This has been a busy month for Primary 6b.

Social Studies/ICT/Art

We have been developing our research and enquiry skills through the creation of Sway presentations on earthquakes and tsunamis linked to our Social Studies topic on ‘Natural Disasters’. We have been learning all about the earth’s layers and how earthquakes are caused when rock underground suddenly breaks along a fault line and releases energy. Olivia said, ‘I have been working on my note-taking skills when searching for information on the internet,’

This month we have all been awesome achievers by working hard on developing our entrepreneurial skills when planning for our Dragons’ Den event. Both Primary 6 classes have worked extremely hard in linking our knowledge and skills from different areas of the curriculum. The Dragons’ Den enterprise activity has enabled us to work co-operatively to share our ideas and show case our communication, creativity and leadership skills. Phoebe said, ‘I have worked really hard on my team work skills and enjoyed presenting to the Dragons.’

Our four qualifying teams presented their sales pitches to two Parent Council members and Mr Lawson. They all did such a fantastic job that all teams were successful in securing funding to make their winning designs.  Please look out for our finished products which will be on sale at our annual Christmas Fair on Saturday November 24th.

Science

We have just started our new Science topic on ecosystems and have been learning how plants and animals interact and depend on each other in different habitats. We have learned to make food chains and food webs to show these interactions and can now identify producers, primary consumers and secondary consumers in various food chains. Dougal said, ‘I now know that producers are at the beginning of a food chain.’

Health and Wellbeing

In HWB, as part of Dyslexia Awareness Week, we watched various presentations and animations on dyslexia and learned all about the different strategies that dyslexic children use to help them overcome their difficulties. We designed our own information posters to highlight the important facts associated with dyslexia.

We also enjoyed the Decco comic workshop which enabled us to think carefully about our own learning and loved creating our own comic strips and drama scenarios demonstrating our ideas, thoughts and feelings.

French

We have been learning to recognise and recall zoo animal in French. We have also been learning the vocabulary to say which animals we like and don’t like, for e.g. j’aime les éléphants (I like elephants) and Je n’aime pas les crocodiles (I don’t like crocodiles).

 Awesome Achievements

As well as developing our learning at school we have been very busy achieving lots outside of school. Iain has been very busy this month and has represented the school in football and athletics. Iain said, ‘I showed stamina in my athletics to keep going and do a sprint finish.’

Amy has been developing her literacy skills by completing Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. She said, ‘I have enjoyed reading over the years and will continue to read more books in my own time.’

Literacy and Numeracy

Our learning in these areas will draw upon the contexts listed above but will differ according to the needs of each class / group. Your support with consolidation of core learning through homework activities will be very beneficial to our children.

This has been a busy, productive but enjoyable month for Primary 6b.

We have particularly enjoyed participating in Maths Week Scotland. We learned how maths is employed in various jobs and thoroughly embraced the challenge of a variety of practical maths activities. We learned to use our problem-solving skills and collaborate as a team when embarking on the aluminium architectural challenge. We had to work co-operatively to design the sturdiest and tallest freestanding tower using tin foil. We also enjoyed having Mr Serafini, a P2 parent, visit our class to talk about his job as a banker. We enjoyed learning all about the world of finance, including the importance of saving and budgeting.

In Social Studies, as part of our Natural Disasters topic, we have been developing our note-taking and research skills and have used Microsoft Publisher to create our own structured information leaflets. Iain said, ‘I have learnt all about hurricanes and how they can form and the different categories there are.’

In Art, we have been learning all about monochromatic colour to make different shades.  We used different painting techniques to create a tsunami picture inspired by the work of Japanese artist Hokusai.

We have been motivated by our French lessons and have been working hard to read and demonstrate understanding of French vocabulary linked to our mini-topic on animals.

In PE, we have been developing our skills in team games.  We have been working hard in perfecting our passing and shooting skills in both netball and hockey. We have also been developing our leadership skills by undergoing Playzone training.  We have been working closely with Craig Gordon, East Renfrewshire’s Active School Co-ordinator, culminating in us leading playground games with our younger children over the coming weeks. Zara said, ‘Playzone training has enabled me to work with my classmates better and helped me with my talking and listening skills.’

We have also been busy preparing for our Inclusion Service on October 11^th. We have been writing our own poetry and learning all about the importance of embracing diversity. We hope to see you all at Orchardhill Church at 1:15pm.

 Literacy and Numeracy

Our learning in these areas will draw upon the contexts listed above but will differ according to the needs of each class / group. Your support with consolidation of core learning through homework activities will be very beneficial to our children.

