This week we have been busy celebrating Book Week Scotland. We enjoyed our walk to the library together and listened very carefully to the stories the librarian read to us, which we got to take home in our very own book bags.

We enjoyed listening to the stories so much that we have read them again together as a class. We voted on our favourite out of the three and the winner was ‘My First Book of Woodland Animals’. We discussed why creating spaces for nature is important when we were in our P1 garden and decided to build our very own bug hotel to welcome lots of bugs and insects into our garden. We collected lots of materials from the woodland and brought them up to the garden where we worked as a team to construct a very impressive three storey bug hotel. We even had some little visitors to the rooms before we returned indoors.

We took lots of time to visit our own class library this week and enjoyed reading a story with our friends.

We also took time to read One Button Benny by Alan Windram, a story about a robot who feels  different from the other robots. Based on this, we tried to design a vehicle that can move in different environments and has various special features. The designs were very creative and it was lovely to see the children working so well with a partner to develop their drawings and then bring them to life in the garden using the loose parts.

We continued our work on One Button Benny in our writing and decided it would be nice to create a sidekick fro Benny. We brought out the metal loose parts to help us with the design process and used our designs to help us add labels into our robot design writing lesson.

We finished the week by inviting our P6 buddies down to read to us.

Have a lovely weekend!

Mrs Denholm

It has been another busy week in Primary 1 with lots of learning and fun had by all. This week the boys and girls have been sorting, categorising, displaying on Carroll diagrams, using tally marks and carrying out surveys as part of their data handling. The children were also able to use Scratch Jr to add a background, characters and to code individual characters.

In Literacy and English, we looked at three new sounds z, w and ng and tried hard to blend sounds to make words using these sounds.

There were lots of yummy dishes being prepared in the outdoor kitchen and some tricky obstacle course under construction with the loose parts in the garden.

We have been able to show off all of the balances, jumps and rolls we have learnt in gymnastics as well as creative ways to travel along the apparatus.

Next week is Book Week Scotland and P1 will be focusing on the book ‘One Button Benny’ by Alan Windram. For this we will require some junk materials to help us design and create a robot to go alongside the story. If you are able to send in some junk on Monday that would be most helpful and will be put to good use.

I hope you all have a lovely, relaxing weekend and I look forward to seeing all of the children again on Monday morning.

Mrs Denholm

This week we have been busy learning about Diwali and what celebrations take place during this time. Some of our pupils were able to share their own experiences with the class which was lovely to hear. We made rangoli patterns out of 2D shapes and coloured pencils and created a display of our hand prints with patterns on them, which we have learnt is called mehndi.

We worked hard to develop our understanding of blending sounds together to make words like rat, mop and sun and shared our reading books together, taking turns to read aloud to one another in our groups.

We enjoyed our time in the P1 garden, exploring the loose parts. This week a mouse trap and obstacle course were created which the boys and girls had great fun designing and using.

As part of our Health and Wellbeing lesson, we were thinking about something that can be tricky to do like zipping our jackets. We had 4 volunteers wearing their jackets in a funny way and the class had to recognise what was wrong and how to fix it. We then talked to our shoulder partners about the best way to put our jackets on and zip them up, making sure the little handle is at the bottom before we begin. There have been lots of happy faces in the classroom this week when they have managed to zip up their own jackets for the playground.

There has been lots of creativity on show this week as a result of new resources being added to the imaginative area. The boys and girls have absolutely loved making their own games up, which in turn is developing a whole variety of skills including turn taking and language development as they share their own life experiences with one another. Here are a few pictures from within our play areas this week…

All of the pupils have their take home folders in their bags and I know they are very excited to share them with you. Please take time, if you can, to talk about what they have been learning and return the folder (with feedback sheet, writing jotter and maths workbook) on Monday to ensure work can continue in these.

Have a lovely weekend!

Mrs Denholm

This week in maths we were exploring numbers before, after and in between. The boys and girls worked hard to use this new terminology to ask and answer questions. We also explored pattern and were able to copy patterns of colour and shape indoors and out. Next week, we will work more on creating our own patterns as this was a little bit trickier.

