will be looking at numbers t0 100. The children will engage in a range of listening, talking and writing tasks. We are also learning our ‘Hail Mary’ in French. As the term progresses, we will also look at Christmas traditions in France.

IDL

The children have really enjoyed getting started on our new Novel ‘There’s a Viking in My Bed’ which is related to our Viking Voyagers topic this term. We will explore the life of Vikings, including their culture, voyages and influence on Scotland. We will develop our skills in reading and writing through our topic.

Expressive Arts 

We will link our artwork this term to our topic, exploring and creating Viking artefacts using various materials and techniques. Last term we have been learning about rhythm and beat with our glockenspiels, we will continue to develop our skills this term and we will start to learn Christmas songs as the term progresses. We will also share some of our musical skills during our visits to Crossgate’s Care home.

Religious Education

This term we will be reflecting on the lives of various saints including St. Margaret, St. Andrew, St Ignatius, St. Francis and St. Columba. The children will be preparing for Advent and their forthcoming Sacrament of Reconciliation by taking part in class prayers and School Masses, and we will continue to build on our knowledge of common prayers and Mass responses. Approaching Advent, we will also look at the meaning of the Liturgical Calendar and become familiar with the meaning and importance of the various feasts and associated liturgical colours.

Homework will continue in the same format as last term, it will be distributed on a Monday to be completed and returned by Friday.

Keep an eye on the School blog and Learning Journals for updates on some of our wonderful activities and learning.

Thank you as always for your continued support,

Mrs McIntyre & Mrs MacDonald.

Welcome back to everyone and I hope you all had a wonderful October break.

Primary 1 are back on the learning train! We have a busy and fun filled term ahead. We have started the term with some spooky Halloween activities and look forward to celebrating our first Christmas as part of the Mount Carmel school community.

Literacy

This term we will continue to practise our letter formation and pencil control skills to ensure we can write the letters we have been learning.

Now that we know some of the sounds the letters of the alphabet make, we will be “blending” these together to make words. These words will help us with our reading and writing tasks.

We are very excited that we are becoming “readers” in Primary 1 and will soon be bringing home our first texts with words in them. We will be answering questions about the stories we read in class, to check our comprehension skills.

During writing activities, we will be trying to use descriptive language to describe a range of items. Some of us will try to write using the sounds we have been learning.

Numeracy

Now that we have explored the numbers to 10 fully, identifying quantities which are “more” and “less”, we will be focusing on the concept of addition. We will begin by combining two quantities and understanding that when you do this, the quantity gets bigger. This will lead us on to learning the addition facts, where we learn the different ways to “make” our numbers. These number stories (or facts) are the building blocks to which all of our calculations are built upon, so we will spend a lot of time on these, ensuring they are well embedded before moving on.

Numbers are tricky to write, so number formation will continue to be reinforced in class and through homework tasks.

Through our topic we will be exploring Position and Movement by using directions and positional language.

Health & Wellbeing

We will continue to welcome our PATHS puppets to help us talk about our emotions and friendships. We have been talking about the kinds of things friends do together and have discussed what makes a good friend.

We have been exploring our emotions and sharing our experiences and we will be looking at ways to help us manage our feelings.

We will also be talking about ways to keep ourselves safe when indoors and outdoors.

During PE sessions we will be continuing with ball skills before moving onto our first block of gymnastics. In preparation for our Christmas parties, we will also be taking part in social dancing.

Topic

Our topic this term is “Maps and Mapping”. We will initially be exploring our community and identifying buildings, roads, grassy areas with a view to creating our own maps. Through play we will create a range of maps for our cars and small world toys.

We will also be using our knowledge of direction and positional language to direct our friends to specific destinations.

RE

During RE we will continue to give thanks for God’s love.

We will also explore the Bible story of ‘Creation’, developing our awareness of the natural wonders of the world around us, in particular the seasons of Autumn and Winter.

As the term progresses, we will celebrate advent together, preparing for the birth of Jesus by showing love and kindness to those around us as much as we possibly can. We will be exploring the story of the nativity through songs, role play and craft activities.

