We started learning about enterprise this week and we used a programme by Virgin called “Make £5 Grow.”

We are raising money for our trip to Amsterdam which we are all extremely excited about. Mrs Fraser split us into groups of three & four and these are the groups that we will be working with throughout the project. Currently we are coming up with ideas for a product that we are going to sell to the school later. The class all talked about the qualities you need to have to be a good entrepreneur. Here are some of the skills that we came up with: teamwork, creativity, problem solving, negotiation, adaptability, Decision-making skills etc.

In the playground we played a game that helped to develop our teamwork skills. If there were four people in a group, we would have five hoops. The team had to use only the hoops to move down to the bottom of the hill. We were not allowed to stand on the concrete outside of the hoops. The team to get to the bottom of the hill and back up again were the winners.

Last week it was PURIM!

Every year everyone in our school dresses up for PURIM!

This year there were some amazing costumes and the teachers theme was hilarious! The teachers theme this year was EMOJIIS!

In the morning we all gathered in the hall and we sang PURIM Songs.  Then we showed off our costumes to the other classes. After the costume parade Rabbi Rubin came in with a phenomenal CAT COSTUME! When he walked through the door everyone laughed.

After that we all went back to our classrooms and the Primary Seven’s hosted some fun activities. There were eight activities altogether:

• Story Telling & Refreshments
• Mask Making
• Mishloch Manot
• Active Games
• Quiz
• Drama Station
• Colouring / Games
• Dancing

Everyone enjoyed the great activities and it was lots of fun. The Primary Sevens also enjoyed hosting the activities. To top it off we just wanted to say…

HAPPY PURIM!!

This week Mrs Fraser taught us about facts and opinions. We made adverts in our groups of 4-6 people. We performed them in front of the class and they had to recognise the facts and opinions in our advert posters.

One group created a Virtual reality book. The people in that group were Oliver, Zainab, Leah and Daniel .D .They changed the lyrics of Shout Out to my Ex by Little Mix.

Another group created a phone called the Holo Phone. In their group there was Pippa, Daniel .S, Elyze, Rachel and Ilya. Some of the words to their song:

It’s the Holo phone

You’ll want it for your own

Its totes amaze

It’s the newest craze.

Another group with Ben, Abi, Aisha, Saba, Hannah and Gideon created a car which had a hot tub in it and went so fast and had seats that massaged you.

The last group were Lana, Sergei and Talia. They made an advert on an ice-cream that can change colour. They even made up their own website name rainbowice-cream.org. On the website you can create your own ice-cream.

By Daniel + Pippa.

Last week Dean came into our classroom, however, we had to call him Captain Manning! He brought a lot of exciting equipment and laid it on the desks for us to look at and wear.

We also had to dress up as evacuees. An evacuee was a child from WWII who was evacuated from the city to the countryside because the city was no longer safe for them.

On one of the tables there were tinned and rationed food that people ate during WWII. Anything could be rationed such as materials and food. The reason for rationing was because the ships that delivered food and materials over the sea were most likely to get bombed.

On another table there was German and British battling equipment such as bombs, bullets, rifles. There was also toiletries such as newspaper for toilet roll and grooming equipment.

On the third table there was a lot of information about jobs and there was some magazines, identity cards and laminated sheets with information.

On the last table there was gas masks, hard helmets and costumes that we could try on.

Near the end of the day parents were invited to come so we did a few activities. First we went out and tried to hose down an incendiary bomb but sadly it wasn’t real!  Next we went into the hall to make some noise with the air-raid siren. The air-raid siren was to inform people to quickly go to the air-raid shelter due to the bombing.  The air-raid siren was really loud imagine being in WWII!  Lastly we sang some songs called the ‘Ovaltineys’ and ‘Run Rabbit.’

WE HAD GREAT FUN!!!

BY SABA AND ZAINAB

This week we started our mandarin class with our new mandarin teacher, Miss Ji. We started to revise some of the words that we have already done in our previous years of learning this unique language.

The first thing we went over were some basic words like hello (Nǐ Hǎo), how are you, (nǐhǎo ma), I am very fine, (wǒ hěn hǎo), thank you, (xiè xie) and goodbye (zài jiàn). After this part of the lesson we started to focus on the numbers one to ten using a song online to help us: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2eLP3FuuEVs.