We had great fun with the parachute which helps to develop our listening skills. We had to listen for our names and colours to swap positions when the parachute went up. There were lots of giggles when the parachute landed on our heads.

We had lots of spooky activities set up this week as we approach Halloween. The boys and girls showed off their creative sides as they made up potions in their writing, made their own skeletons and played at the tuff spot where they could bring their potions to life.

We were glad of the rainfall as it meant all of our pots and pans were full to the brim to play with in our outdoor kitchen. We built dens, made mud cookies and flower potions in our P1 garden. A reminder that outdoor clothing is needed on a Tuesday and Thursday.

And finally, some photos of all of the fun we are having in our play areas…

Have a lovely weekend!

Mrs Denholm

It was lovely to welcome the children back to school and hear all of their stories from the October week. Everyone was well rested and ready to learn. We moved onto gymnastics in our PE lessons and the boys and girls were more than delighted to show off how good they are at balancing and creating shapes with their bodies.

We spent our time outdoors in a series of challenges to help us talk about shape in the environment. The first was to see who could build the tallest tower which got quite competitive. The children showed great enthusiasm and determination to add another layer to their tower. We spoke about what shapes needed to stack, the edges and corners we could count and how easy the shapes would be to move.

The second challenge was to design a set of stairs using the knowledge you had gained about stacking. It proved quite tricky to begin with but after discussion within each group a solution was found in the end. We even tried out the stairs to check they were stable and secure.

We enjoyed reading our new books which we will take home for homework next week. Our tasks involved identifying the missing words and sequencing events and words in the stories. Mrs Denholm is very proud of how hard everyone is trying to sound out their words and recognise tricky words in the text.

I can’t quite believe it is the end of the week again. It has flew by, but we have managed to squeeze lots in, including work on the seasons, months of the year, blending cvc words, matching numbers to number names, adding and having lots of fun in the areas as we learn together. Here are some highlights from the week…

Have a lovely weekend!

Mrs Denholm x

This week the boys and girls have been very excited about the changes they can see in our environment. The trees have been changing colours and there have been lots of colourful and different sizes and shapes of leaves for us to collect. We took them into our classroom where we could look at them a little closer with the magnifying glasses. Today we are going to bring our favourite leaf home with us.

In our topic, under the sea we have been learning about what sea creatures eat. We now know that we can show this information in a food chain. Here Lucas and Dhruv have chosen an example of a food chain they believe would happen.

The block area has been a firm favourite area to play in and build some amazing creations this week. Both they boys and the girls have built some fantastic structures that have allowed them to work together as a team, to problem solve and to show off their creativity. Here we have some photos of the buildings created this week… ,  another castle by Zak and Dhruv where you can see fireworks from anywhere,

a castle by Sarah

another castle by Zak and Dhruv where you can see fireworks from anywhere,

Amaya made a shop called Morrisons. I think you will agree that the children have worked so very hard on their designs. I can’t wait to see what they come up with next.

We went on a 2D and 3D shape hunt in the school grounds to help us recognise what these shapes look like and help remember their names. We found loads of shapes in the woodland and our P1 garden. Here are some examples of the shapes we found:

We have come to the end of our possession games block. This term the boys and girls have been working hard to develop their control over the equipment, specifically throwing, catching and aiming at a target. We also enjoyed the warm up games where we had to listen carefully to instructions of how many body parts could be in the hoop. We look forward to moving on to gymnastics when we return after the holidays.

Here are some additional pictures of children in the play areas this week directing their own learning.

Our classroom is looking great thanks to the children helping Mrs Denholm develop the play areas further. After observations of the children playing and discussions as a class, we decided to move the block area as it was a little squished and develop our imaginative area. We now have a selection of materials that the children can use in their play where they can pretend it is anything they want it to be. This has proven to be popular and so far this week they have played zombies, built and played in their castles and created  a dinosaur land.

I hope you all have a lovely and well deserved rest over the October week. I look forward to hearing lots of stories upon the children’s return.

