🌟 Primary 3/4 Weekly Round-Up – Term 4, Week Four

✏️ Literacy

We continued our Magical Door writing theme this week, exploring a new world: Jungle World. On Monday morning, we arrived to find sand at the bottom of the door, an animal footprint, some bananas, and a mysterious note!

This sparked lots of excitement and led to some fantastic writing. The children created fact files about the jungle and animal profiles about jungle animals, linking our learning to Global Goal 15 – Life on Land.

We have also been learning how to peer review and edit with a partner. This has been lots of fun and is a great way to spot mistakes, make improvements, and add more detail to our work.

Following our literacy focus last term, we were very excited to receive a letter back from Julia Donaldson. We had written lovely letters to her telling her all about our favourite books. She also kindly sent us some stickers!

In grammar, we continued our work on pronouns through pronoun art and a pronoun phrase mix activity. We also worked on comprehension using Story Blast and Ninja Comprehension, exploring texts about the United Kingdom and Mahatma Gandhi, with a focus on filling in missing information and checking understanding.

💻 ICT

In ICT, we finished our personal research projects. The children used Kiddle to research their chosen topics and then learned how to use PowerPoint to present their information clearly to the class.

🔢 Maths

In maths, we continued learning about money, building our understanding of coins, values, and how things are bought and sold. This links closely to our Building a Business Together topic.

We also continued working on column subtraction with exchanging, and developed our doubling and halving Speed Skills. The children created beautiful doubling flowers to help show their understanding.

🌍 Topic – Building a Business

Our business topic continued through our money work, helping us understand how money is used in real-life situations such as buying and selling in a café.

🌱 Wider Learning

On Friday, we had a full David Attenborough Day to celebrate his 100th birthday. We read the Little People, Big Dreams book about David Attenborough, watched clips from some of his documentaries, and learned more about his life and work.

The children created fact plaques, made mini animal documentaries, and recorded a birthday message video. We also created large leaf art pieces, adding our own promises to the planet, which we hope to turn into a tree for our classroom door. The full film will be shared with families by email.

We also enjoyed attending the P4/5 assembly on Friday, and another group visited the polytunnel this week to help with planting and support our school community.

🎨 Play Provision

Our play provision this week has included lots of creativity and imagination. The children enjoyed dressing up, creating and performing with a puppet theatre, and developing their observational art skills through still life drawings of daffodils using watercolours.

🌟 Primary 3/4 Weekly Round-Up – Term 4, Week Three

✏️ Literacy

This week we continued our exciting Magical Door writing theme. When the children came into the classroom, they discovered that Mrs Teale’s spoon had turned into a giant spoon, leading us to imagine that the world behind the magical door was a giant world! It wasn’t so good for eating her lunch!!

This sparked lots of creativity, and the children wrote about the dangers they might face in a giant world, thinking carefully about how everyday objects might become challenges. They then wrote a diary entry titled “My First Day in Giant World,” describing their experiences and feelings as they explored this new and unusual place.

In grammar, we focused on pronouns, taking part in fun games to help us identify and use them correctly in our writing.

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🔤 Spelling

Our spelling focus this week was the ‘au’ sound. Everyone is enjoying using Sumdog Spelling to consolidate their new words. Who’s been having a go at home?

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🔢 Maths

At the start of the week, we continued our work on fractions, building on our understanding of parts of a whole.

We then moved on to a new topic of money, where the children explored coins and notes, looking at what they look like, how they feel, and how much they are worth. We discussed how values work (for example, 100p = £1) and took part in hands-on activities to support understanding.

The children also used Sumdog to consolidate their learning through interactive activities focused on coin recognition.

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💻 ICT / Languages

This week we had fun combining movement and language through a French yoga session, helping the children practise their French in an active and engaging way.

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🌍 Topic – Building a Business

As part of our Building a Business topic, we focused on the skills and qualities we each have that could help us in our café.

We discussed different job roles within a café and how our personal skills could match these roles. The children began thinking about how they might apply for a job in the café and what they would need to do to be successful in that role.