Here’s an update on what P5B have been learning and what we’ll be focusing on.

Olivia reports, “We’ve been learning about the Scottish Wars of Independence.  So far we have learned about the death of King Alexander III and the selection of John Balliol as king with King Edward I of England as Overlord of Scotland, the creation of the Auld Alliance when Scotland and France refused to join England in battle against each other.”  “After King Alexander III died, Margaret Maid of Norway became queen but on her journey to Scotland she fell ill and died,” recalls Phoebe.

Izaan says “I’m looking forward to learning about when King Edward gets angry when he finds out about Scotland refusing to battle France.”  “I want to find out what happens when Scotland and England battle,” says Finn.  Kate is interested in discovering more about the Battle of Bannockburn and Noah is curious as to whether William Wallace will feature in any battle.  Through this focus, P5B are developing their awareness of significant figures and events from the past and their influence on the future.

Scott has found it interesting and fun learning about Figurative Language, especially alliteration, and is looking forward to learning about other types and spotting examples when he is reading.  “I have learned to regularly use similes successfully throughout my writing,” adds Phoebe.

Chloe says, “I enjoy using the Communication Code as everybody has their turn to speak and I like having questions to think about and share our ideas on.  My favourite discussion so far was on what time the school day should start!”  Kate would like to discuss whether it is acceptable to keep dolphins in captivity or if they should only be in the wild.

We have been creating persuasive texts about Scottish landmarks.  “We have been working on using wow words, figurative language and bossy verbs to persuade,” reports Sherwan.  Lucy is excited to create her own imaginative text, inspired by the Wars of Independence, featuring soldiers and weapons.  Olivia reflects that “I can regularly and successfully use persuasive language throughout a text.”

Ruby recently enjoyed measuring playground items to find their perimeter and area and would like to do more of this, selecting what to measure herself and says “I feel like now I can always confidently measure  perimeter but am still developing my skills in measuring area.”  Zara is keen to learn more about algebra as she did some work on this in P3 and enjoyed it.  In our number talks work Olivia and Corey enjoyed learning the grid method and found this an easy way to multiply.  Kate prefers long multiplication but enjoys learning lots of different strategies then choosing the best strategies to find a solution accurately.

Emma says “We made calm jars for when we feel angry or stressed and we can shake it and it will relax you.  I find my one really relaxing, it’s not entertaining because that would be distracting, instead it helps to make you calm.”  “I think the calm jars are really good and I would also like to make a stress ball,” added Scott.  We will go on to learn about  food and hygiene and Taha is keen to learn how to tell when meat like chicken is cooked properly because if it’s still raw he knows you could get sick.  Finn knows that you can get food poisoning and would like to learn how to avoid this.

Chloe has enjoyed doing gymnastics as she has been able to share her skills and experience with others.  Leena enjoyed using the equipment, especially when she had to do a balance on top of the table and Amy enjoyed doing forward rolls on the horse.  Iain is excited to work on his badminton skills because “It’s really energetic and the racquet is more powerful than you think.”  Others would also like to try out some hockey, volleyball and netball.

Billy is enjoying our science topic, Materials, because “It’s fun to mix different materials and time how long it takes for a substance to dissolve.”  Emma would like to experiment by dissolving other materials and would like to learn more about rusting by putting a nail in a variety of substances.

Andrew tells us “I enjoyed researching internet safety and creating a PowerPoint to develop my presentation skills and share my learning,” and Abdullah is keen to develop his coding skills further while Izaan would like to create more PowerPoints.

Judah has enjoyed creating his own monster and describing it in French.  Zara is enjoying learning how to introduce family members in French and would like to learn how to order food and drinks at a French café.

Awesome Achievements

Well done Corey for showing commitment to her new dancing class where she is developing her dance skills and confidence.  Congratulations to Noah and Oscar who performed their first live gig playing their instruments!  And well done Kate who has been really responsible at home helping looking after their new family pet, Zoe the puppy!

Article 29: You have the right to education which develops your personality, respect for other’s rights and the environment.

P5B Class Blog December 2017

Our Fairtrade focus has now come to an end and we have been reflecting on what we’ve learned.  Needless to say everyone thoroughly enjoyed organising and running our Fizz Boom Fairtrade stall.  “By being a cashier we learned how to calculate people’s change,” said Finn.  Leena enjoyed being a sales adviser and using descriptive language to promote the products on sale to our customers.  Maya pointed out that they also developed their social skills through working together as a team and interacting positively with customers to ensure they were informed about the products, costs and where to pay.  Everyone was delighted with our final sales total of £1155 and our profit of £265 which was donated back to Fairtrade to support the work of the charity.