Expressive Arts

The seasonal themes of Autumn, Winter and Christmas will be the focus of our drama, music and art activities this term.

A very exciting and busy time ahead. Now that we are getting into the colder weather, could zipping/fastening up please be practised at home so we can be cosy in the playground.

Thank you,

Mrs Duff

Take a look on your child’s Learning Journal profile for details and photographs of some of the fantastic learning that has been going on in classes across the school this term.

Remember to check out your child’s Learning Journal Profile for updates on some of the wonderful learning activities happening this term.

Here is a reminder on how to access Learning Journals.

Learning journals info

Thank you.

Welcome back everyone and welcome to the P7 blog! I trust you all had an enjoyable holiday/staycation and I am delighted to welcome back the pupils of P7 who have settled well into the routine of school.

Here’s an overview of our learning that will take place in our first term (Aug-Oct).

Literacy

This term we will be focussing on a novel study, The Wilderness War by Julia Green. We will continue to develop our Active Literacy comprehension skills using the book as a context for learning.  As well as reading the book together, the class will participate in activities that relate to other areas of the curriculum including Art, HWB and plenty of outdoor learning.  As a result, children should bring in appropriate clothes such as wellies or old boots, waterproof jacket and warmer clothes (hat, scarf, gloves) as we move into the colder months.

For writing, we are concentrating on descriptive pieces using a variety of figurative language such as similes, alliteration, and metaphors to interest the reader.

Spelling groups will continue to use Active Spelling strategies and follow on from previous work.

Numeracy

All groups this term have begun by working on place value before moving onto addition and subtraction.  The class will continue to develop their mental Number Talk strategies on a daily basis.

The class are also working on estimating and rounding skills with Mrs Terras and will be developing their knowledge of numeracy in the wider world as well as aspects of money.

Health and Wellbeing

This year we will continue to use the PATHS programme to shape our HWB learning.  P7 have already started ‘pupil of the day’ and participated in discussions around feelings and how we manage our emotions.  We are also investigating the relationship of diet, rest and sleep upon our mental health and looking at ways we can relax and improve brain function.

Our PE days are Wednesday and Thursday and appropriate clothes must be brought in on those days to participate.  I have spoken to the class about personal hygiene and some pupils may wish to bring in deodorant or a roll-on on these days.

IDL

As our novel study is The Wilderness War, we will be looking at environmental issues for our topic.  We will be looking at the damage of single use plastics and what can be done about it.  We will also investigate the Leave No Trace campaign to conserve natural areas.

RE

P7 will continue to complete their journal for the Pope Francis Faith Award as well as reading from the New Testament.  We will be looking at the life of Jesus and how he associated with those who were marginalised in society.

Languages

P7 will be looking at vocabulary associated with saying where you live and describing different places.

Technologies

This term P7 will access and use more features of Glow, attach files to emails, save work to cloud locations and retrieve files using search functions.

UNCRC

Together the class have created their class charter and looked at the rights they are entitled to.  As rights holders, the pupils have discussed the responsibilities they have to maintain in order to protect these rights.  As class rules, the class have chosen 4 Articles to focus on:  The right to be safe; the right to rest, relax and play; the right to be healthy; and the right to be heard.

I look forward to working with P7 in the coming year and hope to have lots of enjoyable experiences that will make learning fun and memorable.

Mr Bertoncini

A very warm welcome to the Primary 1 Blog. The children are settling into their new school surroundings beautifully and have already established routines and friendships within their new class.

We have had a lovely start to the term getting to know one another but we are most definitely poised and ready to LEARN! Below you will find an overview of what we will be covering this term.

Literacy

During literacy times, P1 have already been developing their phonological awareness (the ability to hear sounds in words). We are doing this by focusing on the rhythm and rhyme of language through clapping syllables and working on our nursery rhymes.

We are also working on our fine motor control to develop our mark making skills. Name writing is a focus to ensure we can always sign off on our masterpieces!

