P5/6 2022-23

Mr Atkinson’s comment:

Once again the primary 5 pupils did the class proud when they performed the Christmas Window show to the whole school this week! Thank you to all the parents and guardians for supporting the children with learning their lines and songs. The class thoroughly enjoyed having pupils from primary 7 visit and teach a drama lesson which they performed to their peers as well as creating their Christmas crafts. Both P5 and P6 pupils joined their friends in the other classes at their stage Christmas parties this week. The children had a fantastic time dancing, playing with their friends, taking part in games and enjoying snacks and drinks. Finally I would like to express my thanks and appreciation for the kindness, generosity and support over this term from everyone. Have a wonderful festive period and I am looking forward to hearing all the stories from the pupils in the New Year.

Highlights from the week

Mr Atkinson’s comment:

Well done to all the primary 5 pupils who performed brilliantly at the Christmas Window show and it was also great to see so many families attending it!

Information regarding Christmas parties will be in Mrs McGuigan’s weekly round up.

Literacy and English

Leo – My group read a diary entry and answered literal, deductive and evaluative questions. We then shared our answers with our peers and explained how we reached our answers.

Ruairidh – We have been learning about perspective, which is when people have different points of views. We need to be mindful of this when reading sources as the writer may have experienced the same event as someone else but have a different opinion on what happened. An example of this is when we read two primary sources of passengers on board the Titanic. One was written by a male teenager who was first class survivor and another was an account from a women who was a third class survivor. They shared some similarities but also had differences which we explored and discussed as to why this may be.

Aarohi – We also learned that not all sources are based on facts and that posters, newspapers, documents can be created for a certain purpose.

Numeracy and Maths

Aarohi – As part of our new measurement topic we were challenged to design houses out of Lego. We recorded the the length, height and width in centimetres of the building and some of us also wrote down the measurements of our doors and windows. It was great fun!

Ruairidh – We programmed Spheros to move forward, estimated how far they travelled and then measured the actual distance using measuring tapes in both centimetres and metres.

Health and Wellbeing

Emma – With Mr McMillan, we play a couple of games of Boccia because of the weather. 

IDL

Kyler – At the start of the week we began our preparations for debating who was responsible for the sinking of the Titanic. Mr Atkinson shared the question, was the Titanic an accident or avoidable mistake. We then formed teams and chose a historical figure who played an important role in the events surrounding the sinking of the Titanic. We read a range of primary and secondary sources and then created defences for our person and accused other teams that their historical figure was at fault for the sinking. This again showed us that their are lots of different facts and opinions and that there are many points of views based on one event.

Science 

Isla – Using our knowledge of floating, sinking and buoyancy we were challenged this week to build ships that could carry different weights. Mr Atkinson encouraged us to reflect on our understanding as to why boats float and what happened inside the Titanic to cause it to sink. As naval architects we first designed our prototypes. We chose from either using Lego, Tinkercad or made our own sketches however, for all of these options we had to accurately measure them in centimetres and metres. After creating our prototypes we then used our donated materials to construct the actual models. Afterwards, we tested them in water and commented on why some were successful and how we could improve the designs of some that sank.

Kapla

Retal – One afternoon this week we used wooden blocks and instruction books to create different structures including buildings and animals! It was so much fun working in groups to create these objects.

Mr Atkinson’s comment:

On Friday primary 5 parents/guardians should receive two tickets from their child inviting them to the Christmas Window performance on Tuesday 13th December at 2.00pm. If you have not done so already can all primary 5 pupils bring in a Christmas jumper or accessories that can be worn on top of their school uniform. It is recommended that these items are brought in a bag with your name on it. Please do not buy anything as we will be able to provide some items, however, if you have anything spare we would appreciate if these could also be brought in.

Just a final reminder that there will be no more woodland session this term.

Literacy and English

Sophie – We have been continuing with our diary writing! This week we tea-stained a piece of paper to make it look old and then we wrote an imaginative diary entry from the perspective of a Titanic survivor. We assessed these by reading them aloud to a group and then gave each other verbal feedback by using the success criteria.

Alfie – Before writing our diaries we thought it would be useful to think about the different senses and emotions the Titanic passengers would have experienced. We created a list of helpful vocabulary and phrases and organised them under senses headings.

Heena – This week we have been learning about the differences between fact and opinions, particularly within sources. We then explored opinions further and discussed how people can have differing or the same opinion but this can be affected by their point of view/perspective. We looked at an example of when Matthew Perry visited Japan and how the Japanese and Americans  viewed him differently in picture sources.

