On Friday the 13^th we had Children in Need day where we dressed in the opposite way. You could dress for night time, be a baby, an adult, as a girl if you were a boy or  be a boy if you were a girl. We asked people to donate one pound for Children in Need. After donating a pound we hopefully had enough money to buy a Pudsey biscuit – 35p – at tuck. The pupil council collected all the money – and counted it. At the end of the day we raised a grand total of £678.90! We all enjoyed the experience and would like to do it again.

Cameron (Pupil Council, P6a)

PRESS RELEASE

Monday 16^th November 2015

 Netherlee Primary 6 pupils to grow seeds from space!

Pupils at Netherlee Primary School are preparing to become space biologists and embark on a voyage of discovery by growing seeds that have been into space.

In September, 2kg of rocket seeds were flown to the International Space Station (ISS) on Soyuz 44S where they will spend several months in microgravity before returning to Earth in March 2016. The seeds have been sent as part of Rocket Science, an educational project launched by the RHS Campaign for School Gardening and the UK Space Agency.

Netherlee Primary School will be one of up to 10,000 schools to receive a packet of 100 seeds from space, which they will grow alongside seeds that haven’t been to space and measure the differences over seven weeks. The pupils won’t know which seed packet contains which seeds until all results have been collected by the RHS Campaign for School Gardening and analysed by professional biostatisticians.

The out-of-this-world, nationwide science experiment will enable the pupils to think more about how we could preserve human life on another planet in the future, what astronauts need to survive long-term missions in space and the difficulties surrounding growing fresh food in challenging climates.

Miss Bell, a class teacher at Netherlee Primary says: “We are very excited to be taking part in Rocket Science. This experiment is a fantastic way of teaching our pupils to think more scientifically and share their findings with the whole school. Next April, we hope to plan an Astro Garden or a Table Top Greenhouse to provide quick growing, tasty crops to feed an astronaut.”

Rocket Science is just one educational project from a programme developed by the UK Space Agency to celebrate British ESA astronaut Tim Peake’s Principia mission to the ISS and inspire young people to look into careers in STEM (science, technology, engineering and maths) subjects, including horticulture.

Applications to take part in Rocket Science are still open and will close in March next year or until all packs have been allocated. Schools and educational groups can apply at rhs.org.uk/schoolgardening.

Follow the project on Twitter: @RHSSchools #RocketScience

– Ends –

By Zhi En Wong and Amy Watson

In Community Time we have been doing lots of things. Everybody is doing one of these activities -Knitting, orienteering, new sport, cooking, Spanish, coaching, japan, animation, unusual careers, urban myths and legends or Famous artists. Stuart Mckerlie did orienteering. Stuart says “I learnt how to use a compass point on a map, I enjoyed using the maps,” and Thomas Motler was doing New Sport he says, “I think it is good that we are learning new sports. I have learnt about curling and am going to learn about lacrosse next.”

By Thomas and Stuart

We have been learning about the Solar System. P1 have been learning about Night and Day and when they heard that we knew a lot about Space they wanted to ask us some questions. First of all they brought us a list of eight questions that they had. Then we each went in pairs to create a presentation to answer all of their questions. One of their questions was “Why are there holes on the moon?” We answered: because asteroids have crashed into the moon and made huge big holes. Most of the questions that they asked us we knew the answers to but some of them we needed the laptops to research. It was a bit tricky explaining them in a way they would understand.

Everybody who took part in the task met a primary one. They taught us some facts about the sun that we didn’t know. They told us that the sun’s temperature is 5,600 degrees, because it’s so hot it will burn us to death.

Everyone enjoyed this task they had lots of fun including the primary ones. We hoped you enjoyed reading this.

By Cara, Kasha and Ruby

P6a went on a trip to sky studio on Tuesday 1^st September to learn about making a news report about Mars!

We were split in to four teams and each person was given a job to do. First all the producers met and discussed what each groups report would be about. After that we went to our studios and then the producers told everyone about the report. Next we chose who played who and the scriptwriter made a script. Afterwards we began to rehearse followed by filming. It was a successful day for everyone and we got to take our identity tags and a copy of the film home on USB bangle!

Everyone had tons of fun but came out having learned something! Some people learned how to use a camera, some people learned how to edit, some people learned how to write a good script and some people learned how to act. We all learned about working as part of a team and listening carefully to each other. Everyone learned that making a video is not as easy as it looks.

By Julia and Anna

This is our first post in the P6 Blog. We are going to try and post more to keep you in touch with the work going on in our class. We hope you enjoy hearing what we’ve been up to.

In Art, Primary 6c have been creating a piece of artwork based on a famous artist called Katsushika Hokusai. The art piece is called The Great Wave.  First we were given a template of the wave that Miss Bell had for us. Next we extended the black lines to the edge and we then chose three beautiful shades of blue, light blue and dark blue to colour the wave. This was to help create depth in our painting. Then we designed the background with lovely watercolour paints and we did this by mixing warm and cool colours. After that we neatly dabbed on some white acrylic paint to make it stand out and look very realistic too.