Developing our listening and talking skills forms a huge part of our day. We are learning to follow our ‘carpet time rules’ to ensure we do our best listening while the teacher is talking. We are also learning to take turns at communicating our thoughts and feelings.

Numeracy

We know numbers are all around us and have had a chance to talk about those which are special to us, for example, our age, door number etc.

Number times will consist of lots and lots of counting! We will be developing our ‘number sense’ by counting out and comparing quantities and becoming familiar with the language of mathematics.

We will be reciting our number sequences forwards and backwards, understanding that each number we say represents a quantity.

As our pencil control improves we will be learning how to form our digits correctly. Pattern and Shape will also be a focus this term.  We will link this to outdoor learning by looking for natural patterns and shape in our environment.

With Mrs Terras, P1 will explore 2D and 3D shapes, learning to sort and describe shapes based on certain criteria. Pupils will have the opportunity to explore and investigate shapes through practical games and activities.

Health & Well-being (HWB)

Our PATHS programme will feature heavily during our HWB time. The children will be meeting Twiggle and friends, our PATHS puppets, who will help us explore our feelings and friendships. We will also be introduced to our ‘Pupil of the Day’ initiative, which allows each and every member of the class to be the focus of our kind words and actions for a whole day.

In PE we will initially develop our spatial awareness through games before moving onto large ball skills.

RE

The children have been introduced to our RE times during which we have been discussing God’s love for us all. We will continue to explore this unconditional love by considering the gifts God has given us, including our families and the qualities which make each and every one of us so special and unique.

IDL

Our theme of Nursery Rhymes will be used to explore other areas of the curriculum such as art, music and technology.

We will also be looking at our own ‘history’ by thinking about the people and events involved in our journey from new born baby to Primary 1 pupil!

Expressive Arts

During art sessions we will be creating our favourite characters from the Nursery rhymes we have been learning. We will be exploring the visual elements of line, pattern and colour.

In Music, Mrs Terras will lead P1 through a singing and listening unit of work called ‘My Musical Heartbeat’, learning how to find the ‘pulse’ or the ‘beat’ of the music.

Rights Respecting Schools

We follow the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) in our school. We have introduced the right to be safe, to learn and to play in Primary 1 through our ‘Rainbow Rules’ class charter.

PE DAYS WILL BE MONDAY AND THURSDAY – please think carefully about uniform and ensure NO JEWELLERY is worn on these days.

Mrs Duff

Primary 2 Blog Post (Term 1 Update)

Hello and welcome to our very first blog post of the new session.  Primary 2 have been very busy settling into our new classroom and our new routines.  Children have been working hard to consolidate previous learning and are enhancing these skills through our novel study and outdoor learning.

UNCRC – Class Charter

Primary 2 have worked on creating a class charter, with agreed upon rights that we will focus on as a class. Our class rules and procedures centre around these rights, as we agree that we should all have a right to be healthy, a right to learn and a right to play. We have used our novel study and the main character Plop as a theme for our charter.

Literacy

Our class novel is ‘The Owl Who Was Afraid of the Dark’ and through this text, pupils will explore our outdoor area and write about why dark is fun!  Pupils will create some descriptive writing pieces, describing our main character, Plop, and using adjectives to describe the people he meets and the things he sees.

Our reading and spelling activities are getting underway, and children will be working within groups to revisit previous sounds and texts, ready to use their skills and strategies to tackle new and unfamiliar spelling sounds and reading books.  We will be using our predictive skills to think about what may happen in our book, based on information on the cover and we will begin to look at fiction and non-fiction texts and their differences.

Our focus in writing will be descriptive writing and these written pieces will come from our class novel and topic of Houses and Homes, comparing houses in the city with those of the countryside as well as looking at homes of the past. Children will compare how houses/homes have changed over the last century.

Numeracy

Our focus in numeracy will be place value, with children working on 2-digit numbers, initially to 20 and then to 99. Children will be able to partition these numbers and discuss this in terms of tens (T) and units (u), whilst building on their understanding of number and number patterns. Addition to 10 or 20 will also be a focus as well as word problems to consolidate our strategies within this operation of number.  Children will begin use their ‘Busy Bee’ jotters as the term progresses to develop problem solving skills, applying knowledge of number to new contexts and develop strategies for number problems.

