In Social Studies we are finishing off our exploration of the lives of Native Americans. We used our group discussion skills in talking and listening activities where we considered the impact of settlers on the lives of the Native Americans. We are looking forward to comparing what we have learned with our new topic in the new year, the Highland Clearances.

In ICT, we have used Scratch code to animate our names. Charlotte was very proud of her animation – she put her long name in a diagonal pattern. Alex’s name spun round. Katie’s name flashed in different colours. Aaron’s name spoke and he could even reply to it!

To complement our learning in Numeracy, we drew names out of a hat and made Advent Calendars for our classmates. We have also been following the advent in French.  In PE Lee has enjoyed improving his ball skills.

We are about to enter a competition using our excellent diary writing skills. Sophie knows when you write a diary entry you need to might want to use capital letters to emphasise exciting things. Rosie knows you write in first person. Innes knows that diaries are always written in past tense. Logan says that sometimes you write down the day you are writing about. Laaibah enjoyed peer assessing because it meant she really thought about what the success criteria were for her own work too and was then able to make it the best it could be.

Literacy and Numeracy

Our learning in these areas will draw upon the contexts listed above but will differ according to the needs of each class / group. Your support with consolidation of core learning through homework activities will be very beneficial to our children.

Awesome Achievements

This month we have been achieved an awful lot, showing our increasing maturity. Amelia participated in the Brownie Service AND won a competition with her Brownies. Logan got the highest award in cubs – the Chief Silver Scout Award!!! Evan has also been a responsible cub, earning his Cook Badge by making scones and tea. Alice is very proud that she has been earning her pocket money by tidying her room. Eva has been really helpful cleaning the house with her gran. Lucy has been showing great maturity and responsibility by looking after a kitten and realising what was best for her. Caris has been organising fun activities for her siblings and showing great patience. Lewis is trying hard to be more independent with his work. Drew can play two new tunes on his cornet – he has been practising a lot which has helped him improve. Alex won a trophy for being the most improved cyclist in his group. Katie passed all three of her dancing exams! Rachael won the school’s JRSO poster competition! Wardah has made her own wallpaper using an app. Laaibah’s mum is so proud that she has been working so hard.

 

 

Article 29: You have the right to education which develops your personality, respect for other’s rights and the environment.

Primary 5a Blog – Awesome October (not alliterative, but sounds good nonetheless!)

Before the October break P5 shared an important message with the school at the Church Service. Through the story of the sister with the odd socks, we told everyone that it is fine to be different. Sophie realised that the message was that we should still treat everybody with the same respect and kindness.

In Social Studies we have continued exploration of the lives of Native Americans. We looked at a variety of non-fiction books to find out as many facts as we could. We learned the legend of dream catchers, then in Art we weaved our own models so we could let the bad dreams get caught in the web and the good dreams float down to us on the feathers.

In ICT, Felix has been loving the coding and has expanded his work with Scratch to make a whole story with the nine levels. Scarlett and Alice have enjoyed using code to change the colour of their character.

In French we have been learning to sing a song about Ma Famille, teaching us about possessive pronouns and family members. Eshan has told us about sa soeur et son frere.

In PE Oliver has loved having a cricket specialist in to teach new skills. Evan has loved the parkour tig in gymnastics.

In Grammar we have been learning about both types of apostrophes and IT’S Logan’S favourite thing!  🙂

We loved the visit from Dekko comics to teach us more about Dyslexia.

Literacy and Numeracy

Our learning in these areas will draw upon the contexts listed above but will differ according to the needs of each class / group. Your support with consolidation of core learning through homework activities will be very beneficial to our children.

