Primary 5 February Update 

Primary 5 have had another busy month in class with lots of fun learning activities.  As a nice treat for all their hard work in class they celebrated Pancake Day and Valentine’s Day with a pancake and hot chocolate with cream and marshmallows. Below describes just some of the learning they have experience over the last month. 

Maths and Numeracy 

The children have been continuing to work on their mental agility and have been putting this to practise by competing in a variety of mental maths games. They really enjoy this, and it encourages them to quickly apply many of the strategies that they have been learning through Number Talks. They have also been learning how to measure, length, mass and capacity and are able to calculate perimeter and area. They measured the length of the corridor and various items within school. Having explored weights of varying grams and kilograms, they could combine a variety of sizes to make various amounts. They are learning to convert between various units of measurement. In addition to measurement, with Miss Cairney the children have been learning to gather and analyse data. They put their skills to use by surveying every class in the school in order to gather information to use in their Enterprise initiative.  

Literacy 

The Blue Group have now finished reading The Worst Witch and have used a variety of reading strategies to help them understand the story. They are looking forward to starting a new novel ‘The Queen’s Nose.’  Please provide time for children to read this aloud at home as this will help with their fluency. It is also a great idea to have the children summarise verbally (in their own words) what they have read as this helps to clarify their understanding. 

The children in the Red Group are reading The Demon Headmaster and most are reading fluently and with expression. They are developing their comprehension skills and demonstrating this in their writing. You can help them with this by asking them to make sure they answer in full sentences when discussing their homework. 

The Yellow Group are making good progress and are enjoying the range of novels that they are reading.  

Children have produced some excellent writing this month, they have been exploring the genres of Instructions and Persuasive. They have utilised the knowledge and skills gained by completing a series of science experiments such as The Gummy Bear Experiment, the Lava Lamp and the Walking Water Experiment. They have explored the genre features specific to each and they’re able to write instructions that would help others to carry out these experiments. The children also wrote persuasive letters to Mrs Harley and our local supermarkets looking for their support for our upcoming Enterprise project. Needless to say, the persuasive language used was enough to convince our target audience to comply with our requests and Morrisons kindly donated a supply of diluting juice. 

Religious Education 

This month our class focus has been on Lent and reminding ourselves of ways that we can get closer to God through, prayer, fasting and almsgiving. Many of the children have attended mass during Lent. The children have also been learning about Blessed Mother Theresa and her work with the poor and dying. They have also begun to learn the Stations of the Cross and the responses to this. 

OTHER CURRICULAR AREAS 

Enterprise – our topic has been learning about our skills and qualities and considering what we would like to do as we grow up. We had a workshop delivered by Social Schools Enterprise that encouraged us to think about the ways that we can use our knowledge, skills and experience to make a difference in our world. We learned all about ‘social’ enterprise and giving back to our community. As a class we considered many enterprising projects that we could deliver to raise money for our chosen charity, and we look forward to managing and implementing our business idea after Easter. 

Science/STEM – the children all expressed that they were looking forward to doing lots of science and STEM this term so we have been completing a variety of experiments which the children have been enjoying. They have been exploring Osmosis, Capillary Action and Density and are now learning about Newtons Laws of Motion. We look forward to sharing some of this learning when you visit during Science Week. 

PE/HWB – We have now concluded our hockey sessions in PE and I was extremely impressed with the skills and progress made by many of the children. They were able to demonstrate safe use of the equipment, can hold the hockey stick correctly and can pass and stop the ball accurately. We have now moved on to Gymnastics and the children are learning how to move, balance and perform a variety of shapes safely on various apparatus. In HWB we continue to talk about Respect for ourselves and others and how we should consider or words and actions and the impact they can have. We will continue to explore this as we look at Emotions and behaviours, triggers, and responses. 

Numeracy and Maths 

Throughout the last few weeks the children have been working on division, they have used a variety of concrete and pictorial materials to help explore this and are able to use a variety of strategies to help. They are recognising that secure knowledge of multiplication facts can help them. They have also been exploring the properties of 2d and 3d shape with Miss Cairney.

Literacy

The pupils are enjoying their new novels and are further developing their reading strategies through these. They have been taking notes as they read and then  and writing summaries to express their understanding . They have been also been writing Instructions, using our Science Experiments as a stimulus. This has really helped the children and they have have produced some really good writing.