Sherwan, amongst others, has enjoyed learning more about figurative language.  So far we have focused on alliteration and onomatopoeia.  We have noticed lots of great examples while listening to our class novel, The Christmasaurus.  We have also been working hard on developing our skills in answering comprehension questions.  We have been practising taking time to read questions thoroughly; identifying key words and ensuring our answers come directly from the text, using our skimming and scanning skills to locate important information.

Corey is enjoying our work in Numbertalks where we have been developing a growth mindset while learning a range of multiplication strategies.  “I’ve learned that sometimes when you start to learn a new strategy it can feel like a snowstorm in your head.  Then as you do more it starts to settle down and when it has all settled you feel confident with the new strategy.”  Finn is finding the gird method easy to get to grips with and useful in solving larger multiplication problems.

We made 3D shape snowmen recently.  Hannah wasn’t sure what a shape net was before, “Now I know that a net is when the 3D shape is flattened out and you can see the shapes within it when it’s flat.”

All have enjoyed developing their coding skills through using Kodu to create a programme of instruction for a game.  Sumdog continues to be a popular way to develop a wide range of skills in Numeracy and Mathematics.

A huge thank you to Mrs Ali who came into class to teach us about Georges Seurat and Pointillism recently.  We enjoyed learning about how the artist developed and how colours can be blended using pointillism.  The children’s own pictures were very successful in creating new colours simply by printing the primary colours close together.  Dougal also enjoyed using clay to make Christmas tree decorations.

Phoebe though another fun activity was Superchair where we learned how to use mime to create a character and use objects for imaginative purposes, such as a chair as a telephone!

Awesome Achievers

Thanks to all those who have returned their completed booklets with their November achievements.  Recent accomplishments include caring for ill family members, learning new skills in skiing, taking increasing care over looking smart for school, coming second in the senior talent contest (Well done Scott!) and earning a medal in MMA.  Well done P5B!

P5B Class Blog November 2017

We have been exploring the topic of healthy eating lately, revisiting the main food groups and finding out more about their benefits.  Dougal:  “We discussed what the word DIET means and learned that it has various meanings such as what you normally eat, or eating a restricted selection of food for medical reasons, personal choice (such as vegetarianism) or for religious reasons.”

We started our new topic on Fairtrade with a visit from Josh from Rainbow Turtle in Paisley who told us lots about what Fairtrade is and does and how much work is involved before things like chocolate bars reach supermarket shelves.   Finn: “We know that when we buy Fairtrade products the workers get paid a fair wage.”   Olivia:  “We drew the Fairtrade symbol and noted what each part represents.”  Phoebe:  “We put pictures of the journey from Cocoa seed to chocolate bars in shops into order.  We learned what cocoa pods and beans looked like and how much work was involved in the process.”

Through our research into animal adaptations the children have developed their skills in recognising how animals are equipped  to survive, how to use search words to locate the information required, how to take notes using headings and key words only, how to organise information into logical sections and how to transfer information into your own words.  They have used their ICT skills to present their findings using Sway, a new presentation app that everyone is enjoying using.  Maya: “We had a homework task to design an animal to survive on an imaginary planet to show what we have learned about how animal adaptations help them survive.”  Leena:  “We have been researching animals online to find out about animal adaptations and have put the information into a Sway document.”  Billy: “We are learning how to use Sway.  We know how to put images into it and text.”  Andrew:  “We can also make a picture stack.”

We have some keen actors in our class who have enjoyed our recent drama activities to develop skills in creativity and expression.  Noah:  “We have been enjoying doing some action songs such as Boomchikaboom.”  Ruby:  “We made up plays about how to deal with negative situations to help us when this happens in our own lives.”

We have been developing our French vocabulary to include parts of the body, including reading and writing texts.  Iain:  “We made monsters and labelled their body parts in French then wrote a description.”  Zara:  “This activity helped us to develop our knowledge of the French words for parts of the body.”

To conclude our Blob book study we all took part in a hotseating activity.  This helped to develop skills in interpreting information given about characters in texts.  The children completed character studies then had to answer questions from the class as that character.  Amy:  “We got into groups and were given a character from Blob.  We took turns sitting in the ‘Hot Seats’ and had to answer questions as our character.  I thought it was really fun.”

