We were delighted to welcome Captain Conker and Darryl to our school to read to our P1 and P2 pupils. They left us copies of Captain Conker and The Dastardly Plan to read ourselves. Lots of other activities took place throughout the school. Here are some wonderful photographs of us celebrating World Book day.
 
Many of our pupils took part in lessons as part of Sky Arts Access all Arts School Week. We have been experiencing music, drama, poetry and art, to name just a few. Here is some of the pupils at work.
#SkyArts #AccessAllArts
Articles 17, 29 and 31.
Families,
We are excited to share on behalf of our Parent Council their ‘Sponsored READ-A-THON Challenge’ to celebrate World Book Day (Thursday 2 March), promote reading in school and at home and raise funds for new library/topic books for our young people.
Our Pupil Council and RRS Ambassadors will chat with their classes and pupil voice will inform what books are purchased.
What do you need to do?
Starting from today (03.02.23) for the next four weeks until World Book Day (02.03.23) we want to see how many books/pages our young people can read independently or together with family members as a happy, shared experience.
Families are invited to set a book reading target and kindly request sponsorship from family and friends to contribute towards the ÂŁ20.23 target each class within the school have been set to raise by the PC. Any contribution towards this whole class target is appreciated.
Keep a note at home of the book titles and how many pages you have read and our ‘READ-A-THON Online Form’ will be sent at the end of the month for you to complete. In school reading will be noted by staff/pupils and added to overall totals. Prizes await the top overall class and top reader!
Funds raised can be paid via ParentPay or handed in to the school office.Â
Participation and sponsorship is optional.Â
Our Parent Council share their thanks and hope you enjoy quality reading time with your family. We can’t wait to follow your READ-A-THON journey!
#OnthankPC #HowManyBooks
We are so grateful to have received a lovely donation of brand new library books for our children to enjoy. Thank you to Andrew p6F and his family.
P4 have had a great day celebrating World Book Day 2020. We had dress up fun, shared our favourites stories and books, did book related tasks and some of us enjoyed paired reading with our buddies in P3.
P4K our DFS Group, had a wonderful time celebrating too. We are reading plenty of books and managing to fill in our Reading Passports for the First Minister’s Reading Challenge.
Today our DFS ambassadors (P4K) have been busy organising the launch of the First Minister’s Reading Challenge.
It is believed that reading has the power to change lives and that developing a love of reading in childhood can have a huge impact on educational attainment and future wellbeing.
The First Ministerâs Reading Challenge is open to every pupil in P1-P7 in Scotland. We know that reading journeys can be personal to every single child but, to encourage and motivate schools and pupils to get involved, a number of challenges have been set that we hope will inspire and develop a love of reading.
Find out more about taking part in the First Minister’s Reading Challenge by clicking the link below:
https://www.readingchallenge.scot/about/information-parents-and-carers
Where will your reading journey take you?
Shirley Husband,  author of the McCoo Books  read Nan McCoo to P1/2s and then she read Angus McCoo to P3/4s. Everyone was excited to hear the stories. Primary 1s  made pictures of Betty , Angus and Nan McCoo. What a fantastic afternoon!
Hello,
We are the DFS pupil group for Onthank Primary School. We organise events like the DFS workshop and whole school assembly. We invited  all pupils and parents/carers to come to the DFS workshop. There were lots of fun activities for everyone to do.
We have already achieved  our Bronze Award and are currently working towards our Silver accreditation.
Our DFS school mascot is Dom the DFS Diamond. Keep an eye out for him around the school!
Four of our good friends have made a movie called DFS A Wider World using  IMovie trailer. You will be able to check it out at a later date by scanning a QR code.
Written by Lucy, Emily, Thomas and Stuart P6K
We are all enjoying being active in our learning!
Sometimes we learn best when we are cooperating with others, using interactive Maths materials, learning our phonemes through games and simply…having fun while learning!
P3C have been beginning to divide. They have been learning about the concept of sharing.
P3W have been consolidating various phonemes through rotational tasks.
Today as part of our Dyslexia Friendly Schools journey, the whole school was involved in NO PENS DAY WEDNESDAY. This is a national speaking and listening event which encourages exciting classroom discussion. Check out the blog for class photos.
How did we cope without pens today? Well going by the enthusiastic response of the pupils, very well actually.
With the help of snap cards, jigsaws, dominoes,  division cards, general knowledge quiz, literacy criterion,  problem solving, critical thinking, and teamwork, learning for pleasure was the order of the day. And not a pencil to be seen. All children participated fully in all aspects of their learning today – and had fun. We even had a visit from the SSPCA to round off our day.
PARENT’S EVENING appointments have been allocated and children should have a note of times in their school bags. Thanks to those who have responded and I look forward to meeting you all next Tuesday. There are still a few slots available between 4:30 and 5:50 Â if you haven’t been in touch yet.
DUNDONALD CASTLE. A super day is in store for all tomorrow. It is a fun packed day where children will dress up, act out and discover what life was like in medieval times. As we will be outdoors, children should wear rain jackets and school uniforms. Trainers are ideal for walking around the castle and grounds.
I hope you like the photos that helped capture how busy we all were today.
P4F enjoyed locking the pens and pencils away today and attacking some spelling with our active resources.
After helping the Scottish Sun to launch their new Free Books for Schools campaign, we will be collecting book tokens from the paper.
Between September 24th and November 18th, the Scottish Sun and Scottish Sun on Sunday will be printing book tokens each day. Pupils can hand these tokens into the school office or to their class teacher. The more tokens we get, the more books we receive!
P6K have been finding out a little bit more about each other. The pupils presented a solo talk all about themselves and brought in an interesting item from home to show the class.  
P1A and P1C were very busy reading, writing and spelling this morning with a mixture of activities outside and inside.
Some children used water or chalk to write letters and words, while others played in groups with board games, flash cards or play dough. Mrs Cree and I were very impressed by the children’s concentration!!
P6 had a great turnout for Onthank’s first ever John Muir Award Celebration this afternoon. Our P6s have been learning that John Muir was a Scottish born conservationalist, who lived in the late 1800s and later moved to America to found of some of their National Parks.
The award encourages children to explore natural areas near the school and over time develop and conserve them. You may have noticed that trees have been planted at the front of the school and a wide selection of vegetables have been planted near the nursery.
Congratulations to our P6 pupils, you have worked extremely hard! Thanks to all who came along to help us celebrate. We hope you had a good time and learned something new!
Please contact the office if you would be able to help us water and care for the plants over the summer holidays.
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East Ayrshire Libraries are delighted to be working in collaboration with the SPFL Trust and Kilmarnock Football club to bring the 4-4-2 Reading Challenge to local children.
As a reward for reading and using the library we are offering free tickets to Kilmarnock home games.Â
All that primary aged children need to do is borrow 4 books from the library (on their own card, not a group card) and when they return the fourth book they get a card stamped which they take to Rugby Park to exchange for 1 free child ticket and 1 discounted adult ticket on selected home games. The challenge runs until the end of May but completed vouchers can be redeemed until the end of October.
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Here are just a few of the pictures we took today. Â Well done to everyone who dressed up as their favourite character. Great fun was had by all and thank you to our special guests who read to children today.
