General – Page 3 – Banton Biggies

Outdoor Learning Day June 2023

We started the day by going to the woods to gather a bit of firewood and different things to test as tinder.

The woods have changed quite a lot since our last visit, the grass & bracken is a lot higher. Down by the Gladstone we saw a woodpecker and later on a frog.

Back in school we tried different items as tinder with our flies and steels. not much success. The only thing that really caught was some bog cotton we had picked on our previous visit.

Next we mixed up some dough to cook over the fire later on in the day.

We then explored a new App Seek by iNaturalist , which helped us identify plants and animals in the school grounds.

In the afternoon we rolled out out dough and wound it round some twigs, while the dough was rising we set up the fire pit.

Some marshmallows might have been toasted too.

Earth Day 2023

The Biggies are studying John Muir this term, so that filtered right in with Earth Day 2023.

The day before we had visited Dow’s wood. There we collected natural sights and sounds with our iPads and pencils.

On Friday in class we made composite images of our photos writing & drawing, click on a thumbnail to expand and see all the details:

We also made photos with the text from our favourite John Muir Quotes:

And later on we made some art, could you guess which quote inspired which piece of art:

Universal connection

Wilderness

Exposure to the mountains

A good look at the dark and the light

Forest wilderness

The grand show

Charcoal Flower!

Automata Finished

This week the pupils all finished their Automata. There are a few photos in the video before footage of the machines in action:

Today we presented to the parents & guests about our STEM (or STEAM) learning, including a section on the automata Project. The children did a brilliant job of writing scripts, creating presentations and talking to an audience.

Mythical Creatures

More work with the Biggies & Bairns, painting one side of our mythical creatures, writing & recording text to go with them. Lots of inter-stage cooperation, creativity, leadership and fun.

Cardboard Automata II

We are making some progress using our Makerspace to work on out Cardboard Automata, here is a video from last week:

Feeding the birds

We had a try with our nature watch camera yesterday. 3 species of tit plus one other visitor you might just spot if you watch carefully.

Blue Tit

Great Tit

Coal Tit

Personal Project Morning

On Monday morning the Biggies had some time to follow their own ideas. the previous week they had submitted plans explain what they would do, what they needed and what they learnt.

The idea included making board games, cardboard models, story writing, zine creating, and a micro:bit boat. You can see some of the end results below.

I was excited about the micro:bit boat. The pupils had the idea on seeing a motor attached to a micro:bit in the class. The figured out how to make the micro:bit control the moters and another micro:bit to control that. A lot of problem solving and practical skills involved!

Targets Set

We have reviewed our term 3 targets and set some more for the last term of the year.

P7’s @ Strathclyde Park – Day 4

Primary 7 had a fantastic final day at Strathclyde Park. We started the day by taking on two orienteering challenges; well done to our winners! 🥇 Then it was time for some bush craft activities. We lit our own fires using cotton wool and fire strikers before toasting some marshmallows on an open flame; yummy! We also learned how to saw a piece of wood and used it to make and decorate our own medallions.
After having lunch in the sunshine, it was time to tackle the climbing wall. And what a challenge it was! We had to use all of our muscles and agility to reach the buzzers at the top. Some of us even managed to complete all three climbs! We finished off the week with some races and ball games.
We can’t believe how quickly the week has gone by. We’d like to say a big thank you to our instructors, Lesley and Robyn, for giving us such an amazing experience. Can we come back next week? 😉

Primary Six Poets go Down to the Woods

On Thursday the primary sixes for both p6-7 & p4-5-6 went down to the woods.

We were going to do a little Earth Day prep, but also to play games and read and write poems.

It was quite cold to be sitting long so we warmed up with running around game. All the children really all concentrated on writing and drawing in their tiny notebooks.