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🥣 Health & Wellbeing (RSHP)

We began our RSHP learning, focusing on important life skills. This included:

• Recognising and understanding feelings
• Learning about healthy behaviours
• Exploring friendships and relationships
• Knowing how to seek help and stay safe

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🌱 Wider Learning

We were very lucky to enjoy a visit from the Shetland Folk Festival, where the children experienced a live concert. It was a fantastic opportunity to enjoy music and culture together.

We have also begun visiting the polytunnel, where small groups of children will take part in planting over the coming weeks. Our first group went this week and had lots of fun helping with planting and learning about how things grow. We are looking forward to everyone getting a turn!

With the lovely weather this week, we also made the most of outdoor play, enjoying time outside and staying active.

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🎨 Play Provision

Our play provision this week has been very hands-on and engaging. The children explored a tinkering table using tools and an old till to investigate how things work, developing problem-solving and practical skills.

We also set up a shop role-play area, where the children used money to practise their maths skills in a real-life context. This supported their understanding of money while encouraging collaboration, communication and imaginative play.

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It has been another busy and creative week, with lots of excitement and enthusiasm across all areas of learning!

🌟 Primary 3/4 Weekly Round-Up – Term 4, Week Two

✏️ Literacy

This week in literacy, our spelling focus has been the soft ‘g’ sound. We have also introduced Sumdog spelling, which the children have been using in class and can continue to practise at home as part of their homework.

Our writing this week has continued with our exciting Magical Door theme. The children arrived to find part of the classroom had been turned upside down, with the suggestion that gravity had been switched off when the magical door opened!  Mrs Teale had had a traumatic morning when the gravity had gone off and  great hilarity followed when they saw  the photo Miss Hunter took of her floating around the classroom(and yes, it’s been added to the blog images as per the children’s request!)It has created lots of excitement and curiosity across the school this week.

Using images and discussion prompts, the children wrote imaginative pieces about what might happen if gravity was turned off, describing objects floating and unusual events taking place. Alongside this, they also created fact files about gravity, learning about how it works in real life. This learning has been linked to the Global Goals, particularly thinking about how our world works and how we can care for it.

We also continued developing our comprehension skills using Story Blast, with a focus on understanding and responding to texts.

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🌍 Global Learning

This week we also celebrated Earth Day. We read the story Michael Recycle and created some beautiful artwork linked to caring for the environment. This tied in well with our ongoing focus on the Global Goals, encouraging the children to think about how they can help look after our planet.

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🔢 Maths

In maths, we have continued our work on fractions. This week we explored fractions of amounts, using practical resources such as pom-poms and counters to help us visualise and understand how to find fractions of a group. The children are developing a good understanding of how fractions apply in real-life contexts.

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💻 ICT

In ICT, we continued our research projects using the Kiddle search engine. The children have been developing their skills in safe searching and using key words to find information. They are now working towards turning their research into PowerPoint presentations, which they will present to the class.

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🍳 Topic – Building a Business

As part of our topic “Building a Business Together,” we have continued developing our café project. This week, we explored different job roles and responsibilities within a café and discussed what makes a café run successfully. We also looked at the different skills and abilities each job role would require.

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🍰 Wider Learning

On Monday afternoons, we have been enjoying baking sessions with Miss Farmer as part of our café topic. This week the children made tiffin, following a recipe and working together in groups.

While some groups were baking, others worked with Mrs Teale on Story Blast comprehension tasks, ensuring everyone had the opportunity to develop both practical and literacy skills.

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🥣 Health & Wellbeing

This week we took part in a Healthy Living Breakfast in the hall, where the children had the opportunity to try a range of foods and discuss what makes a healthy breakfast.

We also began our RSHP lessons, with a focus on keeping our bodies clean.  helping to build confidence and understanding in important areas of health and wellbeing.

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It has been another busy and exciting week, with lots of creativity, teamwork and curiosity across all areas of learning!

🌟 Primary 3/4 Weekly Round-Up – Term 4, Week One

✏️ Literacy

This week in literacy, we have been focusing on grammar, specifically proper and common nouns, and continuing to build our understanding of how these are used in our writing.

