Mixing, meta skills and money

This week we explored mixing red and yellow together to make different shades of the colour orange. We painted squares with the colours and once they were dry turned them into little houses.


We have continued to learn about money specifically selecting the right coins to make amounts and matching coin equivalents together up to 15p.

We welcomed a doctor and an artist in to talk to us about how they use meta skills in their jobs. We discovered communication, curiosity and collaboration are key. The children asked lots of good questions and many seemed inspired for a future career.


The children continue to amaze me with their problem solving skills and creativity which is evident throughout their play every day. Here is a little snapshot of some of the play from he week.

I hope you all enjoy your weekend. Hopefully the sun will make an appearance.
Mrs Denholm x

A visit to Summerlee Museum

This week we enjoyed a trip to Summerlee Museum together to explore some items from the past and learn how our grandparents might have lived. It was very interesting to see some of the items such as the wind up telephone, record player, camera, satchel and chalkboard.
the children quickly realised life is much easier now and more convenient with almost instant access to most things.

We enjoyed lunch together before taking a walk to see the cottages where we were able to visit different rooms set up from across the decades.


We even had time for a play outside in the park. It was great fun!

We had a little look around inside at some of the items from the past and enjoyed the interactive buttons on some of the stations.

Thank you to our lovely helpers Nada, Kirsty and Sara. We couldn’t have done it without you!

Have a great weekend!
Mrs Denholm x

Similarities, odd and even and competitive hoop games

This week we have been discussing the similarities we have within our class that we can see such as hair colour and eye colour. We have also thought carefully about questions we could ask each other to find out more about our friends for the things we cannot see such as favourite movie or colour. This made us realise often if we listen carefully enough and play with each other we can find out more and grow new friendships.

We have also been exploring odd and even numbers in maths. We used different numbers of children to see if we could split that number into two equally with nobody left out. If somebody was left out the hoops we realised that number was odd.

In PE we have continued to develop control and accuracy with the ball as we played some competitive games. It was very exciting if the ball landed in the hoop, meaning we could try get another ball or hoop.

I hope everyone is having a great weekend! See you all on Monday for the school trip.
Mrs Denholm x

fire visit

This week we were very lucky to receive a visit from the fire service to talk to us about the job of a firefighter and how to stay safe. The children asked some great questions and were able to try the uniform on, see how the equipment works and even got to sit inside the fire engine. It was a great experience for us all.

inventors of 2025

This week we read Manfred the Baddie and became so engrossed in the different inventions he created with his henchmen that we decided we should create some of our own. We worked together in small groups to plan and design the features of our inventions.

Once we had worked together we shared our ideas and designs with the rest of the class.

And later that day got to work bringing our designs to life with various materials and loose parts.

We had lots of fun and learnt lots of skills along the way. Perhaps we will have some budding inventors of the future in Primary 1a!

 

Our Learning Journey so far… Birds!

The children had shown an interest in birds whilst exploring in the garden area and had made many comments about not many birds visiting us there!  We decided to make some bird feeders to attract the birds to come. We learned about the importance of helping look after birds in the winter time and how it can be harder for them to find food on their own.

We have been using different non-fiction books to find information and learn facts about different types of birds, their features and how we can help look after them. We have been exploring the internet using websites such as BBC bitesize and Earth Kids to help us learn. The children have shown a keen interest in learning about David Attenborough and have many questions about him and his role as a biologist! Many were curious if I (Mrs Dickie) was of a similar age!!!

The children participated in some experiential bird experiences outdoors on the school grounds. Our games focused on listening, looking and attention skills to help us become better bird watchers! The children collaborated well together.

We spent some time as a class discussing what we already know about birds and creating a list of some questions that we have that we’d like to find out on our learning journey together.

Before heading out to do our bird watching, we carried out some data handling experiences so that we could record our information whilst bird watching using tally marks.

Then we headed outdoors for some bird watching! The children found a spot on top of the hill that was particularly good for bird watching, some children climbed trees to get a better view and others used binoculars to look closely for them. We looked for gulls, magpies, starlings, crows and robins as these tend to be the most popular around here. As a whole, gulls and crows were spotted the most on this day!

Today we had a visit from the Dams to Darnley Country Park Ranger Rennie. He explained all about the important work he does to help look after the animals and wildlife. He shared lots of very interesting facts about different types of birds that are found at the nature park – 141 in total! The children were able to share some of their own knowledge of birds and ask questions to further their understanding. Many of the children are now keen to have a visit there, if you are looking for anywhere to go at the weekends.  🙂

We’ll be continuing our learning journey next week by carrying out some drawing and writing about our visitor and recording some key facts that we have learned.

portraits, construction curiosity and number

We have been focusing on the different types of line in our art lessons and thinking how we could use them within our drawings. We have created some lovely designs and portraits as a result.

We have been using a number line to support our understanding of addition and have found it a useful tool to help us find the answer.

We visited the construction site today to see the progress of our new MUGA and were very impressed with the progress made so far. It was great to see the diggers in action and the children had LOTS of questions which Mr Weir kindly helped us with.

We continue to learn new sounds, with qu and ou being our new sounds this week. The boys and girls are continuing to practise writing cvc words and this is helping as they play reading games and come across unfamiliar texts.

Have a lovely weekend and I will see you all next week!

Mrs Denholm x

healthy eating in the new year

We have all had a great first week back at school with a focus on revising our sounds, common words, days of the week and number knowledge.

We got our vets surgery up and running in our role play area and researched the life of a vet to enhance our play experiences. We carried out a class vote once we had learnt what a vert does and it was great to see so many children interested in working with animals when they are older.

We looked at ways to stay healthy and eat a balanced diet. All of the children are trying to drink lots more water throughout the course of the day, exercise when out playing and trying to include a healthy snack in their day.

We learnt about estimation and how we can check our answers by counting. We started in the class and took our learning outdoors to estimate how many steps it would take to reach the next landmark. The children worked well together to communicate sensible estimates and then check if they were close with their guess.

As the weather has been so cold we were unable to go out to the MUGA for our PE session this week but we made sure we kept moving with some fun active workouts in the classroom.

 

I hope you all have a lovely weekend. See you all on Monday.

Mrs Denholm x

 

It has been a busy week preparing and practising our class nativity ‘A Miracle in Town’. I am so unbelievably proud of each and every one of the children who worked so hard to learn their lines, think of actions for our songs and standing up and delivering a performance full of confidence. Here are some pictures we took after our dress rehearsal on Wednesday.

Thank you to all of you at home for your support in helping the children prepare for this. They have learnt so many skills and have enjoyed the drama, music and opportunity to come together as a class with their first ever audience.

Have a well deserved rest this weekend and I will see you all next week for the final week of term 🙂

Mrs Denholm x