Category Archives: -My Achievements

Transition Sports Day – Mearns Castle

June 8, 2016 Gayle Santi

Today, at Mearns Castle, we attended a Transition Sports Day. We took part in a variety of sports such as Rugby, Athletics and Bocce.

At the beginning, we were split into our houses: Ramsay, Wallace, Caledonia, Balmoral, Gleneagles and Sutherland. Then we went onto the pitch across the road to start with the activities.

We each took turns in each sport with other pupils from lots of different schools, this gave us a chance to make new friends and learn new skills.

To play bocce you had to split into two teams and one person rolls the white ball and then the other players have to try and get the coloured balls as close to the white ball as possible. Bocce is a Paralympic sport and we even had a champion Bocce player teaching us how to play.

We also played different types of athletics, this included relay races and javelin exercises. All coached by a coach from Giffnock North Athletics Club and S3 pupils.

When playing rugby we played three different games. The first one was rugby rounders, then we played five aside touch rugby and then regular touch rugby.

Today allowed us to try new sports that we will continue to learn when we are in high school next year. The coaches also reminded us about all the different opportunities for clubs we could join next year.

The idea behind today was to give us the opportunity to meet pupils from other schools that would be joining us next year. It gave us the chance to meet new friends so that when we go up to s1 we have people to talk to and lots more familiar faces. This makes the first few days starting a new school a little more exciting.

We’re looking forward to the Transition days next!

The Primary 7 Class

-My Achievements, Expressive Arts, festival, Religious and Moral Education

Yom Hasoah

May 16, 2016 Gayle Santi

It was recently Yom Hashoah and in order to commemorate this day, there was an event held at Giffnock Shul, which I as fortunate enough to attend. This day marks a day of remembrance for the people that died in the Holocaust. 2 school pupils lead the service and we had a Jewish male choir preforming. As the names of all those family members who had been killed were shown on the screen, a man played the violin. There were lots of clips from various Holocaust survivors and we had speeches from special guests, including Ben Helfgot, who is a very well known Holocaust survivor.

6 candles were lit for the 6 million Jews who had died in the War. Pupils from the school or the local area came up to light 5 candles and then the sixth candle was lit by Ben Helfgot, our special guest.

The theme of the evening was “from Poland to Windmere”, and his speech told us all about his story and his journey and how he feels about the Holocaust today.

Primary 7 had also been working on a project and had picked a person from the ‘Boys’ to commemorate and make a hand stitched tea towel that were all displayed in the Shul hall.

It was a special day to be a part of.

By Susie Tenby

-My Achievements, Expressive Arts, Literacy and English

Primary 7 Art Inspiration

March 30, 2016 Gayle Santi

Recently, the pupils in our class each presented a solo talk about a famous person who truly inspired us. It was great to hear the varied individuals that we each chose and why we found them inspirational in the first place.

Afterwards, we thought it would be a good idea if we made collages about our inspirational person, so that the rest of the school could see our work. We were to collect images, words, newspaper and magazine cut-outs all about our inspirational person. Then when we had all the cut-outs that we needed, we stuck them on to coloured board in the shape of something to do with our inspirational person. Later we put PVA glue on them so that they hardened permanently.

Finally, our teacher, Mrs Santi, put them on the wall proudly for the rest of the school to see and as a daily reminder to each of us about those people in the world or the past that inspire us to become better visions of ourselves.

By Josh Zeitlin

-My Achievements, Health and Wellbeing

Tennis in Primary 7

March 30, 2016 Gayle Santi

New topic in P.E

Tennis

In P.E we have started our new topic, Tennis. In tennis, for the last couple of weeks, we have been practicing forehand, backhand and serving. Luckily for our class, tennis coaches came in and gave us lots of tips at the start of our session. They taught us how to hold the racket and how to swing the properly. Everyone enjoyed the coaches coming in because it then helped them in our P.E lessons afterwards.

At the start, we were practicing running and walking around the hall balancing the ball on your racket while Mrs Santi gave different instructions we had to follow at the same time. This was definitely harder than it sounds. We learned about the stance we would need, where you stand on the balls of your feet and take tiny steps up and down.

We have been working with partners and having to hit the ball to them and they have to catch it. From the beginning of the block we have improved a lot in hitting the ball, catching the ball and throwing the ball. This has all hopefully helped with our hand/eye coordination. A lot of people now practice at home throwing a ball at a wall and then catching it with one or two hands.

