Our Lady of Good Aid Cathedral Primary School

On Friday 16th October, three incredible Primary 4 pupils took on an amazing triathlon challenge, showing determination, resilience and a fantastic team spirit as they pushed themselves to achieve something truly special.

The challenge began at Wishaw Sports Centre, where the children swam an impressive 10 lengths of the pool. Next, they hopped on their bikes and cycled all the way from Wishaw swimming pool to Ravenscraig Sports Facility. Once there, they completed the final stage of their challenge by running 10 laps of the running track.

Their fantastic achievement is certainly one to be celebrated as part of their Rose Trainer Award tracking achievements, recognising their perseverance, determination and willingness to take on a challenge. Even more special was the reason behind their efforts. The children undertook this triathlon to raise funds in memory of Zac Gunn, giving their challenge a heartfelt purpose and making their achievement even more meaningful.

A huge well done to all four Primary 4 pupils for their incredible effort and a big thank you to everyone who supported them and contributed to their fundraising. Three amazing children, one incredible challenge and a wonderful way to remember Zac. We are so proud of you all!

Our young learners have immersed themselves in a rich and exciting programme of learning, exploring the history, traditions, cultures, food, wildlife and geography of Africa. Through their learning, they have developed their knowledge and understanding while making connections across a wide range of curricular areas.

The showcase was a wonderful opportunity for our Primary 7s to share their learning, demonstrating confidence, creativity, collaboration and excellent communication skills. From fascinating facts about African animals and traditions to exploring the rich diversity of African food and history, there was something to inspire everyone. And what better way to finish than with an energetic performance of Shakira’s ‘Waka Waka (This Time for Africa)’! Our Primary 7 performers certainly had the audience in the mood for the October holiday, filling the room with enthusiasm, energy and plenty of smiles!

Well done to each and every P7 pupil and many thanks to Mrs Karen Callaghan, Miss Tyrrell and Mrs Kelly Callaghan for inspiring and bringing out the absolute best in their young learners.

Our Come Clubbing @ Cathedral club is a firm favourite with our young learners from across all stages. Inspired and led by Mrs McCarthy, our children come together in faith, friendship and joy, singing much-loved favourites such as Shine, Jesus, Shine and I’ve got love in My Heart. With Happy hymn club leaders from Primary 4 to Primary 6, Mrs Loose and Mrs Gillespie also on hand to support, the club is a wonderful opportunity for our children to grow in faith, build connections and share in the uplifting power of music and prayer.

At Cathedral Primary School, our values of Love and Connection are brought to life in action as our children celebrate together, support one another and let their light shine. A truly uplifting and inspiring club, filling hearts with joy and our Cathedral community with love.

This week, our young learners have embraced the changing season through a wide range of exciting and meaningful autumn experiences.

In our snack area, the children explored seasonal foods by creating delicious dishes, including pumpkin pie and vegetable soup. After enjoying the story Pumpkin Soup, the children were inspired to make their own soup. They carefully cut and chopped pumpkins kindly donated by our families, followed simple recipes, measured ingredients and talked through the different steps involved in preparing and cooking food. Some children were eager to taste their creations, while others confidently expressed that they preferred not to. This provided valuable opportunities for children to communicate their personal preferences, make independent choices and develop confidence in expressing their opinions.

Our autumn investigations continued outdoors, where the children noticed the many different colours appearing on the leaves around the nursery grounds. They observed that some trees were beginning to change colour while others remained green, prompting lots of discussion, questions and predictions. These experiences encouraged the children to develop their curiosity about the natural world and deepen their understanding of seasonal change.

Conkers have provided endless opportunities for playful learning this week. The children have used them in a variety of ways, including counting, sorting, rolling, balancing, and completing stacking challenges. Through these hands-on experiences, they have been developing their mathematical thinking, problem-solving skills, coordination and ability to explore different possibilities through play.

Our daily nature walks have encouraged the children to slow down, observe their surroundings and notice changes in the environment. They have commented on the colder weather, identified signs of autumn and excitedly shared their observations of Jack Frost appearing during the mornings. These conversations have supported the children in making connections between their experiences and the seasonal changes they can see and feel around them.