This month we have been working hard on our growth mindset and attitude to learning and trying new or difficult things. Rosie was really proud that she won the Growth Mindset Character competition with her friends. Lucy has now managed to master riding her bike; even though it wasn’t easy, she kept at it!  Other sporting achievers included Drew, who jumped 3m in athletics.  Aaron and Alice have both started playing rugby and are really getting stuck in. Amelia was thinking back to her summer achievement of surfing on the body board. Logan is learning to turn in skiing. Laaibah is getting better and better at swimming and Alex swam 1 kilometre. Sophie did exciting high up things at Treezone and has got all of her dance exams.
Caris has been learning Gaelic words; this is her grandma’s first language! Oliver finished a large and difficult piece of lego. Innes worked hard around the house, doing chores to earn his own money; this has also helped him realise the value of things. Emma is getting better at the piano, practising Jingle Bells every day. Rachael has been helping out at home and is loving coding. Ella has also been helping, by looking after Squiggle, when she is not doing back-bends with a kick over! Bryony has been very mature, kind and caring, helping her dad after he had an accident. Katie has been developing her leadership skills by becoming a sixer at Brownies.

Primary 5a Blog – September 2018

We were delighted to be the first class to perform in front of our parents and the rest of the school at assembly. We presented our learning on Growth Mindsets.  Rosie and Oliver were our “Super-YET!”s. We appreciate that there is a big difference between not being able to do, understand or know something … and not being able to do, understand or know it YET!

Alice shared that although our brain is an organ it can behave like a muscle and grow stronger the more we use it. We all know that it is about attitude and trying to be our best. Amelia thought everyone performed really well. She enjoyed playing her part of a mum and sharing our learning. We sang beautifully – there are a couple of clips of us practising our songs in the classroom on the school’s Twitter feed.

We loved Maths Week, realising how important maths is in our lives. We have our families’ quotes up in our classroom to show how they use mathematics and numeracy every day in their jobs and lives. We were lucky to have Rosie’s dad to visit us. He showed us how he uses maths in his job as a surveyor. Sophie loved the booklet he gave us to try out some of the calculations he does as part of his work. It was wonderful to have Logan’s mum in too. She explained how her job as an optometrist uses mathematics. Scarlett loved using a ruler to measure the pupillary distance between our eyes.

In Science we have been learning about mixing and separating. Drew has enjoyed experimenting to find out how long it takes for sugar to dissolve in water. Alex liked making his hypothesis then mixing substances with a spoon.

In Social Studies we have started to explore the lives of Native Americans. We know that there are lots of different tribes who each have their own cultures. We explored a map of North America (from before it became the United States). Lee enjoyed developing his mapping skills by showing where the tribes were located. We look forward to looking at the impact of the European settlers on the use of land and society.

In ICT, we have been learning about Internet Safety. Laaibah has enjoyed playing the game Band Runner as it shows you how to stay safe online. Rachael liked how the quotes taught us how to protect ourselves.

In French we have been looking at the difference between spelling in French and in English – and also the similarities. We have been learning numbers up to sixty. Scarlett finds it funny that six is pronounced differently in French and English but it is spelt the same!

Literacy and Numeracy

Our learning in these areas will draw upon the contexts listed above but will differ according to the needs of each class / group. Your support with consolidation of core learning through homework activities will be very beneficial to our children.

Awesome Achievements

We are very proud of our personal achievements this month. Lots of us have been loving books and completed the Beano Summer Reading Challenge at Giffnock Library. Felix made a tasty pizza FROM SCRATCH! Logan has become a sixer in Cubs, Bryony has written a story of 1,000 words and Alice has learned how to ride her bike!

The first six pupils in P5a whose leaves will be on display on the Achievement Tree will be Eva, Lewis, Amelia, Aaron, Murray and Oliver.

 

Article 29: You have the right to education which develops your personality, respect for other’s rights and the environment.

We have loved reading Tom Fletcher’s novel The Christmasaurus. We were even more delighted when we found out that Miss Mitchell had treated us to the musical edition! It is a story about a boy named William Trundle, and a dinosaur, the Christmasaurus. It’s about how they meet one Christmas Eve and have a magical adventure. It’s about friendship and families, sleigh bells and Santa, singing elves and flying reindeer, music and magic. It’s about discovering your heart’s true desire, and learning that the impossible might just be possible . . .

Oliver said, “I really enjoyed the songs because they make you feel really good! They make it easier to sense the mood of the story because there will be upbeat music when the story is happy and slow when the story is sad.”

By looking at meals we enjoy eating and creating a healthy eating pyramid, we have been able to discuss and identify where we could be making better choices to have a healthier diet.