HWB

The children have been learning about how important it is to ensure they keep their bodies and minds active. In PE we have been developing new skills in Hockey  and are currently competing in a class tournament. They are really enjoying this and are able to identify the rules of the game, use specific terminology associated with the game and recognise and describe how to keep themselves and others safe in the game.

OTHER AREAS

Primary 5 are busy learning  about the skills and qualities that they will need both now and in their future. They have considered future employment and what this may look like for them and have researched various jobs and what was required to work in that field. They had an interesting workshop delivered by the Social Enterprise Academy which taught them about ‘Social Enterprise’ and how we can use our skills to bring about positive change. The children are very excited and they are working hard on their business plans; watch this space Our Primary 5 Entrepreneurs have some fantastic ideas.

Primary 5 have been extremely busy in all areas of the curriculum this month, enhancing existing and developing some new skills.

RE

We started the month by leading the school at First Friday mass where we prayed for all the Holy Souls, during the month of November we remembered in our thoughts and prayers all our loved ones who had died.

IDL

Primary 5 this month planned and delivered a highly successful Enterprise Project which saw the budding entrepreneurs in our class plan and deliver ‘Poppy Day’. Each year in Holy Family the primary 5’s are responsible for arranging a whole day of activities to celebrate and remember everyone who has died during conflict. This year Primary 5 decided that they wanted to think about the ‘Poppy for Peace’, very poignant considering what is happening in the world around us. The children very much enjoyed learning all about the different colours of poppies and what they represent. The children worked together in teams to create a variety of fun filled activities to suit all children from Primary 1 to Primary 7, they created a timetable for the whole school – giving each class a designated slot to participate . They used their skills and talents to make bracelets, iced, cookies, hand and face painting and created a photobooth with a green screen which the classes all used to dress up. In the afternoon a panel of judges chose the best dancers from each class during our ‘Danceathon’.

The children have now come to the end of their Swim and Gym sessions in Sir Matt Busby, each child has made excellent progress and very much enjoyed learning this vital, life saving skill.

Maths and Literacy

We continue to work our way through the NLC Active Literacy programme focussing on spelling strategies and rules, our writing genre has been narrative and we have completed some excellent stories with interesting characters and settings, we will be looking at persuasive and instructional writing in the lead up to Christmas.

We have been learning to add and subtract decimals, and to multiply by 10 and 100. We are multiplying by 2 digit numbers. We continue to focus on mental maths skills and have been learning a variety of subtraction and multiplication strategies to explain our thinking.

Primary 5 have been working hard to learn their Scottish Song ‘Wellerman’ they performed this to the school on St Andrews day and did a fantastic job of learning the lyrics – well done to everyone.

We have a busy and fun filled lead up to the Christmas holidays so please continue to check school website for any updates.

Thank you

Mrs Preston and Primary 5.

Primary 5 have had a fantastically busy and productive month of September. We have been growing and learning in all areas of the curriculum, striving to become successful learners, responsible citizens, effective contributors and confident individuals.

It was lovely to meet some of you at our ‘Meet the Teacher’ event and I look forward to getting a chance to speak with you regarding your child’s progress on our Parents Evening on Thursday 12^th October. Please log on to the parent portal and book an appointment if you have not done so already.

Over the last month the pupils have made excellent progress in Math’s and Numeracy, they have been exploring Addition of larger numbers and learning a variety of strategies that they can apply to help them solve these problems. They have been focussing on reading questions carefully so that they have a good understanding of what they need to do to solve the problem. Children are encouraged to apply a variety of strategies such as adding in chunks using a number line, recognising  doubles and near doubles and looking at patterns within number that can help them. We will continue to apply a variety of addition, subtraction and multiplication and division strategies to help us with us our computational skills.

In Literacy we are making good progress with our spelling programme and the children can identify and use the most efficient strategies to spell increasingly difficult and tricky words. We have come to the end of our modelling block and pupils will now apply the skills they have been using to help them explore individual and group novels. I would encourage that when children do not have a book home to read that they are encouraged to read for pleasure. We have a class and school library with a wide variety of books that children are free to borrow any time.