On Wednesday 4th November we had Mandarin with a native Chinese speaker. She taught us how to have a short conversation in Mandarin. We also played a true or false game, to get to know her better and a game were you had to catch a cube shaped bean bag. If we caught it we would have a short conversation with her! Next week she will tell all of us our names in Mandarin.

On Friday 6th November we had a Judo lesson with Brian Long our Judo coach. He has recently fought against cancer. He taught us how to do a pin. Before we did that we all were given blue judo suits and some people were given belts.

Lastly, we had another visitor  in our class for French  called Matilde and she helped us with our French pronunciation of sports. In our booklets, we completed a task about people liking and disliking sports. Next, we started to learn about numbers in French and we played two games of bingo and the winners were Zak and Finn.

By Laura Cramb, Rhuaridh Mathieson and Connie Oberg (Bloggers) and Primary 6c.

On Tuesday 27th October Primary 6c and Primary 1b met in the atrium to share and answer each others questions about night and day. Primary 1b had prepared questions for us about the solar system. We used props to help us answer their questions.

Then we got into groups with them and showed them our art. We had used pastels to create planets in the solar system. We let them touch our art to feel the texture. One of the groups told them what the planets were called and had a competition to see who could name the planets first.

“We talked through the names of planets with the Primary 1’s. It actually helped me to understand facts better about the planets.” – Lauren

“I made a game to try to help the Primary 1’s understand the planets better.” – Joe

“We taught them some facts about the planets and then we played a quiz with them to help them remember their names.” Finn

“Myself and Eva allowed the younger pupils to feel the pastel texture on our art work. They enjoyed learning about the different colours of the planets.” –Laura

“One of the Primary 1 pupils told me lots of facts about Saturn! He had been drawing the planet at home.” – Eve

“It was so fun because it was great to share all our learning.” – Khadidja

“I really enjoyed the experience because I got to know more pupils in Primary 1.” – Amy

“I liked how the younger pupils wanted to touch the artwork, I told them all about blending!” – Kate

By Finlay McCulloch and Rose Williams (Bloggers)

The size and scale of the solar system

To learn about the size and scale of the solar system we took our learning outside. With the support of Mrs Buchanan, we calculated the distances between each planet. We divided the real distances by a thousand and then we scaled the metres to footsteps. For example our scale was: one m = one footstep.

In Art we used compasses to draw a perfect circle to represent the rocky planets and the gas giants. We talked about the real sizes of the planets and again made a scale that we could use. It was important that the diameter of a rocky planet was smaller than a gas giant. Then using different colours of pastels we blended colours together.

“With my ruler, I had to measure the radius of the planets.” – Tom

“Using a compass was a challenge but I overcame this the more I practised with it.” –Rhuriadh

“I enjoyed using the compass and I think I have learnt a new maths skill.” – Katie

“It was quite fun to use the compass but a little frustrating at the same time. My hand kept moving!” -Khadidja

“It was hard to use the compass at first but I soon became much better at it.” – Connie

An artistic and emotional response to Mars Bringer of War

In Music we listened to a piece of music called Mars Bringer of War by a composer named Gustav Holst. We used our emotions and thoughts about the music to create a piece of artwork.

“The music made me feel like I wanted to express my feelings. I used darker colours as the music got deeper.” –Imogen

“I felt that there was an actual war so I created strong patterns to show people running away.” – Eva.

“It made me felt quite nervous as the music was getting louder. I made bigger shapes as the music got louder.” – Aiden

“When the music played I felt like a Roman warrior. The rhythm of the drums helped me to create my artwork.” – Zak

“I felt anger listening to the loud music. I drew lots of different types of lines.” -Lauren

Sharing our learning with Primary 1

Today we used an area in the Innovation Space to find answers to some of Primary 1’s questions about night and day. We used books and laptops to carry out our research. We learned new facts and figures about stars including the sun! We are now looking forward to meeting the Primary 1’s and sharing our research with them.

By Lauren, Rebecca, Katie and Tomas(bloggers)and Primary 6c.

In Primary 6c, we use the ActivExpressions (Maths Pods) to practise our multiplication tables.  We use them so that we can improve on the recall speed of our multiplication tables. Each time we use the pods we try to beat the amount of questions we have answered from last time. At first we found them new and different to use but now we are experts!

“I think the atmosphere is very tense because everyone is concentrating.” – Tomas

“I like using the Pods because it is competitive.” – Rebecca

“I enjoy using the Pods because I think its improves my knowledge of the tables.” – Leeza

“I find the time limit a good challenge.” – Rose

“I like using the Pods because each week I can see my score improving.” – Connie

“I like using the Pods as it helps me to get better at my multiplication tables.” – Angus