Mrs Denholm x

1. This week, we have been practising the sounds we know and have learnt three new ones r, m and d. We played some games and carefully tried to write the letters. We added lots of detail to our writing, which was all about kicking a ball. We took time to discuss what would be in our drawings which really helped us when we sat down to write. Mrs Denholm is keeping our writing in a special green jotter which we will get to take home later in the year to show you.

We were celebrating Maths Week in Scotland with the theme being ‘our world’. In P1b we decided to think about gathering and sorting. We were able to share our ideas of what jobs you would need to sort lots of objects including a postman, rubbish collector and supermarket. We collected lots of natural objects when we were outdoors and worked as a team to decide on the criteria to sort them.

We even had some time left to splash in the puddles.

For our topic this week we looked at sea and land turtles. We now know they have four flippers and a head if the live in the sea and limbs that can retract into their shell if they live on land. Sea turtles can hold their breath for up to 5 hours and they lay their eggs on the beach late at night. We made our very own turtles using paper plates, paint and collage. We can’t wait to hang them in our classroom for everyone to see.

We have had lots of fun building models out of junk materials this week. Lots of focus and creativity has went into them and it has been lovely to see the children working together on these mini projects. Can we ask if you have any junk materials (kitchen roll tubes, cereal bar boxes, tissue boxes etc) that you send them in for our junk box to enable our designs to continue. Here are some from this week…

Have a lovely weekend.

Mrs Denholm x

This week we had lots of fun learning about sharks and dolphins as part of our under the sea topic. We couldn’t believe how high a dolphin can jump out of the water and enjoyed learning facts about the different types of sharks that swim in the ocean.

We have continued to develop control over our bodies and the ball in PE lessons. We mirrored what our partner was doing with their body before adding a ball in. We learnt how to dribble the ball, which was a little tricky, but we kept trying hard and it became a little easier.

Our sounds of the week were ck, e and h. We are enjoying listening to the jolly phonic songs and sing along at snack time to help us with our learning. Our activities this week saw us sorting magnetic letters, matching pictures to their initial sound and blending sounds together to make cvc (consonant, vowel, consonant) words. We even had hopping races, which gave us all a good giggle.

We are working hard to practise writing our names each morning when we come into class, paying attention to the capital letter at the start.

We continued our work on measure and explored numbers on a number line and number square to help us identify the order, patterns and missing numbers.

I hope you all have a lovely September weekend and a well deserved rest!

A special mention to our birthday girls of the weekend, Katrine and Blair Alba. Enjoy the celebrations.

Mrs Denholm x

This week in numeracy and maths, we were learning to measure using non standard units. We found items in our P1 garden to measure and were able to compare which was longest and shortest. Mrs Denholm then set us challenges to find items that were longer and shorter than others.

We learned three new sounds this week; i, p and n and the actions which go with the sounds. We will send a list of these actions home with the first homework pack. We practised writing these letters too.

We have had another great week in P1b with lots of fun in our play areas. We have had some fabulous pieces of artwork, volcanoes in the sandpit and deep concentration as models have been constructed.

Have a lovely weekend!

See you all on Monday for a coffee and chat at 10am (if you are able to make it)

Mrs Denholm x

This week we have been learning the sounds s, a and t. through games, songs and stories.

The boys are girls have been very good at recognising the initial sounds of words and coming up with some of their own. We have made some colourful snakes, used spaghetti in our play, played I spy and memory games, taking an item away, as our friends try to guess what is missing.

In Numeracy and maths, we have been focusing on the numbers 0-20. We have been ordering the numbers forwards and backwards, identifying the missing number and saying one more. We have also looked at different visuals that can represent numbers such as dots, finger patterns and tally marks.

During PE, we continued to practise our throwing and catching skills. Mrs Denholm was very impressed with the control we showed with the ball.

We had great fun exploring the P1 garden on a rainy morning. The ducks were chosen to come outside with us and had great fun playing in the puddles.

Have a great weekend everyone!

Mrs Denholm