Monthly Archives: February 2014
A letter from Theresa Green . . .
This morning when the post arrived we were delivered a letter from a local resident, Theresa Green. As you can see she’s heard that we’re a group of hardworking superstars who work excellently in a team. She asked us if we’d like to build a park in our local area.
We were so excited to get the letter. We worked as a class to create a letter of reply. Jayden J told us that ‘accept means saying yes’. Charlotte and Emma reminded us that we worked well as a team when we built the castle and Nessie for our classroom. Poppy had a fabulous suggestion saying that we want to make Theresa proud. We all signed our names. Because she only lives along the road, Mrs Fraser delivered our reply after break time.
After lunchtime Mrs Smith delivered a letter that she received during the afternoon post. We found out that Theresa has asked us to create the park on a field close to Lochardil. We went to investigate the areas next to the school from the school fence. Mia suggested it was important to go and visit where we are building, before creating our plan.
After visiting the site we came back to the class to begin our plan. Mackenzie told us it was important that we had a plan or we wouldn’t know what to do. We worked together to create four different areas for our park. We’re going to have a play park, a duck pond a field and a flower garden.
During the rest of the week we will create our ground plan for Theresa to send off by Friday.
Thank you Anna from P6/7 for our park suggestion on our last blog. If you have any other suggestions for our park, please comment.
Mr.Cook and Primary 1
Adventureland
It sounds like everyone had a fantastic February break. It was great being back together today. We’ve now got new work-stations . . . it was fun working with new people today.
You might be wondering why I’ve uploaded a photograph of a blank wall. Well this is going to be the display area for Adventureland.
We’re starting to design our park tomorrow. If you or your child think of any ideas at home that we can add to our park, please comment on this blog post and let us know. We’ll continue to update you on our Park Planning progress.
See you tomorrow,
Mr.Cook
Happy Half Term!
We’ve reached another holiday after a six week mini-term.
In the Loch
Our topic ‘In the Loch’ is coming to an end. The finale of our topic will be our visit to Urquhart Castle. Our castle in the classroom will remain standing for a few weeks after the February break before it’s transformed into an office for our new topic.
New Topic – Adventureland
After the February break we will be starting a new topic ‘Adventureland’ which will investigate the role of parks in our community and what makes a park a good place for people to visit.
Your child will become a park planner to learn how plants grow, the kinds of play and recreational activities appropriate for a park and how to work with others to solve problems.
Children will also be developing literacy skills as they talk, write and read about their experiences.
The teaching approach I will be using is called Storypath. This approach is built on the key principle that learning, to be meaningful, has to be memorable, and that we can use children’s enthusiasm for story making to teach important content and skills.
Active learning, cooperation, critical thinking, and reflection are essential skills of the process. As the Storypath develops, children will gain a sense of ownership for their learning as they tackle the problems presented. As events unfold, ask your child to share with you what is happening in the Storypath.
You may find that they will want to learn more about particular topics at home by discussing the parks they have visited with you or the kinds of features they would like in a park.
I hope you will discuss these experiences with your child. At the conclusion of the unit, we will dedicate the park; I hope you can visit our classroom for that event. More details will follow after the February break.
Literacy
In your homework folder you will find a booklet of words which you can use when building words with your child. You should use the sounds in your child’s phonic pouch; however I encourage you to get your child to write the word out also.
Numeracy
Continue to play the activities from the Numeracy Home Pack. For revision over the February break:
| Week Beginning 3rd February 2014 | Revise all of the numbers 0 – 10.Ask your child to put these in order.
Can they tell you the number before/after a given number? Can they tell you the number between two numbers? |
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| Week Beginning10th February 2014 | Match the numbers to their written form
e.g. |
Download the ‘Supporting your child with word building and blending’ booklet below:
CLICK HERE – Word Building Booklet
See you back on Monday 24th February at 9am – have a fantastic week off!
Mr.Cook
We’re all FIVE!!!
Since our last update, we’ve had two more join the Fabulous Five gang . . . this means we’re all 5!!! Hooray!!
Our 5 wall will now be taken down to make room for our next topic . . .
This week in numeracy . . .
Just a reminder . . .
In the run up to, and over the February break, please play and revise the following activities from your Numeracy Home Pack.
| Week Beginning 3rd February 2014 | Revise all of the numbers 0 – 10:
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| Week Beginning 10th February 2014 | Match the numbers to their written form:
e.g.
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Thanks for the support,
Mr.Cook
Nessie and the Three Whales
This week, as it is National Storytelling Week, we have been learning how to tell fairytales. But not just your average faiytale – no – that would be too easy for P1. We took the story of Goldilocks and the Three Bears, and we changed the characters to Nessie and the Three Whales.
We changed the forest to the sea, the house to a cave, the porridge to salmon soup, the chairs to rocks and the beds to slabs of rock with seaweed on top.
We planned out our story together. We then performed our story. Mr Cook told the main story and we all joined in when Nessie or the Whales were talking.
We then created actions to go with each of the parts of the story.
If you want to listen to our story, click the link below:
Nessie and the Three Whales – CLICK HERE
Have a great weekend,
Mr.Cook
Pupil of the Month – January