Ben shared, “I found out that some foods that I enjoy eating all of the time, like crisps, are unhealthy and should only be eaten every now and again.”

Innes realised, “Some of the foods I enjoy eating are unhealthy and I will stop eating them, for example cheese and biscuits. They are fine as a treat!”

We have discussed the important part that numbers play in the world and explored a number system that was used by civilisations in history to record numbers.

Alice said, “I used to have a clock that said the Roman Numerals on them. It was fun to learn about different numbers.”

In French lessons we have been learning about the alphabet and have started to speak about different types of weather. We can spell out our name in French.

Ella – uh, el, el, ah

Bryony – beh, er, ee-grek, oh, en, ee-grek

Aaron – ah, ah, er, oh, en

We are becoming more confident when answering the question Quel temps fait-il?

Lucy said, “Il fait chaud means it is hot.”

Murray explained that, “Il neige means it is snowing.”

We also took part in the Hour of Code and worked through some short Star Wars activities. These taught us to write simple code to programme characters in a maze game. We had to think about clear and concise instructions, possible variables and interesting ideas.

Achievements in November and December

We have been developing our drawing skills. Two of our pupils were very impressed with how realistic their self-portraits were. Pupils have performed well in dancing exams and have moved up a belt colour in martial arts.

In Science we have been exploring food chains and webs. The pupils were able to use scientific vocabulary to describe different animals in a food chain. We learned about Carnivores, Omnivores and Herbivores. The pupils can create their own food chains and webs and identify the Producers, Primary Consumers, Secondary Consumers and even the Tertiary Consumers.

Eshan created a food chain showing the transfer of energy:

Leaves à grasshopper à spider à frog à snake à hawk à fox

We then moved on to investigating Vibrations and Sounds. We explored how sound vibrations are carried by waves through air. In groups, the pupils created a short television show script and PowerPoint to teach the other class about sound waves.

Rosie, Katie and Amelia created a fantastic show called “The Science of Sound”. In their episode they explained that loud sounds create large vibrations and quieter sounds create smaller vibrations. The size of the vibrations is called the amplitude.

Escher patterns will provided a stimulus for our expressive arts study this term. Through Maths, we discussed and explored the properties of 2D shapes and identified those that tiled.

Emma explained, “First we looked mosaics made from lots of little squares. These helped us to think about shapes fitting into each other without leaving any spaces.”

We then practised making repeating patterns using shape and colour.

Cameron shared, “I found drawing the repeating shapes patterns on the dotty maths paper quite difficult at first but it showed me that I had to slow down and concentrate on making sure the shapes were the same and no spaces were left between them.”

Next we created own fish and ghost stencils to use to create our Escher patterns.

Eva said, “To make our stencils we had to cut a shape out of one side of a rectangular piece of paper, and then stick it to the other side. This meant that the stencil fit into itself easily.”

Finally, we all worked together to make a huge class lizard pattern.

Laaibah explains, “Everyone had a piece of the big picture. We had to make sure we all used the same colour pattern. We then worked together to join all of the lizards together.”

Achievements in October

Our sporty Primary 4’s have been developing their skills in a range of activities including skate boarding, tennis, karate and swimming. Cricket club and coding club have inspired some pupils to further their skills at home and practise batting and creating their own computer games.

 

Primary 4a’s first weeks back at school were action packed! We were entrusted with presenting the first class assembly of the year. This allowed us to show off our knowledge of the school values and encourage everyone to be their own hero.

 

Amelia said, “I loved my part in the assembly. Everyone had a role to play and that is why it was so successful.”

 

In Science we have been using our knowledge of the interactions and energy flow between plants and animals in ecosystems to explore food chains and webs.

 

Evan really enjoyed using the flash cards to categorise animals and plants. “I can now match up producers and consumers in a food chain. I can also explain the words predators and prey.”

 

Our next Science study will be based on Vibrations and Sounds. Through research on how animals communicate, we will explore how sound vibrations are carried by waves through air, water and other media.

 

Logan thinks that we will be talking about how sound travels. “I would like to learn about how animals talk to each other.”