Numeracy and Maths

Finlay – This week all the groups completed check-ups covering different topics that we have been taught this term.

Health and Wellbeing

Finlay- With Mr McMillan, we started our football block focusing on dribbling and passing this week.

IDL

Heena –  We created ships logs and chronologically ordered events that happened on the day of the sinking of the Titanic to create a timeline. This also challenged us to use our reading skill summarising when writing done some of the key facts.

Science 

Heena – In science this week we have been learning about floating and sinking. We discovered that molecules affects the density of an object. Items that have closely packed molecules are more dense than loosely packed objects. Density is one of the factors that causes some items to float and sink. We tested this out but changing the shape of play-doh. A ball of play-doh sunk but play-doh in a flat shape stayed afloat.

Technology

Kate – We also finished designed our safe roads on Tinkercad. Some of us created speed bumps, signs, traffic lights, fences and  pedestrian crossings.

RME

Mehr – The P6 pupils visited the Baptist Church and learned about Jesus. We also took part in a range of fun activities such as creating decorative tiles.

Mr Atkinson’s comment:

This week in the blog we have a couple of important updates. The primary 5 pupils all thoroughly enjoyed themselves at the Science Centre and next week it will be the primary 6 pupils turn to attend the annual ADVENTure Trail event at Newton Mearns Baptist Church.

Next Friday primary 5 pupils will be having their final rehearsal for the Christmas performance. If possible, on Friday 9th we would like you to come in your school uniform with Christmas accessories (for example a Santa hat or tinsel) or bring a Christmas jumper. Please could you bring these items in a bag with your name on it. We will store these in school so that we have everything that is required for the actual performance on Tuesday 13th. Please do not buy anything as we will be able to provide some accessories, however, if you have anything spare we would appreciate if these could also be brought in.

With the weather being so unpredictable I have decided to cancel the final Woodland session on the 12th. Instead we will use this time to reflect on our progress towards our John Muir award.

Literacy and English

Ruairidh – In writing this week we were challenged to create diaries for inanimate objects. At first it was tricky as we had to image how these items might react and feel. We also had to include pronouns to show that we were writing the diaries from the objects perspective.

Numeracy and Maths

Harley – This week all our Maths groups created posters for some of our topics such as angles and directions, area and perimeter, multiplication and division, function machines and symmetry.

Health and Wellbeing

Alfie – We updated our personal goal books which we will review at the end of every week. We hope this will improve our work and encourage us to check over things.

Mehr – With Mr McMillan in P.E. we completed more fitness stations such as hurdles jumping, relay races, ladders and skipping.

Harley – On Monday the primary 6 pupils worked in groups to created their very own dances inspired from different styles. We plan to perform these to our friends in a couple of weeks.

Science

Kyler  – The P5 pupils joined the other P5 classes and visited the Science Centre in Glasgow. It was incredible! We watched a performance about how the climate is changing, this included experiments and answering questions. We also explored the different floors such as the human body section, the space zone, technology area as well as test out some of the interesting equipment.

RME

French

Emma –With Mr McMillan, we learned how to express and say whether we liked or loved a certain sports in French.

Retal – We have started to use our daily French calendar which will help us to practice how to say the weekdays, months and weather in French.

Expressive Arts

Sara – On Friday P6 pupils went with Mrs Hutchison to learn about the various types of lines that are used in art and how they can create different effects.

Chloe – The primary 5 pupils have been incredibly busy learning their speaking parts and trying to remember the different songs. We have been joining the other P5 class in the gym hall to practice the entire performance.

Mr Atkinson’s comment:

Preparation for Christmas continues with the primary 5 pupils rehearsing with the rest of their stage for their upcoming performance. Please see Mrs McGuigan weekly round-up which contains information relating to the time and date of the performance. Speaking parts have been issued, accompanying song links have been posted on our Google Classroom and the lyric sheets will be sent home soon. We would appreciate encouraging and supporting your child with practicing their parts. The primary 5 pupils will also be going on a school trip next week.

Woodland dates are: November 28th and December 12th. Please bring appropriate clothing.

Literacy and English

Harley – This week in writing we continued to develop our understanding of how to create a newspaper. Having been inspired from reading Charlie and the Chocolate Factory last week as part of Book Week Scotland we decided to write a newspaper about the children discovering the golden tickets. First we recorded some quotes from the book for some of the main characters. This meant we could look back at these notes to help us with writing the newspaper.

Archie – Some of our success criteria included uses speech marks and commas correctly when interviewing and quoting people. Some of us challenged ourselves to use different words other than said.

