The SSPCA visited P1-3 today and told us all about caring for animals. We learned that too much food is as bad as not enough food. We learned chocolate, grapes and raisins are poisonous to dogs. We need to brush their coats and cut their nails. Our pets need toys to play with to stop them getting bored. If our pets are ill, we have to take them to see the vet. Rescue Centres are good places to get new pets. They gave us a rubber and pencil at the end of their talk.
Our STEM Fortnight was launched on Friday at a whole school assembly, led by Mrs MacGregor, who has coordinated our events. Our guest speaker was Heather Reid MBE, (aka “Heather the Weather”) who was a BBC weather reporter and is a very clever meteorologist.
We have lots of STEM activities planned and lots of visitors coming in to our school. We also have a STEM Showcase evening on 21st March at 6pm – 7.30pm for pupils and parents, with lots of things to see and do.
Our activities will be on the blog. We are looking forward to it.
We finally saw the sun and the bitter wind had disappeared, so we got out to the pitch for a run. It is so good for us to get outside and get fresh air.
We had problem solving maths session today. We had to work together to discover who fell into different categories. We had big discussions with lots of children helping each other and it was a lot of fun.
We had great fun at the sponsored obstacle course today. We were exhausted after running, jumping, climbing and sliding.
We had a visitor in class to watch how we teach science in Primary 1 at Mearns Primary. She was very impressed with our work.
We looked at the properties of ice and why it melts and we even made it colder with adding salt. We made snowmen, looking at how compact ice and snow becomes solid and takes more time to melt.
We had to find ways to rescue the giant paper clips from the ice castles and some of the children tested that out.
Mrs Arbuckle used the digital microscope to look at the snow. It looked tiny crystals.
We looked at animals in the snow and how they survive the cold. The answer was blubber! We used the margarine to make “blubber gloves” so that it was easier to pick up the ice cubes, as our fingers were insulated with the “blubber”. It was great fun.
Well! Throughout my entire career, I have never had a snow day until now! I decided to prepare for some topical science lessons for next week and have got some snow bricks ready and sitting in my freezer. We will look at the properties of snow. ( How can snow be “ the wrong type of snow”? I left outside a container to see what happened to different items in freezing conditions, but I can’t find it now as it has been buried under the snow! The ice castles are also in the freezer ready to discover how to rescue the items inside them.
Ther are lots of things you can do at home too- write stories about the snow and their adventures in the snow; draw pictures about the snow; build snowmen and discover what happens in powder snow; go on Sumdog and Education City. ( Sumdog diaries are in the front of the Diary); read stories with an adult; take photos of the snow and best of all….. have fun in the snow!
Remember to wear snow boots / wellies when we return and for the children to have gloves, hats and scarves on as we will go outside for some outdoor learning in the snow. We will change into our gym shoes in class and let our wet things dry.
I look forward to seeing your stories and pictures.
Some ideas:
Photo from my house.
Photo from upstairs. I love the snowflakes patterns on the window.
I 
View from my hall window. I have never seen this happen before.
We love stories being read to us by Mrs Arbuckle. However, it is important to know that many people love to read too. We will be having Mystery Readers in class every Friday at 12pm.
Today, the fabulous Mrs McCann came to read to us. She is one of our brilliant classroom assistants and we see her friendly face in the playground too. She read ” Jonathan The Porcupine” by Cathie Gebhart and Chelsea Rae Meeker. Thank you Mrs McCann for coming along and sharing your story.
We are loving Sumdog in class. It is very clever and can change our level according to our ability. We have been learning to log on and all of our login details can be found in the front of our diaries.
Sometimes, though, there are technicical difficulties. If it happens, we just move on to other things. We recommend Scratch Junior ( coding), Education City and Nessy. We do put ICT learning in our homework programme. Mrs Arbuckle can see when we have been doing our homework and how long we have been doing it for. It’s amazing ( and brilliant) how many children do a quick Sumdog in the morning after breakfast just for fun!
Here we are on CBeebies to learn how to scroll and choose suitable learning games.
We visit the library every Thursday afternoon. Mrs Arbuckle scans our books, so we know who has what book. We need to remember to return our books. We have a look at the books and Mrs Arbuckle loves reading stories. We also love to share our books and show Mrs Arbuckle the words we know. 📚📚📚