RE

We have been learning about the life of Jesus and the children have worked together in groups to collaborate and research some of the miracles performed by Jesus. They were able to define what a miracle is and were able to ‘teach’ the rest of the class about the miracle that their group, researched using the bible. This was a good opportunity for the children to get used to using the bible and finding the relevant chapters and verses.

PE

We continue to attend Sir Matt Busby every Tuesday for our Swimming sessions. The children are making excellent progress and enjoying this very much. In the sports hall the children are learning a variety of new team games learning skills of co- ordination, pacing, positioning and indeed communication effectively in a team.

IDL

We have been learning lots about the Titanic and the people on board. We are looking forward to participating in some science-based learning using this topic, such as exploring buoyancy, density, water displacement and temperature.

Please continue to check school website for any updates.

Thank you

Mrs Preston and Primary 5.

Welcome everyone to our first monthly update of this session.

I hope that you all had a lovely summer break and am delighted to see all the children back at school, smiling and happy to see their friends and (hopefully) their teachers.

Over the last couple of weeks we have been spending our time settling in to our new class. Primary 5 have moved to a classroom on the top floor of the building and are learning all about the expectations of them as seniors in the primary school.

They have been setting a fantastic example to younger pupils and the new primary ones on how they walk sensibly and responsibly around the school and on the stairs. They understand how important this is to keep everyone safe and to get to class and learning as quickly as they can.

In class we have spent a lot of time discussing and creating our Class Charter. The children have been learning all about their rights and the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC). They have learned that each right has equal importance and that everyone is entitled to these rights. The pupils have also been helping to create their new learning environment and have chosen a Minion theme. They have worked together to create a group name and design a poster for their group. They demonstrated that were effective contributors as they collaborated to compile a list of class jobs and rules which will help us all to ensure a happy, healthy, and safe learning environment.

In other areas they have been showing off everything that they learned last year, in class we have been exploring Number Talks and Mental Maths to get our brains in gear for the coming year. We discussed and voted as a class on what we want to learn this year and have considered  our strengths and targets and what we will do to ensure we are successful learners in Primary 5.

We have already begun to learn about our new topic the ‘Titanic’ and our class novel is ‘Kaspar the Prince of Cats’ which we are really enjoying. We are revising the reading and spelling strategies that we will use to help develop our Literacy skills.

We have also begun our 12-week session of PE at Sir Matt Busby where we will be completing a swim and gym session. This will be our PE for the next 12 weeks and children should come to school dressed in their PE clothes, with a swimming costume and a towel and goggles. Hair should be tied back and plaited if possible as there is a quick turnaround from swimming to gym. Please also ensure that no jewellery is worn on these days.

Homework will be distributed from week beginning 4^th September. This will be issued on a Monday and should be returned on a Thurs/Fri at the latest in order that it can be checked and prepared for the following week. Please note that approximately 20 mins each night should be spent on homework,  please sign it to confirm that you have supported/checked this and that it has been completed. Instructions for homework will be posted on the school website on a Monday afternoon under the Primary 5 tab and children will be shown how to access this.

Please continue to check school website for any updates.

Thank you

Mrs Preston and Primary 5.

Literacy – The children have continued to work through our reading programme which challenges them with longer, trickier texts that demand more focus and application of reading and comprehension strategies. Please ensure that your child is given the opportunity to read their book aloud each night as this really helps with their fluency and discussing what happened will help them to develop greater understanding.

In class, in addition to reading our book we have been working on a media study using the film ‘Zootopia’ which was inspired by the pupils. We had been learning the song ‘Try everything’ as part of our Health and Wellbeing focus where we had discussed being resilient, and not giving up when we found something tricky or hard. We learned that we all make mistakes and how we can use these experiences to help us as we learn. We then watched the film and discussed the characters, the settings, the plot, the themes, and key messages from the film. The children were really engaged and enjoyed learning through exploring, discussing, answering questions and drawing inferences from the film.

At home children can use these skills to discuss what they are watching, reading, is it fiction or nonfiction, why do they find it enjoyable, what is the purpose, aim, or message in story/film/clip/cartoon? This all helps the children to become more engaged in their activities and start to use critical thinking skills.

