Primary 7 were the first year group to use Cathedral’s new Investigation & Innovation Hub. Their challenge was to work in teams to design a kite and, after a week of designing, constructing and modifying, our young engineers headed out into the playground on Friday 22nd August to try them out.
The winning team learned from their mistakes during the course of the week, quickly realising that a flat kite wouldn’t work. After doing a bit of research on kites, they modified their design by constructing a square-based pyramid skeleton and covering this with crepe paper, a material which would catch the air without weighing the kite down. Ingenious!
Here are just a few comments from our Primary 7 learners:
“I loved the round ‘Spark Session’ table where our group brainstormed ideas straight onto the table to get our project started.”
“I liked being able to use a dry-wipe marker to write my ideas and designs straight onto the walls. This made them easy to refer to.”
“I really enjoyed working as a team with my co-operative learning group.”
Primary 1a learners visited Cathedral’s fantastic library for the first time on Friday 22nd August. Our eager readers each chose a book to enjoy in the reading wood before they voted for ‘The Baddies’ by Julia Donaldson to be read aloud by Mrs Laird.
Primary 7 were the very first stage to visit Cathedral’s new Investigation & Innovation Hub on Tuesday 19th August, which has been set up to help take forward Priority 1 in this year’s School Improvement Plan. The hub is an exciting new space for Cathedral learners to collaborate in investigation, enquiry, problem solving and open-ended projects with the aim of developing the four creativity skills:
Primary 7’s first open-ended challenge, carried out in co-operative learning groups, is to design and construct a kite which they’ll test out, adapt and modify later in the week.
Our August – December Family Learning programme has now been finalised. The first ‘universal’ parent workshop, for Primary 1 parents and carers, will focus on phonics and literacy. This takes place on Tuesday 9th September. This is only a few weeks away, so please make a careful note of the date in your diary.
Primary 4a explored the power of words during Health & Wellbeing on Monday 18th August. Mrs Cassidy squeezed a tube of toothpaste onto the desk to help the children understand that once negative or hurtful words are out our mouths, they can’t be taken back and the damage is done. However, one of our Primary 4 learners noticed the toothpaste beginning to form a love heart: a reminder that we should always show our school value of LOVE and, if we do happen to say something that hurts someone, use loving words and loving actions to repair the damage.
To mark Cathedral Primary’s 150th anniversary, Fr Lamb presented a special chasuble to the school during Mass on Friday 15th August. The chasuble, brought all the way back from Rome by Fr Lamb, features an image of Blessed Carlo Acutis, someone particularly dear to Cathedral pupils. Carlo Acutis will be canonised by Pope Leo XIV on 7th September, becoming the first millennial saint.
The Scottish Government has established a new ‘Centre for Teaching Excellence’, based in the University of Glasgow, and Mr Young has accepted a six-month part-time secondment to the centre. From the beginning of September, Mr Young will be in Cathedral Primary School on a Monday, Tuesday and Friday and work with the ‘Centre for Teaching Excellence’ on a Wednesday and Thursday. This arrangement will allow him to start and finish each week here in Cathedral. Mrs Duffy will be Acting Head Teacher on the two days Mr Young is out of school.
Bishop Joseph Toal has written to parents and carers who have enrolled their child in a Catholic school within the diocese of Motherwell. A copy of the letter was sent to Cathedral’s new Primary 1 parents and carers on Friday 15th August and the letter can also be accessed via the link below.
Cathedral learners bounded through the school gate on the morning of Thursday 14th August with their usual smiles and enthusiasm. Once in class, they got straight down to their learning and Mr Young was impressed to see jotters open and pencils being put to paper even before the children headed out for morning break.
Our twelve new House Captains, who were elected by their peers back in June, are eager to get started and will meet formally for the first time at the beginning of next week.