In comprehension, we began using Ninja Comprehension, with a focus on sequencing skills, helping us to order events clearly and understand the structure of texts.

Our writing focus this week has been introduced through a mysterious magical door that appeared in our classroom! The children have been full of excitement, imagining where the door could lead and what might be behind it. We have linked this to the Global Goals, encouraging the children to think about different places in the world and how we can help people and protect our planet. This has led to some very creative ideas and discussions, which we will continue to develop in our writing.

We have also continued working with the Highland Literacy approach to spelling, focusing on syllables, rhyme, parts of speech, prefixes and suffixes. This week we introduced Sumdog spelling practice, as well as more targeted worksheets, to support and challenge the children in their learning. The children can also continue practising their spelling on Sumdog at home as part of their homework, helping to reinforce what we have been learning in class.

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🔢 Maths

In maths, we have continued our work on column subtraction, building on our previous learning and developing confidence in setting out our calculations clearly.

We also introduced fractions using practical resources such as pom-poms in bags to explore different parts of a whole. The children learned about numerators and denominators and began to understand where fractions are used in real-life contexts.

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💻 ICT

This week in ICT, we learned about safe searching online and how to use key words effectively when researching information. Each child chose a topic to research and used Kiddle to create their own research paper. These will be used to create PowerPoint presentations, which the children will share with the class.

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🌍 Topic – Building a Business

We have started our new topic, “Building a Business Together.” Firstly, we started looking at hygiene and our baking skills by making chocolate crispies. We discussed the difference in making it for ourselves and the extra steps required for making for others or to sell.

 We also discussed what we already know about cafés and shared our ideas as a class. We created a class mind map titled “What do we need for a café?”, thinking about elements such as food, drinks, staff, menus, money, customers and safety.

They all came up with some amazing ideas and I think they are all future business entrepreneurs!

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🚢 Wider Learning

As part of our wider learning, Mrs Smith led a session on the anniversary of the Titanic sinking. The children explored Morse code and created detailed drawings of the Titanic, linking history with creativity.

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🎨 Play Projects

Our play project this week was inspired by the Titanic, linking to our wider learning. The children showed fantastic creativity, creating:

• Games and quizzes
• PowerPoints and digital images
• Spot the difference activities
• Junk models and block constructions of the Titanic

It was wonderful to see the children working collaboratively, sharing ideas, and applying their learning through play.

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🎨 Wider Life of the School

We have also been busy creating a bright and welcoming classroom door display to start the new term. The display is based on crayons, representing a colourful and positive term ahead.

Each child designed their own unique crayon, including a self-portrait and their own personal goals for the term. This has helped set a positive tone for the term and encouraged the children to think about what they would like to achieve.

Our January to March term in PE was very busy.  P3/4 did 4 weeks of dance, 2 weeks of handball and 6 weeks of swimming.

Dance

In our dance block, pupils explored how to use movement to express ideas. We focused on:

• Using imagination and responding to different stimuli
• Travelling, stillness, shapes, jumps and gestures
• Changing rhythm, speed, level and direction
• Repeating patterns in movement
• Showing expression and confidence

The children had great fun experimenting with creative movement and performing short sequences.

Handball

During handball, we concentrated on building sending and receiving skills and aiming. We also practised moving into space to make successful passes and talked about how handball is a fast‑paced, exciting team game.

Swimming

The pupils worked really hard developing their ability in front crawl, back crawl and breaststroke.  We also worked on water confidence skills including jumping in, going under and floating.

🌟 Primary 3/4 Weekly Round-Up – Term 3, Week Twelve

Literacy

This week we rounded off our Julia Donaldson focus by writing a letter to Julia Donaldson. In our letters, we shared how much we have enjoyed her books, talked about our favourite stories and characters, and even asked her some thoughtful questions. It was lovely to see the children reflect on their learning and express their ideas in a meaningful way.

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 Maths

In maths this week, we revisited column addition and subtraction, building confidence in setting out our work clearly and accurately.