Through our work in Numeracy and Mathematics we have been exploring concepts including measuring length, time, and multiplication strategies.  Izaan:  “I’ve learned how to measure in mm and cm.  You have to be very exact because mm are so small.  I’m really confident with it now.”  Andrew: “I’ve been learning more about telling the time and finding information on calendars.  It was really tricky to begin with but now I understand it.”  Iain: “I’ve enjoyed learning about equilateral and isosceles triangles.  I feel confident in identifying them and describing their properties.”  When introduced to the long multiplication strategy, some pupils found it very tricky on their first attempt, but showed a remarkable jump in confidence during the second lesson.  Scott:  “We’ve all been learning how to do long multiplication.  It’s fun and helps make tricky calculations easier.”  We also worked in mixed groups to discuss problems and share our knowledge of the strategies we have been learning.  Abdullah:  “We got into groups and chose a calculation then had to show all the different strategies we could use to solve it.”

Awesome Achievements

Izaan is really proud that he achieved a place on the St Cadoc’s football team.  Sherwain is proud to have started piano lessons and is looking forward to learning his first song.  Chloe and Natalie are excited to be learning how to perform an aerial (no handed cartwheel) on the beam at gymnastics.  And Abdullah is now able to hold his breath underwater for 20 seconds, helping him to complete underwater swimming challenges.

Article 13: You have the right to find out things and say what you think, through making art, speaking and writing unless it breaks the rights of others.

Article 29: You have the right to education which develops your personality, respect for other’s rights and the environment.

April has been an exciting month for a variety of achievements in Primary 4b.

Children in the class have been very busy developing their fitness skills in clubs and with their families.

We have been improving our physical fitness by jumping higher on a trampoline and can run the junior park run in sub 9 minutes.   Some of our pupils can now swim 400 meters in the pool. Our gymnastic skills are near perfection and can now do walkovers, straight back somersault off bars, front somersaults onto the floor and a round off straight back somersault.  We have improved our tumble pass in cheerleading and have been learning to ski and snowboard.  Our aiming skills have improved by playing darts.  We have been learning to play musical instruments such as the guitar and we’ve been helping at parties and around the house.  In April our goalkeeping skills and numeracy skills improved too.

Primary 4b continue to celebrate awesome achievements. Our pupils have been helping family members when they were unwell. We can perform double back flips on the trampoline and a round off half twist. We have competed in cheerleading competitions and finished on the podium. Our karate skills have improved as a result of training and gradings. We have been getting better at basketball, scoring baskets and using one hand to pass. We are super active and have been learning to swim and setting new records on our park run!

Primary 4b have had the luxury of two teachers to start 2017. Miss Hannah has joined Mr Thomson in class. We have been hard at work in Numeracy and Literacy as well as Health and Wellbeing.

The pupils have been celebrating their IDL topic, Carnival of the Animals.  The pupils made masks, endangered animals posters and fact files.  The class have loved using gymnastics as a context for promoting confidence, balance and control. Taha performed a hand stand in gymnastics and outside of school Oscar moved up two groups in swimming lessons.  Maya can ride her bike.  Noah is now a master at FIFA 17 while Phoebe was awarded with three certificates and medals for passing her dance exams.  She said, “I am happy because I am good at dancing and getting medals was a nice reward for all my hard work.”

We are looking forward to our new topic Knights and Castles.

Judah and Andrew match multiplication and division calculations.

There have been many achievements in P4b this month.

Our class has been learning how to do front flips on the bars, hand stands, round offs and forward rolls in gymnastics. Some pupils took their gymnastic skills into the swimming pool!

A couple of pupils took part in family celebrations and helped their parents with the shopping.

We looked after little brothers and sisters.

Pupils have been skipping in the playground. 159 is a class record! Some pupils made their own Halloween costumes all by themselves.

Martial Arts, Running and Swimming have featured heavily at the centre of our class’s pupil achievements. Some pupils are getting better at ‘Keepy Uppies’. Many of our pupils are being awarded with the prestigious Pupil of the Week award in class. Charity work has also been an achievement in Primary 4b.

In PE the pupils have been developing rhythm and timing in basketball demonstrating multi directional speed with control.   “I can bounce the ball between both my hands” said Judah.

In Science we have been studying electrical circuits and collaborated in an experiment by making an electrical circuit using a battery, crocodile clips and outputs such as a fan, light bulb and buzzer. Noah said, “I found it fun because we got to experiment with our friends.”