Numeracy and Maths – We have been busy learning all about Fractions and Time this month. The children have been learning about the numerator and denominator and can use the correct notation. They have a good understanding that a fraction is an equal part of a whole and really enjoyed participating in lots of games whilst learning. We are currently learning about time and can tell o’clock, half past, quarter past and some can even tell quarter to. Our recent work on Fractions really helps us with this. We loved getting to do our math’s outdoors, working in groups or pairs, playing lots of time related games.

IDL – Oceans and Continents – We have really enjoyed this topic so far as it has allowed for lots of independent learning and individual choice. Having learned a little bit about each Continent we have chosen a few that we want to learn more about. We have been investigating the different cultures such as music, food, and animals. We have used our ICT skills to research the Continents and have all created a PowerPoint on Glow which we will share with the class over the next few weeks. When exploring Africa, we used musical instruments to make different sounds and rhythms which would match our dance that we had learned, we also drew some African animals and used oil pastels to create an African safari themed backdrop. These look amazing and are proudly displayed in the class for everyone to see. This week we have been learning all about Australasia, and looked at Australia and all the islands that make up the continent. We can name some – why don’t you ask us? We also made Didgeridoo’s and are going to create our own sounds using these. We can’t wait to find out which Continent we are going to look at each week and are going to end our topic with a food tasting session, trying a variety of foods from all the Continents.

RE – Our focus for May is ‘The Month of Mary’ and we have decorated our altar in class to reflect this, one pupil brought in a lovely bunch of flowers and others have contributed flowers and beautiful drawings and prayers for Mary. We also did a great job learning a new hymn to sing to Mary ‘Bring Flowers of the Rarest’.  With Mrs Gilfedder we are learning about Islam and love learning about other religions.

Homework – As we approach the end of the term there will be no homework given out in diaries to be returned each week. I will give the children their diaries this week to be kept at home so that the children can access their GLOW logins. The children will be given another personal project to work on for the next 3 weeks, details will be discussed and decided with children this week. Most of the children have now completed their spelling programme and the next few weeks will be targeted revision and consolidation of phonemes and common words. Children should continue to practise these and to read the book that they are given home each night. They should continue to practise counting forwards and backwards in 2s, 3s, 5s and 10s, and learning the 2,3,5,10 x tables.

Children could use this time to develop other skills such as learning to tie their shoelaces, school tie, shirt buttons. This will all help them to become more independent in preparation for next session.   Thank you.

Time for another update from the hardworking children in Primary 3

Literacy – The children have continued to select a variety of books from our class library or from home and often choose reading time which has helped them progress in their fluency and accuracy when reading aloud in groups in the class. They have enjoyed listening to stories and looking for facts in their topic books. We have read The Roman Beanfeast, and are reading Pugly Solves a Crime. They continue to work hard using various strategies each week to learn new common and tricky words. The writing genre focus was on letters, explanation and recount. The children demonstrated their skills by writing letters for penfriends in P3 at Mossend Primary and we delivered these to them. We were so excited to receive a letter back from them.

Numeracy and Maths – Having spent a great deal of time working on multiplication and division they are now working on Money. The children can identify and order all uk coins and notes up to £20.00. They have been using plastic coins to make amounts and calculate change up £10. We learned about the decimal point separating pounds and pence and know this is really important. We looked at receipts we had brought in from home and added and subtracted items. We loved playing games like Money Monopoly, Coin Collecter and Toy Shops which helps to reinforce what we were learning in a fun and enjoyable way. We can’t wait to move on to Fractions.

IDL – Oceans and Continents – The new IDL topic chosen by the children was Oceans and Continents and the children are really engaged in this already – asking lots of questions which we will explore in more detail over the next few weeks. Please ask children to tell you all about what they have learned. They can already name the 7 Continents and 5 Oceans and I’m certain they will all be able to impress you with their learning already.

PE/HWB–The children have come to the end of their sessions on ball skills, they learned how to make different passes and to travel with the ball. Athletics will be the focus of this term, and they will looking at improving their fitness and performance in running, jumping and throwing – all great practise for Sports Day. The class have also been talking about their emotions and explored these through the story ‘The Rabbit who was Afraid of the Dark’, we will continue to work on this,  identifying triggers and behaviours which are connected to our emotions.

