Monthly Archives: March 2015

bootcamp, Technologies

Bootcamp Photo Challenge

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This week Mrs Hunter chose a group of us who were good at photography to take part in the blogging bootcamp challenge. For the challenge we had to take some interesting photos from a list of criteria. One of the things we had to do was research forced perspective which was really cool! We tried things out like classroom tilt, stand on each others hands and get picked up by the head. It was difficult because it took a while to get it right and it was a lot shouting different instructions. It was easy to find something yellow because we had a lot of daffodils in our school grounds. It was fun jumping off the wall and Abbie and Lucy to take the photo at the right time. The girls went into the toilet to find a mirror and took a selfie! The odd things were Abbie and Lucy’s both right foot. Some of the things we tried did not work so we had to think creatively about how to do it.  We really enjoyed working on this task and learned things like keeping our elbows in, standing still with steady hands and getting the picture in the frame well. We feel we developed our photography skills and new ways to take photos using the camera. The photos that have been uploaded by ourselves by adding a gallery and captions for our photos.

bootcamp, Sciences

Watching the Solar Eclipse

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Today we were learning about the Solar Eclipse. A Solar eclipse is really rare and next time I might see one is when I’m well over 40! Watching the eclipse this morning was AMAZING! It was interesting to find out that in ancient Chinese history, they thought that an eclipse was a dragon eating the sun because eclipse in Chinese is ‘shi’ which means ‘to eat’. We all used our home-made objects to reflect, see and watch the moon as it passed over the sun. We knew we couldn’t look directly at it so we used things to watch it safely. Anton had a special box to look into, it wasn’t so successful but looked really cool! David had a rectangle of black glass which he put over his eyes. This worked really well because you could really see the shape the eclipse was making. It was good because David managed to use it to watch the eclipse safely without hurting his eyes. We all had a turn too, including Mrs Hunter, Mr Sinclair and Miss McCready! Alana and I had two pieces of white paper with a pinhole in the middle of one which reflected the light and allowed us to see the shadow of the sun. The sky slowly got darker as the moon moved in front of the sun and it went really cold. We all really enjoyed watching and learning about an eclipse and hope that we see one again. By Rebecca

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bootcamp, Health and Wellbeing

Our New Rights Charters!

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Recently, the Rights Action group got together to make a playtime and lunchtime charter to make sure we are safe and happy in school. We looked at the UNCRC and decided on rights that meant most to us at playtime and lunchtime. Our charters got sent to a special sign maker to get made into big boards for the playground and gym hall. We are now going to get them up all around the school so pupils know their rights and how they can help others get their rights too. We had to be confident and present to the whole school at assembly to tell them about the rights charters and why we have them. The letters of the word RESPECT have been cut out and today we got all pupils in the school to sign their names on each letter so that they are in agreement to uphold these rights. Everyone got a band that said ‘we care, we listen, we act’. You might have seen the billboard posters about Inverclyde with the new campaign supporting children’s rights. By Lucy F

Here are the posters.

we caew we care

Here are pupils signing the letters.

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bootcamp, Sciences

Learning How to Code Using Scratch

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Scratch is a computer animation and programming site and this term we have been learning to use it. We have had to learn how use code to make things move and how to make things called sprites, change. One of our tasks was to make a children’s rights game. Some people made their game like flappy bird or paddle and you had to collect wee icons and a right would pop up. The game is meant to help you learn your rights. I am good at Scratch and have been using it for a while now. I understand it really well so I had to go around helping everyone with their coding and make their game work. You had to be creative to come up with ideas to make your game interesting for people to play. Some people found it difficult to use code but everyone now knows how to make a basic game with controls now. I want to have a job in computer programming when I am older so I hope this will help me prepare for it.