Health & Wellbeing

Our Paths Pupil of the Day has now begun, and our Pupil of the Day has been receiving lots of compliments.  All children will have the opportunity to be Pupil of the Day.  We will begin exploring emotions, comfortable and uncomfortable and how we recognise these emotions within ourselves and in others.

In P.E, our sessions will happen on a Tuesday and a Thursday and our focus in term 1 will be on football and netball.  Children will have the opportunity to partake in some fun activities which support teamwork whilst focusing on developing their listening skills and awareness of space.

R.E

Our focus during R.E sessions will be on prayer, their meaning, the routines of the church and the celebration of Mass.  We will also spend some time reading and discussing bible stories relating to friendship and love, whilst considering how each of us are unique and have our own God given talents.

IDL

As the class novel is The Owl Who Was Afraid of the Dark, we will be doing a mini topic which focuses on exciting things that happen in the dark, developing children’s imaginations and ideas in fictional texts.  We will also look at woodland animals as these are a feature in the class novel and will tie in nicely with our term 1 social studies topic about houses and homes, comparing houses in the countryside to those we find in the towns and cities.

Modern Languages (French)

In French lessons, children will begin to understand basic greetings, ask and answer simple questions about themselves and begin to look at numbers to 10. We will learn songs and rhymes to help us retain this information.

Homework

Homework was sent out this week. Please check your child’s homework bag weekly for the homework to be completed.  Reading books will be attached to pupils’ accounts through our online Bug Club reading programme. I have issued Bug Club login details with these homework tasks. Homework will consist of spelling, reading and maths, both mental and worksheet/jotter jobs too. These will be issued on a Monday and should be returned to school on a Friday.

We hope this is the start of a very successful term and that the pupils are enjoying their return to school and seeing their friends and teachers.

Take care,

Mrs Travers

Please find below links to apply for either a Kids Cards or a NEC card for your child dependent on their age. This card will enable your child to access FREE bus travel throughout Scotland.

If your child has previously had an NEC and has lost their card please do not use the links below, please contact the school office and we will send home the relevant form for you to complete.

Application Form 1

This form is for pupils aged 5 to 10 years old. Parents should use the link below to apply for this card on behalf of their child, the person completing the form on behalf of their child MUST be the main contact registred for the pupil.

NEC Card 1 5-10 Application Form – Mount Carmel

Application Form 2

This for is for pupils aged 11 to 15 years old This application is for a National Entitlement Card for pupils under the age of 16. Parents must apply for the card on behalf of their child, the person completing the application MUST be the main contact registered for the pupil. Parents will then have the option of having the Young Scot branding and/orthe PASS Hologram as well as free bus travel added too this card.

NEC Card 2 11-15 Application Form – Mount Carmel

Please note we are only able to process application forms from current pupils of Mount Carmel Primary 

Check out your child’s Learning Journals page for some photos from our recent trip to Blair Drummond.

P4 have been having a great time during their music technology inputs with Stuart from Sonappa.

We have been learning about melody and rhythm and have been using the functions of Garage Band to create our own digital compositions.

There are definitely some budding musicians in P4!

P4 had a fantastic afternoon celebrating their First Communion.
We had a delicious cake made by the very talented Ann from the kitchen, and enjoyed some party games and dancing.
We were delighted to be joined by Fr.Jim.

We are planning to go ahead with our sports day plan tomorrow and are looking forward to inviting our parents and carers in to see their children race. A few gentle reminders…

Please ensure that all children come to school dressed for sports day – they should not come dressed in school uniform and should wear sports clothing (as always – no football colours)

Please ensure that the clothes the children are wearing are weather appropriate – sensible shoes and a jacket if needed.

Please also ensure that the children have enough water for the day, they will be busy all day and have a timetable full of events.