John – We also learned about the differences between primary and secondary sources. Primary sources are usually written from someone who was there at the time of the event, an artifact or photo from the time period. A secondary source is like the books we read in school, they are written by someone after the event who may have used primary sources to help them write it. Using this knowledge we looked at different types of sources and decided whether they were secondary or primary. Finally we discussed what will be a primary source from our time period, such as a mobile phone or diary.

Numeracy and Maths

John – Our mental maths strategy this week involved multiplying 3 and 4 digit numbers by separating them into thousands, hundreds, tens and units and then adding them together.

Aarohi – Using our survey results last week we used Microsoft Excel to create pie charts, bar graphs and scatter plot. Mr Atkinson challenged us to add relevant pictures under our labels. We also had to check that we used the correct scales and labels in our graphs.

Ruairidh – In our functions machine topic we had to decided which rule and pattern was needed to complete the calculation.

Maya – My group was revising how to multiply 4 and 5 digit numbers with carrying.

Health and Wellbeing

Mehr – This week was Anti-Bullying Week. The P6 pupils were visited by the the campus police officer. The whole class learned more about what dyslexia is and how it can impact on people. However, we all agreed that regardless of our individual differences we should be respectful, kind, caring and supportive of one another. The P6 pupils also learned about epilepsy with Mrs Lamont.

Mehr – In gymnastics we got out the apparatus to help us with practicing our different types of jumps – it was so much fun!

Aarohi – In our Bounceback lesson we discussed different problems in life and decided if they were small, medium or large. We also spoke about who we can speak to if we feel overwhelmed.

Harley – With Mrs Lamont we created happiness hero badges!

RME

Sophie – After learning about the different types of Hindu gods we created our very own and wrote descriptions about them. We had to think about what there purpose was and how they helped people.

Expressive Arts

Sara – This week we finished our Christmas card for the Whitecraigs Care Home competition.

Mr Atkinson’s comment:

The pupils have thoroughly enjoyed celebrating Book Week Scotland which you can read about below. The primary 5 children will be involved in a Christmas performance and we have begun rehearsing songs which will continue for the next couple of weeks. We hope to send individual lines and song lyrics home next week for the pupils to practice at home.

Woodland dates are: November 28th and December 12th.

Literacy and English

Emma – It was Book Week Scotland this week! One of the activities we took part in was recording on our class poster how many books we had read over the week.

Maya – Mr Atkinson read us Charlie and the Chocolate Factory at the end of everyday because our Book Week Scotland tasks were related to it. We are also going to be writing a newspaper based on the main events from the novel.

Harley – Both the P5 and P6 pupils became reading buddies and visited some of the younger years to help them explore new books.

Numeracy and Maths

Alfie – We were inspired to create our own chocolate bars after reading chapters from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory so we surveyed the class on their favourite flavour and shape. We also asked them what they thought would be the best size and price for a cholocate bar. Using this information we created bar graphs and pie charts to display our results.

Lewis – In groups, we used an online programme called TinkerCad to design a 3D model of our own chocolate bar. This was challenging as it involved applying our knowledge of maths, including; shape, size and some calculations. This activity also encouraged us to use a Growth Mindset as it tested our ICT skills!

Health and Wellbeing

Sara – For our final P6 lesson on Growth Mindset we drew icebergs  and wrote words to describe our emotions either under or above the water. These pictures represented what people see above water such as success or achieving goals but under the water we wrote words such as studying and learning from mistakes as people do not always see the effort that goes in to accomplishing something.

Ruairidh – For our final P5 lesson on Growth Mindset we discussed what makes an effective learning. We came up with qualities such as hardworking, positive, resilient, perseveres and willing to accept feedback. Afterwards, we took inspiration from looking at cereal boxes and decided to create our own cereals but instead base the ingredients on the effective leaners qualities.

Mehr – Our second lesson of gymnastics involved being more creative with our balances that we learned last week, practicing different rolls on the mats and spelling out words in a group by moving and rotating our bodies.

Outdoor Learning

Kyler – This week we worked in groups to find materials that could be used as instruments so that we could form a woodland orchestra! We had so much fun trying to recreate popular songs and themes.

Expressive Art

Mehr – On Friday we started designing Christmas cards for the Whitecraigs Care Home competition.

RME

Chloe – We have started learning about Hinduism and the different Gods. One of our tasks involved matching the Gods with their names.