In serving, we have gone with a partner and served the ball to them and they have to catch it. We have also been practicing the way we hit the ball and working on our precision and aim.

We have also learnt about rally’s, a rally is when you go with someone and hit the ball back and forth for as long as you can. Lilah Cowen was a big fan, “I believe that the tennis lessons have improved our skills”.

Look out for us at Wimbledon one day!

Rachel Jacobs

-My Achievements, Expressive Arts, Health and Wellbeing, Literacy and English, Numeracy and Mathematics, Technologies

Upper School Master Classes

March 22, 2016 Gayle Santi

The Primary Four, Five, Six and Seven classes have recently started Master Classes every Friday. Each one of the master classes will run for 4 weeks.

The classes consist of:

Film making
Sewing
Woodwork
Baking/cooking

Each class is led by one of the class teachers.

In Primary Seven, we have recently started Film Making with Mrs Santi. We have been given the challenge of creating a short film that will send a message to the viewers. This will then be shown to the rest of the school at one of our weekly assemblies.

We have completed projects like this in the past. Mrs Santi was able to show us some of the work from the project we did a few years ago, when we were all in Primary 3. One of the most helpful tips we picked up on was the importance of impact. We realised that sometimes the use of dialogue in a short film can take away from the message that the group are trying to share.

We chose groups to create our films with and with those groups we had to come up with a team name and a message for our film.

We then had to plan out where the scenes would be shot and what props would be needed. We carried this out in a similar way as we had [previously done in our writing lessons for Script-Writing.

Now we have completed practice scenes and watched them back to see would we could add in or take out, to help make our short film even better. The groups have also discussed if their short film will look realistic and if the characters are easy to play.

Overall the film making work shop will not only help with filming and editing skills, it will also help improve our dramatic acting skills too!

We have loved the Master Classes so far and look forward to trying the other ones. We have heard that the Primary Six class have been learning to sew and have been using their new skills to help them make things like puppets.

In Primary Five, they are learning about woodwork and have been using their new skills to make bird houses. This sounded really interesting. First of all they planned out the design and structure of their bird house and then cut their wood to be a fitting size, they are soon to move on to actually building their bird houses.

Finally, in Primary Four, they have been learning about cooking and baking skills. So far they have made savoury things like cheese scones and pizzas. Then they have also made sweet things, like flapjacks. I am extremely excited to learn all these new skills that I have never tried before.

By Madeline Friel

-My Achievements, Literacy and English, Numeracy and Mathematics

Problem Solving in Primary 7

March 22, 2016 Gayle Santi

Primary Seven’s Problem Solving

In Primary Seven we decided that we would like to update our Numeracy and Mathematics wall with a brand new Problem Solving display.

We didn’t take this challenge on lightly. We each came up with some challenging problems for our classmates to solve. Some questions involved acting out the situation and others involved some difficult calculations. They all involved a lot of brainpower. We made sure that we were using our problem solving skills to complete these questions.

We split into our maths groups: Red, Blue and Green, and answered the question that someone in our group had come up with. We also made some very eye-catching posters and symbols of our learning.

This activity helped us show our understanding of all the problem solving skills that we had learned throughout our time in Primary 7. Now all of our posters, questions and answers are up on the primary seven wall, we even colour coded them to make it easy to match them up! We are all proud of what we have done and we can’t wait to continue to improve our knowledge of problem solving. We think it might get even more challenging in High School.

I asked Iman what she thought about the Problem Solving activity:

“I think that it was a fun activity and I enjoyed completing other people’s questions to see what they came up with.”

By Lilah Cowen.

-My Achievements, Health and Wellbeing

Football Tournament…the sequel

March 22, 2016 Gayle Santi

East Renfrewshire Football Festival

Coming up shortly, is the East Renfrewshire Football Festival. Sadly, last time, Calderwood were not very successful. However, we are adamant to try our hardest and prove ourselves at the tournament as worthy opponents.

Personally, I am extremely excited, as I love playing football whenever and wherever possible and I am definitely sure my teammates are equally as eager to play and perform to their best level.

At the tournament, we will have some Primary Fives, Primary Sixes and Primary Sevens playing in our team.