Meanwhile, our construction area has been transformed into a busy and imaginative space station, inspired by the children’s growing fascination with space. Through collaborative building projects and imaginative role play, the children have shared their knowledge and ideas about planets, rockets, astronauts and life in space. Working together, they have designed and constructed their own creations, negotiating ideas, solving problems and using creativity to bring their plans to life. Their play has also provided rich opportunities for conversation as they explored what space might be like and wondered about the people, places and objects that could be found beyond Earth.

It has been a wonderful week of exploration, discovery, creativity, and learning, with the children showing enthusiasm and curiosity across all areas of their experiences.

The North Lanarkshire Tackling Poverty Team attended Cathedral’s Parents Evening on Thursday 8th October. As well as having a selection of goodies, including water bottles, for our learners, the team were on hand to signpost parents and carers to a range of financial support such as debt advice and benefit assistance.

This week, Cathedral Primary is proud to recognise Challenge Poverty Week, an important opportunity to raise awareness of the realities of poverty and the impact that financial pressures can have on children, families and communities.

Challenge Poverty Week -– Working Together, Supporting Every Family

Our Primary 5 learners have been busy putting their creativity, problem-solving and engineering skills to the test as part of our exciting Lunchtime LEGO Lab Club, led by Mrs Alison.

Our young engineers and architects of the future have been constructing increasingly impressive structures and designs, tackling weekly building challenges that require careful planning, teamwork, perseverance and creative thinking. From their first ideas to their finished creations, our learners have shown tremendous enthusiasm and determination as they test, adapt and improve their designs. Each challenge has encouraged our learners to think critically, solve problems and learn from what doesn’t work — developing the resilience and confidence to have another go and find a solution.

This is Developing the Young Workforce in action, giving our learners opportunities to explore skills and experiences linked to engineering, architecture, design and construction from an early age. Who knows… we may already have some of our future engineers, architects and innovators designing their next big idea right here at Cathedral!

Our Primary 6 young learners have been working brilliantly with the Attainment Team on their A Message in a Bottle story. Their writing was truly impressive as they confidently used independent and dependent clauses, alongside coordinating conjunctions, to develop their ideas and create engaging sentences.

The pupils proudly presented their fantastic work at Mrs Duffy’s office, beaming with enthusiasm and excitement as they shared their learning.

We are absolutely delighted to celebrate their continued improvement and growing confidence on their learning journey. Their hard work, determination and enthusiasm are shining through!

Today at Cathedral Primary, we were absolutely delighted to welcome two very special visitors — Mrs McMillan and her beautiful new baby, Georgie Marie McMillan. Born on 16th September, weighing a healthy 7lb 11oz, baby Georgie was warmly welcomed by our Cathedral family as she came to meet our wonderful Cathedral learners for the very first time.

We send our heartfelt congratulations and very best wishes to Mrs McMillan and the whole McMillan family as they begin this precious new chapter together.

Mr Young took a short break from his secondment on Tuesday 5th October to be Head Teacher for the day and, during his classroom visits, he spotted something rather unusual… bread hanging up in sandwich bags!

Thankfully, it wasn’t anyone’s packed lunch! Instead, Primary 4/5 young scientists were carrying out an investigation into germs, hand hygiene and mould growth.

The children tested:

• A control slice – untouched
• Dirty hands – handled without washing hands
• Clean hands – handled after washing hands

They also compared fresh bread with ultra-processed bread to see whether the type of bread made a difference.

The class made their hypothesis: bread handled by dirty hands will develop the most mould.

Now the experiment begins: the children will be watching, observing and recording their findings over the coming days.

What a fabulous Explore & Extend learning experience from three of our talented Primary 5 learners.

These young performers took on the challenge on Monday 5th October of creating and performing body percussion to two songs — and what a performance it was. Working together, they demonstrated excellent rhythm, timing, coordination and concentration, keeping in perfect time from beginning to end. They never missed a beat! Their performance was energetic, animated and full of confidence, with each learner contributing to make the final performance truly special.

Mrs Duffy was so impressed by their confidence, creativity, teamwork and performance skills that she awarded all three learners a very well-deserved Head Teacher Certificate.

This is exactly what we love to see at Cathedral — learners taking their learning further, challenging themselves, working collaboratively and confidently sharing their talents.