 

Mr Atkinson’s comment:

Thank you for donating materials to help us with our ship building which we will be starting over the next couple of weeks. For our P.E. and outdoor learning lessons please refer to the school website and weekly round-ups for information regarding appropriate uniform/clothing.

Woodland dates are: November 14th, November 28th and December 12th.

Literacy and English

Mehr – This week we have starting learning how to write newspapers. We were challenged to created engaging headlines by using alliteration, include important information such who, what, where and when in the lead paragraph, draw a picture to match the topic and use a byline.

Eva – Before starting our writing we read both primary and secondary resources based on our Titanic topic. For the primary sources we read articles and journals of people who survived the sinking of the Titanic and then we read an information book on it. We used some of the comments from the passengers journals and quoted them in our newspapers to make it seem like we interviewed them. It was tricky but it made them more interesting to read!

Aarohi – In our Grammar lessons we explored past and present tense and the equivalent words. Some of us used our knowledge to correct a paragraph and put it into past tense.

Lewis – Using our knowledge from the writing lesson, we answered a range of comprehension questions on a newspaper article.

Numeracy and Maths

Chloe – This week my group started their new topic of function machines. This involve solving a calculation by following a rule.

Sara – Mr McMillan challenged us to solve a range of problem solving questions! Afterwards, we shared our strategies and discussed our answers.

Sophie – To finish our angle topic Mr Atkinson gave us a map with instructions from where to start and finish. We then had to apply our knowledge of angles, anti-clockwise and clockwise and compass directions to write down a route to get to the places. This was challenging as we had to carefully think about what direction we were facing and if the angle was acute, obtuse or a right angle.

Health and Wellbeing

Harley – For Remembrance Day we had a minute silence and Mr Atkinson explained the importance of it.

Sophia and Emma – With Mr McMillan in P.E. we completed a bleep test and went around different stations which will help to improve our fitness.

Eva – With Mr Atkinson we started our new gymnastics block. This week we were focusing on balances which involved performing both solo and partner balances. We were challenged to hold our balances for a certain amount of time and some of us modelled different types of warm-ups before we started and finished the lesson.

Alfie – As part of the P6 Growth Mindset series, we took part in a debate about whether Rebecca Adlington getting a bronze medal in the 2012 Olympics was a success or failure. We looked at a range of different newspaper articles from the time and felt like they did not give a positive image about it. Afterwards, we split into two teams and debated the issue. In the end we all agreed that making it to the Olympics, regardless of winning, is an achievement.

IDL

Alfie –  We created a diagram of the Titanic’s structure with a key and labelled and coloured the main sections.

Science

Retal, Ruairidh  and Lewis – This week the P5 pupils went to the science bus with Mrs Lamont. We learned about the different parasites farm animals can get and we discovered how scientists and vets check the health of sheep. We all have an amazing time!

Mr Atkinson’s comment:

It was great to meet with all the guardians and parents this week in person! Also thank you for returning jotters and the feedback forms.

Woodland dates are: November 14th, November 28th and December 12th.

Literacy and English

Aarohi – We all delivered group presentations of different types of ships from both the present and the past that we had researched. We also compared the similarities and differences of the ships to the Titanic. Mr Atkinson also assessed our talking and listening skills during the presentations and gave us feedback.

Kyler –  This week in comprehension we have been learning how to answer deductive questions from a story about children exploring an abandoned mansion. This challenged us to carefully read the text and draw conclusions from the information as well as use some of our own understanding.

Kate – With Halloween coming up, we wrote a spooky story which had to include lots of features that we have learned about this term including; senses related vocabulary, statements, commands, questions, speech marks and apostrophes to show possession.

Numeracy and Maths

Ruairidh – My group has been learning how to identify shapes with more that two lines of symmetry. First we drew lines of symmetry on a range of shapes and then we were challenged to create our own shapes with a certain number of lines of symmetry. To help check whether we had successfully done this we used mirrors to see whether they looked the same on each line.

Health and Wellbeing

Emma –  With Mr McMillan we continued complete our fitness circuits but also we played capture the flag at the end of the session.

Finlay – This week the primary 6 pupils had their first session of Heartsone with Mrs Nasar! We discussed that it doesn’t matter what you look like and that it is okay to be different as we are all individuals.

IDL

Sara – We have been learning about off the different types of classes that travelled on the Titanic and the facilities that were available to the passengers on board including a gym, swimming pool and barbers!

John – With the knowledge of the different rooms on the Titanic we worked in pairs to make our shoeboxes into the compartments. We then organised the boxes into the shape of the Titanic for our new display! Everyone had a great time building this!