RE – The children have had the opportunity to receive the Sacrament of Reconciliation on a further two occasions in school with Father Brown and were incredibly lucky when Bishop Toal visited our class on a recent visit to talk to the Primary 7’s about Confirmation. We have been learning about Jesus’ apostles and how we can show love to one another as Jesus did. We will be leading first Friday mass this week and look forward to celebrating with our whole school community. Please join us if you can.

February saw another busy month of learning in Primary 3.

Literacy 

The children have continued to develop their listening, talking, reading and writing skills and have been reading a variety of fiction and non-fiction texts. They have been working on developing their understanding and ability to express this verbally and in their written responses. Children have been learning to use more complex sentences using connectives and have been exploring the genre of explanation writing through their IDL topic, the Romans.

Numeracy and Maths 

The children have spent the last few weeks developing their understanding of division, they have used a variety of concrete and pictorial materials to help explore this, such as cubes and counters. They are continuing to work on learning the 2, 5, and 10 X Tables, as well as learning the 3 X table. They are developing an understanding of division as sharing and equal groupings and are familiar in using mathematical vocabulary and notation related to this. Please continue to provide opportunities for children to practice and learn their multiplication facts and relate this understanding of division to their everyday lives.

RE 

Children are continuing to learn about the sacrament of reconciliation and their relationship with god and others. They enjoyed a confession retreat in the chapel hall and a special visit to the Church, where Father Brown was happy to discuss all important parts in the Church, such as the Alter, Sanctuary, Pascal Candle, Pulpit, Baptismal Fonts and Confessional boxes. Father Brown also visited the children in the class to answer their questions on the sacrament. The children have also been learning about Lent, and about prayer, fasting and arms giving. Throughout Lent, Mass is celebrated each Monday and Wednesday mornings at 8:15am.

Other Curricular Areas

IDL – The Romans – The children have been learning about the legend of Romulus and Remus and the development of the Roman Empire. They have learned about life as a roman soldier and identify their protective clothing. They have used Lego and Magnetics and Jenga blocks to create structures of famous roman building, such as the colosseum and Roman Forts. They designed and created their own roman shields and will continue to explore this topic through a variety of STEM based learning activities.

HWB/PE – The children are coming to the end of their learning block of gymnastics. In addition to developing their skills in balance, movement and shape, they have demonstrated that they can work together to create a sequence incorporating the above skills. They very much enjoyed being given the opportunity to incorporate some of these skills on the wall bars. Going forward, the children will move on to develop their wall skills. The children have also been learning what it means to be a good friend. They are learning to show respect and kindness in the playground and in the classroom. They are working hard at being responsible citizens and are working within the class and throughout the school at demonstrating our school values of faith, learning, encouragement, and mutual respect.

*Reminders*

Homework out on a Monday to be returned completed and signed on a Thursday.

PE Days are Monday and Wednesday. Children should come to school in full school uniform on PE days and bring in their PE kit. This will help to foster their organisational skills.

It was lovely to welcome the children back after the Christmas break and to hear all their excited tales. They wasted no time in getting settled back to school and class routines and getting busy with their learning. There have been many opportunities throughout the month in which they have demonstrated that they are successful learners.

Literacy 

All groups have developed their fluency and comprehension skills by engaging with their texts each week. They have read a variety of fiction and non-fiction texts but the main focus over the last few weeks has been on non-fiction. They have been learning to use the Contents page, Index and Glossary to help them find information. This will help them to be effective contributors as they will  be able to apply this knowledge as to our new IDL topic of the Romans. Please continue to support children with their spelling and phonics and reading at home as this really does help to support what the children are doing in class.

Numeracy and Maths 

The children have spent the last few weeks working on multiplication, they have used a variety of concrete and pictorial materials to help explore and develop an understanding of this topic. They have been learning the 2, 5, and 10 X Tables and been learning about multiplication as arrays, repeated addition and groupings. We are now moving on to division where the children will develop further their understanding of sharing, equal groupings, repeated subtraction and  the inverse relationship with multiplication. Children can use many household or everyday items to help with this concept, eg sharing pasta shapes into equal groups, sharing sweets among 2 or 3 people and there are many games on Topmarks and Sumdog that children can play to help them in this area.

RE 

This month and next has had a focus on the teachings of Jesus. They are learning about forgiveness and many are preparing for the Sacrament of Reconciliation. The children have been listening to bible stories about Jesus’ time on earth, how we are made in God’s image and the meaning and lessons we can take from the parables. I appreciate your support in returning Confession workbooks completed on time.