 

Social Studies this term will have a geography focus. By comparing our local area with a contrasting area out with Britain, we will investigate the main features of weather and climate, discussing the impact on living things. 

 

Wardah hopes we do lots of experiments in the playground. “We could see how much it rains and how strong the wind is.”

 

Escher patterns will provide a stimulus for our expressive arts study this term. Through Maths, we will discuss and explore the properties of 2D shapes and identify those that tile. Using this knowledge we will design our own tiling patterns based on the style of Escher.

 

In ICT we will be developing our knowledge and use of safe and acceptable conduct while using different technologies to interact and share experiences, ideas and information with others. We are very lucky at Giffnock to have a range of equipment that we can access and use to enhance our learning and it is important that we all understand how to stay safe.

 

“To stay safe online you have to be careful what you are saying in comments and posts. Don’t share any personal information with someone you don’t know,” explained Sophie.

 

We have been developing our fitness levels over the past couple of weeks and are looking forward to experiencing rugby, basketball and dance sessions in term one.

 

Lewis said, “I like PE and enjoy playing games. The Daily Mile is fun and keeps me fit and healthy.”

 

Linked to our work on the SHANARRI Wheel, this term’s Health and Wellbeing focus will be on staying Safe, keeping Healthy and staying Achieving. Our first lessons have looked at people who help us at school, home and in the community. We were lucky to meet the new Campus Cop and can’t wait for our first library visit.

 

Alex said, “The lollipop lady helps us cross the road. She makes sure we cross at a safe place. The police make sure everyone follows the rules. The doctors and nurses take care of us when we are unwell.”

 

Through RME and Bounceback we have been developing our understanding of the values of respect and honesty. We will also be studying Judiasm and how different religions celebrate Christmas Around the World.

 

Literacy and Numeracy

 

Our learning in these areas will draw upon the contexts listed above but will differ according to the needs of each class / group. Your support with consolidation of core learning through homework activities will be very beneficial to our children.

 

Achievements in August and September

 

Now that we are in Primary 4 we have been learning to be more independent. We have challenged ourselves by remembering our 4 and 6 times tables and we are learning to tie our own ties. Many of our pupils have become more experienced at a sport by taking part in after school clubs and activities; some have even won awards or moved up a grade.

 

Article 29: You have the right to education which develops your personality, respect for other’s rights and the environment.

 

This month we were very lucky to go on a class trip to the Science Center. At the Planetarium we learned a lot of facts about the earth, stars and the moon.  Rachael said, “We saw lots different planets and stars that you can join together to make a picture, these are called constellations.”

 

In Science we have been learning about the phases of the moon for example gibbous moon, full moon, crescent moon, new moon, half moon and quarter moon.  We also learned how we get day and night and the seasons.  Sophie said, “We have also been learning about the human body and how it works.  We have played some games to help us learn.” Emma even drew a picture and labelled it with facts about the human body and shared the facts she learned with the class.”

 

In ICT we have been using our skills to make a PowerPoint about the phases of the moon.  Emma said, “In art we have been using different strategies to make a moon”. We used chalk, pastels and different shades of grey to make our pictures.

 

Logan said, “In music we have started learning different musical instruments from Peter and the Wolf that represent different characters from the story.”

 

In Social Studies we have been learning about wants and needs.  For example a need is something you can’t live without and a want is something you would like to have but could live without it.

 

May’s Awesome Achievers

P3 have been amazing achievers this month using their creative skills to make things and create beautiful art work.  Others have been celebrating their sporting abilities in football and swimming.  One person was being very responsible at the train station looking after their siblings, while others demonstrated their confidence in being able to perform at a dance show.

In social studies we talked about the importance of different Scottish inventions and how they have had an impact on our lives today.  We have even been using our creative skills to think of ways to be inventors ourselves like coming up with ideas to reinvent a pencil.  In ICT we researched some Scottish inventors to find out more about them.  We used this information to practice using PowerPoint.