In Calderwood, we are counting on our best players to help others to become better at football. It is a great opportunity for people, as some schools may have pupils who aren’t the most avid players. This means that these pupils can experience something new and it may turn out they enjoy it more than they thought they would.

There may be some tough competition, but I feel that Calderwood are ready for the games. Especially for a school that doesn’t have a proper team and does not participate in training. I believe that Calderwood can improve and develop our skills and efforts from last time.

Calderwood Lodge definitely have the ability to win, which is very important. Football comes with a great deal of sportsmanship and teamwork which are two aspects of our team which we possess.

Wish us luck!

By Freddie Hyman

-My Achievements, Health and Wellbeing

The Muddy Mile

March 22, 2016 Gayle Santi

The Muddy Mile

On Sunday the 20^th of March, I travelled with my family to Craufurdland Castle, to take part in the Muddy Mile.

Although I was 15 minutes late, I was still able to run. My little sister Albie, who is in Primary 2, ran with me. The others were already ahead of us because they had started earlier than we had.

At the start of the mile, my sister and I kept saying that we didn’t think it was really that muddy. However, we then came to a big patch of mud and it was really quite deep! Not as deep as some of the ones we were about to come up against. My little sister’s shoe even came off in one of the puddles, so I ended up holding her shoes the whole way around.

We came to a swamp where they had to have somebody there to help you across because it was so deep. It wentall the way up to my neck.

When we crossed the swamp we went through very thick mud and I got stuck in the middle of it, but thankfully Albie helped me out.

I was very proud of myself and also I had carried my sister most of the way so I was extremely tired. I ran to the finish line and was given a treat bag and met up with the rest of the Calderwood Lodge Team. We got a picture taken with Mrs Carlton, which I will put up here once we get a copy of it.

Well done to all the Calderwood Lodge Muddy Mile runner. We will all be wearing our t-shirts proudly!

By Lyla Gaizely-Gardiner

-My Achievements, Class Trip, Expressive Arts, Literacy and English, Religious and Moral Education, Technologies

Yom Hashoah

March 22, 2016 Gayle Santi

The Yom Hashoah Project

The Primary 7 class has been working on a project led by Mrs Hyman (Freddie’s mum!). We were all given the task of going away and creating our own ICT collages based on a person who lived through World War II.

We have been learning about Ben Helfgott and ‘the boys’. Many of the people that we have chosen to work on were children in the Holocaust and separated from their families. Many now live in the U.K and we have looked at and learned a little about what their lives are like now.

With the people we have chosen, we have selected pictures and words that link to them and help people to learn more about them.

When we had all finished our collages, we had them printed on to fabrics which are now going to be sewn onto a cloth which we will keep, as a pillow or a tea towel.

Our collages will also be shown at an event for people to see them. Ben Helfgott is also going to be coming to the Yom Hashoah event at Giffnock Synagogue to speak. He was actually in the Olympics as a weightlifter and even won a gold medal!

In these lessons with Mrs Hyman, we have put colour on to the cloth to brighten it up, we have also been stitching the fabric into the cloth and some of us were just learning how the stich.

The people we have chosen, we have picked because there was something about them or their story that stood out to us and inspired us.

By Susie Tenby

-My Achievements, Latest News, Literacy and English

Class Debate

February 15, 2016 Gayle Santi

In Primary Seven, we have been working on our debating skills. We were challenged by Mrs Santi to think of a debate spontaneously. We were given ten seconds to think of a topic. We voted on which topic we should then debate on and the final decision lay between:

This house believes that there should be more toys for the Calderwood Lodge playground

and

This house believes that animals kept in captivities such as zoos, should be encouraged.

The final verdict was to debate on animals being kept in captivity. We were divided into two sides where we were given fifteen minutes to come up with points and information without any prior research.

It was a challenging activity to think of information and points to persuade people to agree with our thoughts. We felt pressurised but we were developing our confidence levels at the same time. We had to work well together and make sure we were communicating properly to avoid people saying the same things.

In the end, the opposing team won.

It was very fun but quite a challenging activity. It helped us to understand the format of debates and what skills we still need to develop. We would like to do it again so we can continue to improve. Mrs Santi was able to give us constructive criticism and pointers, so next time we will be even more prepared.

By Freddie and Lilah