Other Curricular Areas

ICT – children are working on creating a Powerpoint which they will present to the class. They are also learning about coding and very much enjoyed this.

IDL – SCOTLAND – the children showed that they can be confident individuals when they learned and sang a song from the Disney Movie Brave called ‘Touch The Sky’ at our Burns Day Assembly – they did a fantastic job learning all the words and actions in such a short space of time. They tasted some traditional Scottish food such as haggis, neeps and tatties, shortbread and Tunnocks tea cakes, they even had a wee taste of Irn Bru (sugar free) a variety from every food group. They are at the beginning of our topic on Romans and have already learned how Rome was founded and some of the countries that the Romans conquered.

PE – our focus has been on gymnastics and the children can name and demonstrate a variety of shapes such as pike, arch, straddle and dish. They can travel safely, balancing and moving in a variety of shapes and speeds.

 BIRDWATCH – Primary 3 were also effective contributors by completing the birdwatch survey to record the variety of different birds in our local community. They spotted Crows, Magpies, Blackbirds, Seagulls, Wood Pigeons and some Robins. They recorded this information using tally marks and will learn how to interpret and display this data in Maths.

*Reminders*

Homework out on a Monday to be returned completed and signed on a Thursday.

PE Days are Monday and Wednesday.

Well, what a busy month we have had in Primary 3. We have had lots of fun learning experiences throughout the month of November.

Literacy

We have been working through our spelling programme and learning new phonemes and common words each week. We are building our vocabulary and have been learning about using adjectives to improve our writing. We are enjoying our reading tasks each week and are good at recognising our common words and phonemes in the books we are reading.

We used the Monster Mallows that we made at Halloween as a stimulus for writing Instructions and then applied this later in the month when we made Snowman biscuits. We are getting good at writing instructions. We have also explored narrative and recount and have written about Sneezy the Snowman and created our very own funny Elf stories. Going forward we are going to try and work on our presentation. We are continuing to focus on letter and number formation and using a ruler to underline our work and making sure our letters are not floating on the line.

We are still working on our listening and talking skills and are trying to listen carefully to instructions to help improve our learning. We are trying not to interrupt and to listen carefully when someone else is speaking. We know this is respectful and that everyone in our class has a voice.

Maths and Numeracy

Over the last month we have spent a great deal of time working on strategies to help us with addition and subtraction, we have been using concrete materials such as ten frames, one hundred squares, cubes, and number lines to help us add and subtract in tens and hundreds. The children have applied their prior understanding of place value to help with this. They are now going to be focussing on multiplication and division and again will explore a range of concrete, pictorial and abstract resources to help them develop a greater understanding in this area.

RE

The children have been praying for all their loved ones during the month of November and remembering the angels and holy souls. The have been learning about the Nativity in preparation for their performance of Wriggly Nativity. They worked hard to learn all their songs and sang beautifully during the performance. The children are now learning about Advent.

Social Studies/Art&Design/Other Areas

The children have finished their topic on Space, completed by a trip to Motherwell Heritage Centre where the children took part in a Rocket Workshop. This was an enjoyable and educational visit for the children, and they all participated fully in the engaging activities provided. They also showcased their learning as were able to respond to the questions asked throughout the day. The workshop co-ordinator remarked that it was lovely to have such enthusiastic and confident individuals participating in the workshop. Please log on to our class Team on Glow to see pictures of the day.

In addition to this we have spent time making crafts for the Christmas Coffee morning and creating a variety of Christmas themed artwork. The children are exploring line, shape, colour and using a variety of different media to create different effects. We hope that you have enjoyed looking at their work.

PE – we have been learning dances for our Christmas Party. The children have enjoyed this and are almost prepared to demonstrate these at their Christmas party on 20^th December.

**Finally, Primary 3 have achieved their target and earned four hundred Dojo points. They have chosen to have a class pyjama and pizza party. Children may come to school in pyjamas or comfortable clothing on this day and bring in a pillow. They will have pizza, ice cream and a Christmas movie to reward their effort this Term. This will take place on Friday 16^th December 2022.

Have a wonderful Christmas and New Year and please check Twitter and our class Team over the next week or so for class and picture updates.