EWHCF Class of 2023

This week we have been doing art.  In art we have been looking at the pictures and deciding how we feel about it.  We looked at a picture which had elderly people floating in the air holding umbrellas and dancing.  We think it was raining or snowing and there was a reflection from the umbrellas.  We discussed how this piece of art made us feel such as joyful,  happy, excited and maybe even sad because the characters could be lost.  It made us feel happy because the characters looked like they were having fun, the characters looked like they were together as friends, the artist used bright colours such as orange, light blue, red, yellow etc.  and many of the colours were the primary colours.  The other piece of art included lots of people walking in the rain and were also holding umbrellas.  This picture mainly made us feel unhappy, sad, scared or bored because the colours were dark and there wasn’t many bright colours, the characters looked sad themselves and looked as though they were walking alone.  Next week we will be choosing a random feeling written by one of our peers and we are going to draw a picture which would make us feel that feeling.

In Art we were making fans just like the fans in China of which we added drawings of flowers, bamboo and some animals which represent Chinese New Year such as a rabbit, rat, ox, tiger, pig, sheep, horse, monkey, dog, dragon and snake.  The day before Chinese New Year they give the house a good clean and decorate the house with red Chinese decorations such as lanterns and signs.  Red is the main colour which stands for good luck.

In maths we were doing word problems related to Robert Burns.  In one of our word problems we used our chance and uncertainty skills when discussing the chance of picking someone called Elizabeth to play with.  Of the 7 daughters Robert Burns had 5 of them were called Elizabeth and the other 2 were called Francis and Jean.  The chance of playing with an ‘Elizabeth’ is very likely. We also learned that he died when he was 37 .  One groups’s question said his age was 3 tens and 7 units and the other group’s clue included a number line with the year he was born and the year he died.  We added on in tens and units.

This week, Learning for Sustainability DYW group were creating pictures out of natural materials.  Have a look. What do you think they have created?

  

    

      

In P.E. we were learning how to use the tennis racket and how to hold it as if shaking someone’s hand.  We learned that you have to hold it top the side and flick your wrist.  We split into groups of 3 of our choice and had a job each.  The runner, the batter, the baller. The baller’s job was to throw the ball and the batter’s job was to hit it back to the baller.  The runner’s job was to catch the ball when it bounced it in a different direction.  We discussed that in tennis the proper name for the runner is the ball boy or the ball girl.

In writing this week we were making leaflets about Newton Mearns and persuading people to come here.  We were focusing on including a bold heading, a few sub-headings, lots of information in paragraphs under the sub-headings or in bullet points.  We discussed that it would need pictures and colour to make it attractive to the reader and some pictures could have labels or captions to tell the reader what the picture is of or where it is.  In addition, we tried to include persuasive language which are adjectives that describe something to make it sound great and to encourage the reader to want to go there.

In P.E. this week we have been developing our balance skills with a tennis ball and racket by dropping the ball from different heights and trying to catch it on the racket without it bouncing off.  In the next few weeks we will be building on our skills to play a game of tennis.

D.Y.W. started back up again this week and in the Life Skills group we made breakfast bars with apricots, raisins, sultanas, coconuts and oats. We will be making pancakes, pitta pockets and learning how to sew.  In Design and Manufacture we were being engineers and in groups from mixed classes we had to make a table from scrap paper and our aim was to make the table stand and hold a lightweight book.  It also had to be 20cm tall.  In Learning for Sustainability we gather natural materials outside such as sticks, leaves, stones, bark and pine cones to make a piece of Eco Art next week.  In Digital Technologies we were learning how to control Spheros.  First, we watched a video on how to programme the Spheros.  We had to download an app and have learned how to change colour, direction and speed of the Spheros.

In R.M.E. we were learning about Shabbat.  Shabbat is celebrated by Jews every Friday and finishes at sunset on Saturday. Just before sunset, the woman of the house lights 2 candles and the father blesses the children.  The father then pours wine or grape juice into a special cup and passes it around.  After that, they cut the Challah bread and sprinkle it with salt.  Then families have a meal around the table and  talk to each other about their week and sing songs together  Shabbat is celebrated because Jews believe God built the world in 6 days and took a rest on the 7th day. Therefore, they rest on Friday evening through to Saturday so in preparation for this they have to tidy their house, do their shopping and chores beforehand.  Today is Friday so Happy Shabbat!

Today, in Science we have been learning about sound and vibrations.  We participated in an experiment where we got a bowl which had clingfilm over it and we put sprinkles on it.  We had to talk or sing over the sprinkles to see if there was a vibration.  We knew there was a vibration if the sprinkles bounced a little or if there was a slight noise.  We learned that when 2 things touch they push air around it and it vibrates creating sound waves and when the waves touch your eardrum you hear the sound.  When you are in a cave or an empty room and you speak, there is an echo.  This is when the sound bounces off the walls back to your ear.  We also did a sound field trip to learn of the sounds in our environment.

