Mr Mulligan came in and talked to us about his job as a Renewable Energy Engineer. It was fascinating to see all the different tools and materials he uses daily. We learnt the difference between waste, water and heating pipes and the different ways they would be attached – either by filing, gluing or soldering. We got to try bending a pipe using a special tool too. Mr Mulligan told us about some of the important skills for his job – for example, maths for estimating and measuring and literacy for filling out paperwork and talking to customers. He also told us a bit about the difference between working for a company or being self employed.

P4a were delighted to have a visit from Clare Prenton, who is a theatre director. We were amazed at how many different jobs there are within the creative arts industry – when Mrs Prenton directs a play she has to lead a massive team of different people (joiners, lighting engineers, vocal coaches, writers, costume designers, and loads more)! We talked about how there are jobs that would suit all interests and skills – creative types may prefer acting, writing or designing, while technical jobs may involve sound/light engineers or set designers and builders.

Today was World Book Day so we have taken part in lots of reading inspired activities: we have had lots of time to read our own books in class, and have read some of our class novel all together. We have used our Information Handling skills to show which of our class novels have been the most popular so far. On the World Book Day website there are some book quizzes, so we had a go at both the KS1 and KS2 quizzes (they’re tricky!). Finally, we thought about what our favourite books are, what happens in them, why we enjoy them and who we would recommend them to and put this all on a poster to try and persuade people to read our favourite books!

P4 shared their Inventors homework at the end of block 2 – it was fantastic to see all the hard work that had gone on at home, and to see which tasks everyone had chosen. Everyone’s homework was incredible! Mrs Stevenson and Mrs Wallace were so impressed and proud of you all!

Below are some pictures of P4a’s amazing homework – I tried my best to take a photo of all of them and include them all, but think I may have missed some. So sorry if it’s your homework I have missed!

We are going to be learning about Inventors in block 2. Here are some of the things P4 know already about Inventors:

Inventors are people that spend weeks/months/years creating cool technologies for people that need them

Someone that invents things like computers

Invented by my mum

Make new/exciting things

Work in factories

God invented the world

Alexander Fleming invented penicillin

Inventor who made medicine for smallpox – Edward Jenner

Medicine was invented

Everything has been invented except for nature

Digestive biscuits made as people were choking on other biscuits

Xbox was invented by Microsoft and Ps4 by Sony

If we didn’t have inventors we wouldn’t have beds, shops, toilets, lights, heating, phones

Animals evolved so they invented new animals

Inventing has been around for 100s of years

Discovered is different from invented

We played a game in class, for ordering and comparing numbers. We enjoyed it so much that we wanted it on the blog so we can play at home too!

http://www.sheppardsoftware.com/mathgames/placevalue/BPOrder1000.htm

Primary 4a had the task of choosing 4 things that they wanted to share with the class. They could bring anything, however they had to fit in a paper bag (and not be valuable)!

We had an amazing circle time sharing our bags, and it was a really fun and interesting way to get to know each other. Here are what P4a chose to share…

Can you work out who each bag belongs to from what they chose to share?!

Today we discussed what we are doing in our topic this block:

I know the symptoms of some common diseases caused by germs.  I can explain how they are spread and discuss how some methods of preventing and treating disease benefit society

Key words: germs, diseases, medicines, drugs

What do we know already?

Germs spread, make you sick

Medicines make you better, they’re disgusting

Washing your hands gets rid of germs

Diseases can make you ill and kill you

Diseases can be stopped with vaccinations

Germs come from other people

Medicines stop some, but not all, diseases

Germs give you cancer

Running out of penicillin as people who don’t need it are using it

Germs have little things to make them move

Headlice and dandruff make  nits go away

Germs are when you feel sick

Diseases are caused by germs

What would we like to do to learn about this?

Get Sam F’s dad into school – he is a microbiologist

Jamie’s mum come in – paramedic

Doctors come to visit

Some experiments

Class trip to BGH/Haylodge/science lab

Make our own science lab

Make pretend medicine/potions and see how it works

Find out about people researching new medicines (e.g. flowers in the rainforest)

Research germs, diseases and medicines – books, internet, ask people

Can we get a machine to see germs?

Visit Boots to look at medicine

Look at what medicines we have at home