We also created our own Top Trumps cards based on the mix-up animals we designed previously. The children thought carefully about giving fair and reasonable ratings  combining creativity with numeracy skills.

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 Topic – People Who Help Us

This week we finished our learning about medical emergency services and medicine safety. The children developed a better understanding of how medicines should be used safely and who helps us when we are unwell.

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Class Novel

We finished our class novel, The Wild Robot, and enjoyed watching the movie as an end-of-term treat.

To add to the excitement, we took part in an Easter egg hunt around the school and grounds, collecting treats to enjoy while watching the film.

We continued the theme of robots into this week’s play projects and the children created some brilliant models, pictures, drawings and digital  creations.

We also took a class vote for next terms class novel – The Explorer by Katherine Rundell won!

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Wider Life of the School

We ended the term with Big Play, where the children had the opportunity to play across all classrooms with the whole school. It was wonderful to see them interacting with different age groups, building friendships, and showing great behaviour as role models.

They also enjoyed a visit from the P5,6,7 class who were sharing their knowledge their topic with the class including interactive and games and fun.

🌟 Primary 3/4 Weekly Round-Up – Term 3, Week Eleven

✏️ Literacy & Writing

Our spelling sound this week was ‘ie’.

Our writing focus was inspired by Monkey Puzzle by Julia Donaldson. The children took part in a fun animal mix-up art activity, where they created their own imaginary animals using parts from different creatures — from giraffe heads to mermaid tails!

They then wrote a detailed fact file about their new animal, including where it lives, what it looks like, what it eats, and whether it has any special powers. It was fantastic to see their creativity and descriptive writing skills develop.

We also explored opinion and reasoning in writing. The children were asked: “Would you rather be your animal or Mrs Teale’s animal?” They had to clearly state their opinion and give reasons to support their answer, developing their ability to justify their thinking.

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🔢 Maths

In maths this week, we focused on consolidating our learning. We:

• Continued practising times tables

• Completed some assessments

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🎭 Assembly Preparation

We performed our Maths Spectacular Assembly today and it all went amazingly well! The children showed fantastic confidence and teamwork, and we are incredibly proud of them.

Throughout the week, we focused on developing key performance skills, including:

• Bringing the performance to life through expression and confidence

• Using props effectively

• Understanding how music enhances performance

• Learning about stage positioning and each person’s role

It was wonderful to see all of their hard work come together. A video link will be sent out so you can enjoy the performance too!

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🏊 Wider Learning

We enjoyed another swimming session this week, with just one week left to go. The children continue to show great enthusiasm and confidence in the water.

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🌍 Topic – People Who Help Us

This week we had several exciting visitors linked to our topic.

We learned about germs and hygiene with a visit from Environmental Health. The children used special Glow Bug handwashing kits to see which areas they had missed when washing their hands, helping them understand the importance of effective handwashing.

We also welcomed paramedics, who spoke about their role and what their job involves. The children asked thoughtful and interesting questions, showing great engagement with the topic.

Our class roadmap display is now up on the wall, showcasing the different emergency services and the important roles they play in helping others.

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🧪 STEM Learning

As part of St Patrick’s Day, we took part in a STEM challenge based on the story How to Catch a Leprechaun.

Working in small groups, the children designed and built their own leprechaun traps, developing skills in:

• Problem-solving

• Teamwork and communication

• Measuring and building

• Creative thinking

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🎨 Play Projects

Our play project this week, led by Miss Farmer, was based on the rainforest, linking to our Monkey Puzzle learning.

The children showed fantastic creativity, building:

• Rainforest homes and habitats

• Digital creations and presentations

• Large construction models

One particularly impressive creation was a forest scene complete with a flowing waterfall. It was wonderful to see the children working collaboratively, using imagination, and applying their learning through play.

🌟 Primary 3/4 Weekly Round-Up – Term 3, Week Ten

✏️ Literacy & Writing

Our spelling sound this week was ‘ai’. Our writing was inspired by The Scarecrow’s Wedding by Julia Donaldson. We zoomed in on the crows in the story, imagining what they might have been up to and using adjectives, adverbs, and punctuation to make our writing more descriptive.