 

We have been learning about different rhythms and have started using rests in Music.  A rest is a break in the music when nothing is played or sung.  In Art we have been exploring our use of colour and texture to create beautiful cherry blossom trees to decorate the school corridor with.  We have been practicing our performance and presentation skills for both our Class Assembly and for our Spring Service.  We were confident at speaking our lines clearly and used movement, expression and voice to make our performance interesting.

 

Awesome Achievements:

P3a have been awesome achievers this month in music, sport, personal skills and hobbies. Some people have felt they have been achieving by helping others. Some of us continue to challenge ourselves in reading and maths by practicing our times tables. One person has been proud of being able to do a walk over in gymnastics. Others are happy with their sporting abilities in swimming and cycling. One person has started to take piano lessons, while others have been exploring their creative skills by building and making things. Some of us have been really excited to be starting cubs and brownies.

 

Great work P3a!

During January P3a have been working very hard and have been learning about some very interesting things. In science we have been learning how magnets work. Rosie said, “We learned about the North and South poles. If you put two of the same poles together then they will repel. If you put the opposite ones together they will attract.” We investigated using magnets through different materials; Innes said, “We made a maze and a character. We put them on the table and used a magnet underneath the table to bring it around the maze.”

 

In ICT we have been using our research skills to find out information about different Scottish inventors. We have been using different websites to find facts about the inventors. We recorded the information so that we could report back to the class. “Did you know that Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone and he was born in 1847?” said Alex. We also played a fun interactive game to find out about John Logie Baird and how he made the Television.

 

We have been researching people from the past by finding out about some Scottish Inventors. We completed a really challenging task by using clues to help us find about some Scottish inventors. We looked at our poster of skills for learning, life and work and saw that we were using our problem solving, leadership and working with others skills.

 

In RME we explored Chinese New Year and how it is celebrated. We investigated the Chinese Zodiac designing our own animal with adjectives to describe their personality. We used our artistic skills using line, shape and colour to create dragons and “good luck” cards with special Chinese writing.

 

In Health and Wellbeing we have been focusing on the topic of courage. We have been using our talking and listening skills to discuss various acts of courage and have been thinking about ways to help us be more courageous when we are scared.

 

Awesome Achievers

P3a have been awesome achievers this month in music, sport, personal skills and hobbies. Some people have felt they have been achieving by helping others. Some of us continue to challenge ourselves in reading and maths by practicing our times tables. One person has been proud of being able to do a walk over in gymnastics. Others are happy with their sporting abilities in swimming and cycling. One person has started to take piano lessons, while others have been exploring their creative skills by building and making things. Some of us have been really excited to be starting cubs and brownies. Well done P3a!

This month in Primary 3a we have been working really hard in science, social studies, art, ICT, French and music. In science we have been learning about different types of renewable energy. We took part in the “switch off fortnight” challenge, which encouraged us to save energy at school and at home – some of us even had to teach our parents how to be more eco-friendly! We have been learning about the importance of caring for our environment so that we can help stop pollution. We were even practicing our persuasive writing to persuade Mr Lawson to make Giffnock Primary more eco-friendly.

 

We were really excited to have our first trip of the year when we went for a walk in the local area. We looked out for solar panels, different types of houses and homes and collected some leaves. We used the leaves as inspiration to create some “Awesome Autumn Art” by using colour, line and texture to create leaf prints and a portrait of an autumn tree.

 

In French we have been learning to say the days of the week and months of the year so that we can now talk about the date in French. C’est fantastique!

 

In ICT we have been learning to use search engines to research eco-friendly houses and homes.

 

Finally, in music we have been learning all about rhythm and rests. We have also been learning some musical notes with hand signs.

 

Awesome Achievers

We have been celebrating our personal, sporting, responsible and creative achievements in P3a this month. Some people have been taking on some extra responsibilities at home to help out with cooking and looking after pets.  A few of us have been proud of becoming more independent in doing our homework, calculations and making computer games.  We have been delighted with our achievements in various sports including: swimming, football, gymnastics, golf, climbing and tennis.  Some of us have even demonstrated our achievements by performing for the Bollywood dance show.  Others have been really creative by building a hedgehog house and practicing our drawing skills. Personal achievements this month have included taking part in a Brownies service. Well done to the awesome achievers in P3a!