Here are Nick and Aidan’s games

Scratch NickNick's gameAidan's game

This is Abbi’s game

bootcamp, Expressive Arts, Sciences, shareourlearning

Felt Making Tutorial

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During Science Week we were learning about friction. We found out that friction is a force between two surfaces that are sliding, or trying to slide, across each other. The wool fibres are felted or fused together using moisture, friction and heat. As the wool shrinks the fibres interlock and mat together. You may have noticed that if a wool jumper is washed too hot in a washing machine it will shrink and felt! The wool fibres are layered out horizontally and vertically then soap and warm water are applied and the felt is massaged and rolled. It was challenging and very time consuming but we all enjoyed learning how to felt. We are really proud of our felt pieces but had sore and tired arms at the end! Watch Alana’s felt tutorial below for step by step instructions.

Here are some photos of the felting process:

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Some photos of our felted pieces:

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Religious and Moral Education

Cracking the Easter code!

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Today we visited our local church old Gourock and Ashton. Our minister David taught us all about Easter and had prepared some fun activities for us. Firstly we played a “who wants to be a millionaire” game all about the history of Easter eggs. We found out how many Easter eggs were made in a year which was around 300,000!

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The most expensive Easter egg ever made was £50,000! The winning team collected 13 plastic eggs in their bucket and received a prize at the end. We then split into groups and had 5 different stations to investigate. At each station you had to find a word beginning with “s” to crack the Easter code and find out about holy week.

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  • At station number 1 we found out all about the Jews and their special dinner, we also got to try some of the food that they eat but most importantly we found out the word beginning with “s” and it was sharing.
  • At station number 2, David let us take part in a drama scene of Jesus seeking to be heard.
  • At station number 3 we learned all about serving and as an example of this we washed each others feet because that’s what Jesus did to his disciples and the word beginning with “s” was seeking.
  • At station  number 4 we designed our own crosses by scratching special card to make it colourful, this station was all about sacrifice because Jesus sacrificed himself on the cross.
  • The last station was station 5 where we watched a short clip on Jesus going into the garden to pray. The “s” word was struggling because his whole life he knew that he was going to die.

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After we had finished these activities we heard a drama scene about Jesus rising from his tomb. We all then got a cross to write our feelings and reactions about what we would have done if we saw that happening. We all learned that the Easter story is more interesting than we all first thought. It was good to learn in a small group as well as a class. I feel that I could now share my learning with others that don’t know about the Easter story. Now when it comes to Easter I wont just think about the chocolate that I get I will think about the story of Jesus! Click here for a link to their website.

bootcamp, Expressive Arts, Literacy and English

Scots Language Learning

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In  Primary 7 we have been learning all about Scots Language. We have learned the meaning of words like ‘stramash’ and ‘bairn’ and it has been really interesting! It’s sad to think that Scots might not be remembered as a language in the future because not everyone knows about it. It’s a really important language and it is our Scottish culture and heritage. Some people think it is slang but it is actually a language just like French or Italian.

We have made a Scots ABC Picture Dictionary with words that we have enjoyed learning about to help teach others about Scots words. Everyone was allocated a letter from the alphabet and then made a little poster with their chosen Scots word and a picture of something that represents it.

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We were inspired by a really informative and fun website called Scots Hoose. It has loads of great ideas for learning about Scots Language. It helps you get better at writing and reading Scots because it’s not really that hard, you just think about the words you use everyday!

scots hoose

We also have tried one of the activities which is writing poems in Scots. We chose an object to write about like an ipad, dog or even a football team!

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Everyone has had great fun learning all about Scots, and we hope it will be a known language for years to come 🙂 Look at our Discussion Directors ‘Responsible Scots’ page by clicking here to see more about our thoughts on Scots Language.

By Dionne 🙂

bootcamp

A Picture of Learning in P7!

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We think learning in P7 is all about having fun and working hard!

In P7 we love being creative in art and drama and spending time with our buddies in P1, helping them learn. Photos are a great way of capturing this. We also LOVE P.E and sports like Volleyball, Gymnastics, Athletics and Basketball and that doesn’t always involve writing things down so we need pictures of what we were doing to show what we know. It’s fun to work with classmates and learn from each other and we think photos tell you that. Seeing photos that Mrs Hunter has taken of us learning is always great because we can discuss what we were doing and remember our learning. We can also put them on our e-portfolio to share our learning journey with others! By Heather, P7.

LEARNING IN P7
Learning in Primary 7, Gourock Primary