We also looked at a non-fiction fact file about scarecrows, learning about the difference between fiction and non-fiction texts.

On Friday we used Play-Doh to explore sentence structure and punctuation in a hands-on way. The children created punctuation marks and used them to build sentences while listening to a short story about a Viking who liked icing, which made the activity both creative and memorable.

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🔢 Maths

In maths we continued developing our understanding of the jump strategy, this time applying it to subtraction. The children practised moving along number lines and explaining their thinking as they solved problems.

We also continued exploring ordinal numbers and introduced fractions, using Play-Doh to model and divide shapes into equal parts. This practical approach helped the children visualise halves and quarters more clearly.

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🌍 Topic – People Who Help Us

Our topic work continued this week with a focus on emergency services. The children learned about how to make a 999 call and took part in role play activities where they practised being both the caller and the call handler. This helped them understand what information is important in an emergency situation.

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🎭 Assembly Preparation

We are nearly ready for our Maths Spectacular Assembly next week. This week we finished creating our props, tried on costumes, and continued rehearsing our lines and drama scenes. The children are working very hard and are excited to perform.

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🐉 Wider Learning

On Friday we had a special visit from the SMUHA Vikings, who were in great voice and brought lots of energy and excitement to the morning. In the afternoon we held our own galley burning ceremony, linking to the local traditions.

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🎨 Play Provision

This week’s play included;

• Large construction play using giant Lego blocks

• Viking-themed play with the galley returning to the classroom

• Creative craft activities where the children made kindness cards and Mother’s Day cards to share with others and take home

These activities encouraged creativity, collaboration, and kindness.

🌟 Primary 3/4 Weekly Round-Up – Term 3, Week Nine

✏️ Literacy & Spelling

This week in spelling we focused on the suffix “able.” We continued building our understanding of prefixes and suffixes and how they can change both the structure of a word and its meaning. The children have really enjoyed exploring new vocabulary and thinking carefully about how words are formed.

Our new traffic light spelling system has also been introduced. This allows children to identify words they feel confident with, words they are still practising, and words they want to research further. It has been fantastic to see the children taking ownership of their learning by investigating unfamiliar words and expanding their vocabulary.

In writing, our work was inspired by The Highway Rat by Julia Donaldson. The children wrote news reports about the capture of the Highway Rat, creating exciting alliterative headlines to hook the reader.

We also completed a joint ICT and writing activity, where the children worked in pairs to design comic strips retelling the story in sequence. This task helped develop their understanding of narrative structure while building digital creativity and teamwork skills.

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🔢 Maths

In maths this week we continued developing our understanding of the jump strategy for addition, helping the children strengthen their confidence when solving addition problems using number lines and mental strategies.

We also consolidated our understanding of odd and even numbers, as well as greater than and less than, reinforcing number sense and comparison skills.

This week we also explored ordinal numbers. To help make this concept practical and engaging, the children held races using wind-up toys, observing which toy came first, second, third, and so on. This helped them understand that ordinal numbers describe position in a sequence rather than quantity.

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💻 ICT

We continued developing our ICT skills this week. As part of our writing work, the children created comic strips on the computer retelling The Highway Rat.

We also used Story Blast to work on comprehension activities such as word sorting and sentence building, helping to strengthen reading and grammar skills.

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🌍 Topic – People Who Help Us

This week we began our new topic: People Who Help Us, focusing particularly on emergency services.

The class worked together to create a large roadmap display for our classroom wall. Each child created:

• A building where a helper might work (for example, a police station, fire station or hospital)

• A picture of the person who works there

• A short explanation describing what they do and how they help others

We will continue adding to this roadmap over the coming weeks as we learn more about different roles in our community.

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🎭 Assembly Preparation

We are continuing to work hard preparing for our upcoming Maths Spectacular Assembly. Scripts have now gone home so the children can practise their lines, and we have begun creating some fantastic props for the performance.