In Maths, some groups have been making 24 hour clock pie charts to show what activities we do throughout the whole day.  We have also been using calendars and exploring months to find out how many days there are in each month and a leap year.  We learned that 30 days has September, April, June and November.  All the rest have 31 except for February alone, which has 28 days clear and 29 in a leap year. One of the maths groups has been exploring strategies such as CUBE to figure out a word problem. C = Circle, U = Underline, B = Box and E = Evolve.  We will be continuing with this next week.

In our second last week of the year the rectangles have been finishing up with our division topic that we’ve been working on for some time now. I think they’re looking forward to working on something different for a while.

The circles, however, have just started learning about the same bus stop method that the rectangles are just finishing with. They’ve done really well so far and I’m sure they’ll enjoy working with more complex numbers next week and after the Christmas holidays.

With our writing this week, with Mrs Abercrombie, was continuing with the Incredible Snowman story that we were planning last week. We will be redrafting these next week, so that they can be displayed around the school to let other classes see our wonderful work.

We have all been working on our Christmas crafts for the Christmas Fayre on Monday. Using acrylic paints and Sharpie pens, we have been painting some lovely snowflake and star-shaped tealight holders. The whole class has put a lot of effort into their designs and they look absolutely fantastic! They’re looking forward to showing them off at the fayre next week.

Just like last week, we had our PE slot inside the classroom. We had good fun keeping active with some Go Noodle videos, as well as some yoga and Just Dance videos. This afternoon, we also ran a mile and timed ourselves doing it. The aim is that we will repeat this next week and see if we can improve on our times by increasing our fitness levels and stamina.

Mrs Melville has been teaching us about the names of colours and numbers as a bit of revision in French. We have covered this before, but it was useful to go back over things again.

One of the more exciting things to happen this week was the delivery of two 3D printers, which have been paid for by the fundraising committee. We talked about the different things that can be printed using the printers and watched some videos to see how long it can take them to be printed. Hopefully next week, we will get the opportunity to see them in action!

Enjoy the weekend!

In Art, we were working on our crafts for the Christmas Fayre which are tea light holders. Some people have stars and some people have snowflake designs on theirs. We used glitter paint, sharpie pens and regular paint for our designs, however, some people wanted theirs to be plain. Groups were mixed to use different resources so that we had a range of designs. We are keeping them safe in the classroom just now but can’t wait to sell them at the Christmas fayre on Monday. We hope to see you there!

In our art this week we have been continuing to practice adding tone to our drawings and we have also been learning about adding in detail. Today we were using the fine liners to draw pictures of the school, really focusing on the detail that we could see, such as bricks, stones and the windows. It was lovely seeing their concentration on their work and they all did a wonderful job of their artwork. Have a look at some of their results!

For our Wednesday PE session this week, we weren’t able to use the hall, so we did something a bit different in our class instead; some dancing and then some pokemon yoga, which was great fun. We also tried to run our daily mile again for the first time, though had to cut it short because of the rain. We will try this again next week if it stays dry enough.

Thankfully, we were still able to get outside with Miss McNair on Thursday. We played cops and robbers with her and we all really enjoyed it.

Today we were learning some of the different names for animals in French. We learned that a cat is “un chat,” a dog is “un chien,” snake is “un serpent” and hamster is “un hamster” but in French you don’t say the “h.”

In maths, two of our groups have taken a break from our focus of multiplication and division to learn about something different. The rectangles have been learning about directions, using right angled or quarter turns and creating routes to follow. On Wednesday they were playing a game on the laptops which used computer coding to direct one of the Angry Birds around the screen to squash a pig.

The circles have been learning about grid references and have been enjoying playing battleships to practice their skills when they have finished their work. They have learned a phrase to remind them of the order that they have to read grid references: “along the corridor, then up the stairs.” This reminds them that they have to read the numbers or letters along the horizontal axis first, before reading the vertical axis.

The triangles have been continuing with the work that they have been doing for the last few weeks, looking at addition and place value of Hundreds, Tens and Units.

We also had an opportunity on Thursday afternoon to watch the dress rehearsal of the P5 show school, which we thought was great and wish them luck in all their performances!

Enjoy the weekend!

We were linking Art with RME and drawing mosques.  We focused on the visual elements of line, tone and pattern.  First we drew the outline of the mosque and we focused on the tower and dome (Onion dome).  We used Wolff’s Carbon Pencils to shade it in going from light to dark.  Some of us used a brick pattern, stone or tile pattern using squares, triangles, rectangles and semi-circles.  Some people also included the Islamic symbol on their mosque.