The numbers in order went like this: yī / 一 – one, èr / 二 – two, sān / 三 – three, sì / 四 – four, wǔ / 五 – five, liù / 六 – six, qī / 七 – seven, bā / 八 – eight, jiǔ / 九 – nine and finally,  shí / 十 – ten. The last thing we did in this lesson was go over the colours, the ones that we went over are the following: white – lán sè, yellow – huáng sè, green – lǜ sè, red – hóng sè, orange – chéng sè, black – hēi sè, purple – zǐ sè and grey – huī sè.

We will be having more mandarin lessons over the next 4 weeks and we are all excited to learn more.

By Oliver and Talia

A few Fridays ago, a lady called Mrs McInnes who is a journalist visited our class. She taught us some interview skills because we are part of a team who are creating a transition magazine for our cluster. Primary 7 have been given the task to interview the Head Teacher, the head boy and head girl, the head of Science and Home Economics and some S6 pupils.

Firstly she taught us how to keep the interviewee engaged in the questions that we were asking. Then she asked us to create questions for our shoulder partners so we could practice. After that she made us come up with a criteria for the questions. The criteria we picked was “How Well Do You Know Your School?”. Lastly we thought of some questions to ask the teachers and pupils at Mearns Castle. Our class really enjoyed having Mrs Mcinnes come into to our class, to talk about interviews.

Here are some questions we came up with:

• What has been your most embarrassing moment in your entire school life in Mearns Castle?
• What were the punishments when you were naughty in school?
• How many pupils are there in Mearns Castle?

By Elzye and Hannah

Today we practised the provost debate. The motion is, should children be allowed social media.

Elyze is the chair person and Pippa, Talia and Sergei are the media.

We moved all of the tables and chairs in the classroom into a horse shoe shape and sat round it.

The debate is going to take place at Eastwood House on Monday.

Mr Fry came in to help us with whose saying what and when they’re saying it.

WISH US LUCK!!!!!

By Talia and Sergei

Last Wednesday was the P6 and 7s Burns supper. There was loads of dancing, singing and poems. Dances included: The Dashing White Sergeants by P7 and Strip The Willow By p6 as well as P7s recital of Address To The Toothache By Robert Burns. The first verse, recited by Oliver, goes like this:

My curse upon your venom’d stang,

That shoots my tortur’d gums alang,

And thro’ my lug gies mony a twang,

Wi’ gnawing vengeance,

Tearing my nerves wi’ bitter pang,

Like rackin’ engines!

It was also translated into English by Daniel Dotan:

My curse upon your venomous sting,

That shoots my tortured gums along,

And through my ear gives many a twinge,

With gnawing vengeance,

Tearing my nerves with bitter pain,

Like rocking engines!

All our parents were invited to the supper and after Oliver and Flora’s presentation they were served haggis, neeps and tatties and a glass of IRN BRU. All of us wore something Scottish, like some tartan clothing or a piece of tartan ribbon around the girls hair or a Scottish style tie. Oliver and Sergei both wore kilts! Another Poem called Tae A Bottle flip was recited by Sergei and Daniel Tatarenko and it was about how teachers HATE the bottle flip!

The parents, at the end, were told to look at the p6 and 7s artwork to celebrate Burns Night. The artwork consisted of Kilts by P6 and a painting of Robert Burns by P7.  The painting of Robert Burns was special because each part of the sixteen piece painting was done by a different person, which had a pretty nice effect!

By Daniel Dotan and Oliver

Last Thursday, Sally from the Scottish SPCA came into talk to us about how to help wild animals in Scotland and to report any cruelty to animals with the number 03000 999 999.

At first we played a game at our tables and it was about animal knowledge. It was similar to Trivia Pursuit  but it was the animal edition.

We then watched a video clip about animals and wildlife that had been brought into the Scottish SPCA to be cared for. A women talked about how she was caring for three baby dears because they had been abandoned at the side of the road.

After that we did a quiz to test our knowledge and all got a prize. The prizes were: a bumper sticker with a paw on it, a sharpener with a hedgehog on it and a goldfish sticker.

We all loved seeing and learning about the animals.