Mehr – We read some books about some of the more famous passengers that travelled on the Titanic. Afterwards we designed and painted suitcase for our chosen passenger profiles to recreate a baggage hold.

Expressive Arts

Harley – Mrs Hutchison worked with us to create thank you cards for people that help and contribute to the school.

Mr Atkinson’s comment:

A selection of jotters, worksheets and workbooks have been sent home. Work from previous years can be kept at home but please return any work from P5/6 on Monday 31st as some of it will be further discussed at Parents Evenings. I am looking forward to meeting everyone next week.

Woodland dates are: October 31st, November 14th, November 28th and December 12th.

Literacy and English

Maya – Now that we have finished our class novel, we have been given our group books. For the next couple of weeks all the groups will be focusing on reading non-fiction texts.

Isla – On Friday Mr Atkinson gave us our weekly spelling test which revised some of the words we have been learning from the last couple of weeks.

Sara – For our writing this week we created mind maps based on a ship of our choice. Mr Atkinson taught us how to structure our mind maps by using a main topic, subtopics and coloured branches. Afterwards we used the Chromebooks to research different ships and then we took a note of the relevant information which we wrote in our mind map. Next week we are going to compare the information of our ships against the features of the Titanic.

Numeracy and Maths

Kyler – The primary 5 pupils have started learning about symmetry. First we drew lots of different shapes and then we had to identify how many lines of symmetry they had.

Harley – The primary 6 pupil have also started a new topic about angles! We have been using our knowledge of degrees, anti-clockwise, clockwise, and compass points to find the location of places. We also have started to learn about the different types of angles and their names.

Ruairidh – All the groups were challenged to use their mental maths strategies such as solving calculation that had different words for multiplying and dividing. Another strategy was how to solve tricky addition questions by separating a single digit so that the larger number can be rounded up to the nearest ten.

French

Aarohi – With Mr McMillan we were learning how to say the names of different countries in French!

Health and Wellbeing

Emma – In P.E. this week we started our new block of fitness. We went around different stations such as hurdles, skipping, ladder running and relay races – it was so much fun!

IDL

John and Alfie- We have started learning about our new topic, the Titanic! One of our tasks this week was to watch several information videos about the Titanic and take notes. Using our skills that we had been taught in our writing lesson, we then organised our notes into a mind map which we then shared and discussed with a partner.

Mr Atkinson’s comment:

This week the class finished their class novel, Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone and had the opportunity to watch the movie which they all thoroughly enjoyed. Our next IDL topic is a study on the Titanic and once again I would like to request if you have any spare shoe boxes it would be appreciated if they could be donated as the pupils would like to create a 3D model of the ship.

Woodland dates are: October 31st, November 14th, November 28th and December 12th.

Enjoy the October week everyone!

Literacy and English

Aarohi – After finishing the novel we watched the movie version of it whilst creating our story mountains.

Kyler – We created story mountains by working in teams. This activity challenged us to use a lot of different skills such as summarising and identifying the main events. We had to write a introduction covering the first couple of chapters, then list some of the build-up events, record the main problem in the story, explain how the main character resolved the issue and then write a short conclusion.

Ruairidh – In our writing we continued the story about discovering a dragon. In our paragraphs we were encouraged to use apostrophes to show possession.

Harley – Our last task was to create a Triorama which involved writing information about the plot of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone and explain as to what was our favourite event from the book was. 

Numeracy and Maths

John – To finish our area and area and perimeter we played online games which involved creating models of buildings.

Chloe – We have started solving division questions involving 3 digit numbers and carrying on.

French

Tia – With Mr McMillan we were learning how to say and write different places that you would come across in a town. Afterwards, we applied our new knowledge to draw and label our very own towns! For a challenge we wrote sentences in French describing the position of buildings to one another.

Health and Wellbeing

Retal – This week in basketball Mr Atkinson taught us how to do a layup and we practiced shooting from different positions around the basket. We also discussed the points system in preparation for playing some more matches in future weeks.

Expressive Art

Lewis – Before going to our outdoor learning session we drew plans of how we were going to construct Hagrid’s Hut. Some of us labelled our sketches and created keys to show what our colours and objects represented.

Isla – Working in teams, we drew our designs of our dragons which were inspired by our class novel. After drawing them we then created profiles listing their interests, strengths and talents. Finally, we selected materials to build them out of and then we presented our dragons to the class.

Outdoor Learning

Alfie – We were challenged to work in teams and build Hagrid’s Hut using materials from the woodland area and by using our plans that we had created in class.