Parents of classes are invited in as follows…

Primary 1 – 9:10

Primary 2 – 9:40

Primary 3 – 10:10

Nursery children – 11:00

Primary 4 – 11:30

Primary 5 – 12:00

Primary 6 – 1:30

Primary 7 – 2:10

We ask that when the classes have finished their races that the parents please leave swiftly to allow the next class set of parents to come in.

As always, we thank you for your support. Here’s hoping we get some sunshine!

#teammc

Primary 5 showing their competitive sides during their class bowling championships this morning

Parents and friends of Mount Carmel would like to thank you for all of your wonderful donations for our house hamper.

We still welcome any more donations this week and next and hope to raise a lot of money through our raffle tickets.

Raffle tickets can be bought through parentpay for £1 each as well as on sports day. Raffle winners to be drawn during our fun day on the 26th June.

As always, we thank you for your support

Parents and Friends of Mount Carmel 💙

We kindly ask that all children bring in their costumes ASAP as we are hoping to fit in a couple of dress rehearsals next week before our big performances. The chorus for our show are wearing white shirts, grey trousers or a skirt, white socks and black shoes.

We do really appreciate your support with this and without it we would be unable to put on such a spectacular show.

With thanks, always,

MC staff 😊

With our rehearsals well under way we wanted to share a little sneak peek with you all. I think you would agree the children are all excellent. We cannot wait to welcome you in to see our performance. Remember, get your tickets on Parentpay as we have limited numbers available.

We would like to give a great big thank you to Beth from Take A Bow who is giving up her own time to choreograph our dancers.

We have a new stage!!!

Our amazing Parents and Friends of Mount Carmel used some of their funds to buy the school a new stage, just in time for our MATILDA musical next month. The stage is built and looks amazing. We have a few very big thank yous to make. First of all, our Parents and friends of Mount Carmel. Thank you for providing the funds to buy the stage. Next we would like to give a big shout out to Stuart and Graham who travelled quite a distance to collect the stage. And finally, a big thank you to our very own Mr Leslie who spent this afternoon building the stage. It is now ready for the children to rehearse on tomorrow.

We cannot wait for you all to see our show!

#teammc

Primary 4 – 7 children have been busy rehearsing and getting every thing ready for the big show. The children have been given a letter home today with information regarding costumes. We are asking for your help with providing your son/daughter with what they need; however, if for any reason this is causing issues or you require support for this then please do not hesitate to get in contact with the school office and we will do everything we can to ensure that the children have everything they need to perform.

As always, the staff at Mount carmel would like to thank our parents for their ongoing support. Without it, we would be unable to put on these awesome shows.

Thank you!

#teammc

With less than 3 weeks to go until our opening night, rehearsals are well underway. We hope you have the popcorn ready… You are in for a treat!!

Our advertising group for Matilda paid a visit to our friends and neighbours at Crossgates yesterday to invite them along to our community performance of Matilda. The group got to meet some of the wonderful residents and staff. We can’t wait to see you at the show everyone 💕

Primary 5 have had a brilliant morning making snores and den building. We also took our reading outside to enjoy in the sunshine as well as creating some transient art with natural materials.

May is a month traditionally dedicated to Our Lady and the Rosary. Mary, the mother of God, was a loving mother and a model for us all.

During this month, all our classes are making a special effort to pray the Rosary to help us to reflect on the life of Mary and Jesus.

As the Mount Carmel Missio Champions, Primary 4 put together some ideas to help us all learn about Mary and to pray the rosary.  We distributed these to all classes.

Our Lady, Queen of Peace, pray for us.

On Wednesday, our Primary 4 and Primary 5 classes will be taking part in outdoor activities to celebrate Natural Scotland week. We were hoping to go to the Dean Park; however, due to the Mayfest the park will be closed. The classes are very excited to be den building, making smores and roasted marshmallows in the morning and then we can continue with our rehearsals for MATILDA in the afternoon.

Please ensure that the children have suitable outdoor clothing on (jogging bottoms or leggings) with school uniform on top. They should also have suitable outdoor shoes on as we will be on the grass.

Thank you for your continuing support,

Mrs McCreadie and Mrs MacKinnon