A team of Primary 5 pupils made the short walk to Motherwell’s Duchess Park on Friday 22nd March to sow wild flower seeds and plant
native plants. The event was run by Starling Learning, an ecological consultancy, environmental education and conservation management agency based in Lochwinnoch. Armed with gloves and gardening tools, our eager horticulturists worked in partnership with pupils from other local schools to sow and plant and can look forward to seeing the rewards of their hard work in the coming months.
Our three Primary 7 classrooms were transformed into court rooms on Wednesday 20th March for an engaging Developing the Young Workforce
activity, facilitated by Cathedral parent, Mrs Neville. Mrs Neville works as a Sheriffdom Legal Advisor for the Scottish Courts & Tribunals Service and supported our Primary 7 learners to run their very own court case, the case of the stolen jelly beans. The big question was: who stole the jelly beans, gifted to him by Mrs Duffy, from Mr Young’s office?
It turns out that Wednesday 20th March was ‘national proposal day’ and pupils from Primary 7c took the opportunity to make a proposal to Mr
Young he just couldn’t resist.
Due to unforeseen circumstances, it has been necessary to change the dates of several events next term (Primary 1 Mass, Primary 3 Mass, Primary 1 Learning Showcase, School Show, Sports Day, Shorts & Shades disco).
These Cathedral pupils spent part of St Patrick’s Day, Sunday 17th March, making a pilgrimage to St Patrick’s well, just outside the town of Motherwell. The well itself dates back to the mediaeval period and was linked to the foundation of St Patrick’s church. We pray that the faith carried to Ireland by St Patrick will always remain alive and vibrant in our school community.
P4a visited Motherwell Heritage Centre on Friday 15th March for an art and wellbeing workshop. The children explored a selection of paintings, dating back to the 1940’s, by local artist, Millie Frood. Our young learners participated in a guided meditation session before using the various pieces of artwork as inspiration for their own masterpieces.
As part of their current class topic, Knights & Castles, Primary 2 pupils were set a homework
task to build their own model of a castle. The children showcased their incredible models to their peers on Friday 15th March and had the opportunity to give written feedback to their friends via post-it comments. Mr Young was extremely impressed by the array of castles (one was even made out of biscuit!) and could see how much the children had enjoyed making them. Well done, Primary 2!
Pupils and staff brought a burst of colour and fun to Cathedral Primary on Friday 15th March for this year’s Crazy Hair Day. As you can see from the photographs – one from the nursery and one from each of our four learning streets – pupils and staff had great fun conjuring up an array of whacky hair styles!
As we continue to look ahead to our inspection from HMIe, which is likely to take place between now and the summer holidays, this week’s Friday Focus is on self evaluation and quality assurance.
Primary School & Nursery Class. Cathedral views self-evaluation and quality assurance as an opportunity rather than a requirement: a chance to reflect on our vision, values and aims and to take an honest look at where we are now, where we want to be, how we know we will have arrived and how we are going to get there.
Quality Assurance includes the Leadership Team monitoring teachers’ planning and pupils’ jotters as well as conducting lesson observations. The Education Scotland document ‘How Good is our School? 4’ is used to evaluated Cathedral’s current performance across a range of Quality Indicators and set our next steps. Teaching staff also collaborate in small groups called Professional Learning Communities (PLCs) to reflect on and improve their day-to-day practice.
Here in Cathedral, pupils write independently for short bursts EVERY day of the week as this allows learners across the school to apply what they’ve been learning in phonics, spelling and taught writing lessons. Mr Young was extremely impressed when he popped into a Primary 1 class just after the 9 o’clock bell on Thursday 14th March and found Cathedral’s youngest learners starting off their day with independent writing. Well done, Primary 1, on your super sentences, super spelling, super letter formation, super punctuation and super enthusiasm for your learning!