So far the class has created:

• Number cards

• Angle cards

• A large opening display sign

The children also have some exciting ideas for a large prop, which we hope to begin creating next week.

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🐶 Visitors and Wider Learning

On Friday we had a visit from Dogs Against Drugs, where the children learned about the important work these dogs do and how they help support communities. It was a very interesting session and the children asked some excellent questions.

Our Primary 4 pupils also took part in a STEM activity day, where they explored coding and robotics. They worked with small programmable robots, learning how to code them to move and complete tasks while thinking about accuracy, measurement, and problem-solving.

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🎨 Play Provision

This week’s play provision included Barbies, dolls and doll’s houses, which were voted for by the class. The children engaged in imaginative role play, storytelling and collaborative play.

There has also been a big interest in jigsaws and board games, with children working together to solve puzzles and play cooperatively, developing patience, teamwork and problem-solving skills.

Alongside this, we continued exploring construction activities and times tables challenges, allowing the children to practise both creativity and numeracy skills during play.

🌟 Primary 3/4 Weekly Round-Up – Term 3, Week Eight

✏️ Literacy & Spelling

This week our literacy focus was inspired by Stick Man by Julia Donaldson. The children imagined that Stick Man was something special — perhaps a magic wand, a sword, or another powerful object — and wrote creatively about what it could become. It was fantastic to see their imagination and descriptive writing skills shine.

Our grammar focus this week was on capital letters and full stops. We even learned a little dance to help us remember when and how to use them correctly! The children then applied this knowledge carefully in their writing.

We also wrote our own newspaper reports, focusing on using alliteration in our headlines. The task was to create catchy titles using repeated initial sounds, and the children produced some fantastic, eye-catching examples.

In spelling, all of our spelling words this week contained the suffixes “less” and “ness.” We explored how these suffixes change the meaning of root words and practised using them accurately in our writing.

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🔢 Maths

In maths, we introduced the jump strategy for addition, using practical and visual approaches to help us understand how numbers move along a number line. The children showed growing confidence in applying this strategy independently.

We continued consolidating our understanding of place value with another lively round of Place Value Bingo, and we extended our shape work with Mrs Smith.

This week we also explored odd and even numbers, learning how to look at the last digit of a number to decide whether it is odd or even. We read a fun story about Monster Odd and Fairy Even, and played games to help embed our understanding.

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💻 ICT

We continued developing our coding skills using Code.org, building on our sequencing and problem-solving skills. The children are becoming increasingly confident at debugging when something doesn’t work the first time and understanding the importance of giving clear and precise instructions.

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🏊 Wider Learning

We enjoyed another visit to Sandwick Library before heading to swimming. The children continue to show great enthusiasm and responsibility during these outings.

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🎭 Assembly Preparation

We have begun preparing for our upcoming Maths Spectacular Assembly. The children will be sharing their maths learning with the rest of the school through drama. This week we enjoyed drama sessions to begin rehearsing, developing ideas, and working collaboratively on our performance.

We also attended the P1-2 assembly, where we listened respectfully and enjoyed learning about what they have been working on in their class.

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🧠 Dough Discovery Session

We ended our week with a busy and creative Dough Discovery session, which included a range of mini challenges linked to our recent learning. The children:

• Measured and compared lengths

• Created 3D shapes to consolidate our shape work

• Formed punctuation marks out of dough

• Built a bridge strong enough to hold counters

• Designed an animal habitat

The session ended with a lively Dough Disco, where children took turns leading dance moves using their dough along to music — a brilliant mix of creativity, teamwork and fun.

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🎨 Play Provision

Our play provision this week was inspired by Chinese New Year. The children explored:

• Noodles and tongs for sorting and fine motor challenges

• Chinese New Year crafts

• Large traffic light signs

Our Play Project focus this week was vehicles, which linked perfectly with the traffic lights and cones. The children created detailed digital vehicle pictures using Paint, built vehicles with blocks, designed car washes, and tested imaginative transport creations. It was fantastic to see such creativity, collaboration, and problem-solving in action.