March 26, 2024
by Mrs Maxwell
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It was World Water Day on Friday 22nd March. We know that water is vital for life and we use it every day for drinking, washing, brushing our teeth, cooking, gardening and for farming. We know how privileged we are … Continue reading
March 21, 2024
by Miss Stout
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This week the children of Fair Isle Primary went on a trip to Lerwick for two nights, staying at the Anderson High School Halls. The plane was delayed on Monday so unfortunately we missed our first swimming lesson but we … Continue reading
March 18, 2024
by Mrs Maxwell
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February was LGBTQ+ history month. Over the past year, we have learned more about the LGBTQ+ community and how attitudes have changed over the past 50 years. Last month in class, we learned about the discrimination suffered in the past. … Continue reading
March 17, 2024
by Mrs Maxwell
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We decided to hold a coffee morning for Red Nose Day on Friday 15th March. Luca and Harris designed a poster to put up in the shop. We came up with a couple of games to play. The first was … Continue reading
February 27, 2024 by Miss Stout | 0 comments
The children have studied the artist Andy Warhol this term with their art instructor, Fiona. They have developed their understanding of Pop Art and worked on various pieces. We are very impressed with their colourful vibrant work and also their attention to detail in the Campbell’s Soup tin drawings. Their eye-catching work has certainly brightened up our classroom!
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February 16, 2024 by Mrs Maxwell | 1 Comment
As part of our journey towards becoming a Rights Respecting School, we explored the ABCDE of Children’s Rights. Through this process, the children now understand that their rights are always there no matter what (unconditional) and that they apply to every child without discrimination (universal). We made a classroom display to remind us.
Our next step was to develop a charter for our school/class. We started by exploring the UNCRC (Convention or Rights for Children) articles to decide what rights felt most relevant within our school environment. Through discussion, debating and voting, the children agreed to incorporate 4 rights:
Article 12 – Respect for Children’s Views – Our children’s views will be sought on all matters concerning them. Their views will be taken seriously and considered.
Article 13 – Freedom of Expression – Our children have the right to share their views and opinions freely.
Article 29 – Aims of Education – Education should develop the personality, talents and abilities of all our pupils.
Article 31 – Rest, play, culture, arts – Our children have the right to play and rest.
A summary of Children’s rights can be found here:
https://www.unicef.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/UNCRC_summary-1_1.pdf
We then explored each of our chosen articles in turn to agree on actions for pupils and adults to uphold within each right. Together, we decided on a display to represent our Charter. The petals on the flowers are our 4 chosen rights. The leaves on the left are pupil (Duty Holders) actions and the leaves on the right are adult (Duty Bearers) actions. The roots represent the pupils and adults in our school community.
Duty Holders (pupils) will….. Duty Bearers (adults) will
(31 – Play and rest)
(29 – Aims of Education)
(13 – Freedom of Expression)
(12 – Respect for children’s views)
We included Article 12 in our charter which is one of 4 Guiding Principles of the CRC. We wanted to include the other 3 other in some way too so Article 2 (Anti-discrimination) is the rain, Article 3 (Best interests of the child) is the sun and Article 6 (Life, Survival and Development) is the soil.
Our final task was to ask every pupil and staff member to agree and sign our Charter to show our commitment to uphold it.
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January 9, 2024 by Mrs Maxwell | 0 comments
We really miss Sue who was our lovely cook for 20 years before leaving the isle last summer. As we approached the end of term, our fantastic Parent Council volunteered to cook the pupils and staff a delicious Christmas lunch on 15th December to keep the annual tradition going. Many thanks to Susannah and Eileen for the fantastic meal! They even used up the rest of our home-grown school tatties! The children wrote and sent lovely invitations to our guests and made Christmas card place-cards. Well done to Freyja for making the placemats for her final FIPS Christmas lunch!
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January 9, 2024 by Mrs Maxwell | 0 comments
The children and staff of FIPS thoroughly enjoyed performing their Christmas Concert to our isle community on Thursday 14th December! It was great fun to make, and a real team effort from all staff and children.
It all started after the October holidays. We brainstormed a Fair Isle version of the Nativity. Instead of Mary and Joseph in Nazareth, we had Magni and Merron in Lerwick who were expecting a baby. Even though it was 2023, there was a National Census requiring everyone to return to the place of their birth. Back to Fair Isle for Magni and Merron . Instead of travelling by donkey on the long and dusty road, they travelled ferry on the rough and choppy sea, as there was no chance of flying from Tingwall due to full planes or ice on the runway (common at this time of year).
We met many Fair Isle residents along the way, from the boat crew, Jimmy and Glen Dog, to three ‘wise’ crofters, Ian, Deryk and Marie, bearing gifts of lamb, veg and knitting! Magni and Merron tried different B&Bs (Burkle, South Light and Springfield – all full) before settling in Steven’s byer. The baby was named Nick – our nature-expert isle-resident Nick Riddiford was born on Christmas Day!
Fiona and the children made all the set pieces and backdrop in Art lessons. Pat and the children rehearsed the singing and chime bar accompaniment to our Good Shepherd song (to the tune of Little Donkey). With so few pupils, Hollie did a brilliant job playing herself, Josie, Steven and Marie with extraordinary quick changes in between!
We received excellent feedback from all in the community who thoroughly enjoyed the performance and the tea and mince pies afterwards, served up by our Parent Council.
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January 9, 2024 by Mrs Maxwell | 1 Comment
As a Rights Committed (UNICEF Bronze Award) school, we are generating awareness of children and people in the UK, and around the world, whose human rights may not be met for a number of reasons. This can range from natural disasters or war, to poverty and other events that can affect lives.
In addition to our UNICEF and Children in Need Coffee Morning Fundraiser in November, the pupils and staff of FIPS decided to support two further charities last term. We took part in the Blythswood Care Shoebox Appeal. Each of our families filled one or two shoeboxes for children of different ages. The boxes included a toy, toothbrush, toothpaste, soap, sweets, socks, hat, scarf and gloves. Our pupils appreciate that every day items like these can make a difference to the lives of children who cannot always afford such items.
On Thursday 7th December, we took part in Save the Children’s Christmas Jumper Day. The children enjoyed wearing Christmas clothing that day. This event introduced the children to another important charity that helps children around the world. We raised £30 which we think is brilliant for a tiny school like ours!
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November 23, 2023 by Miss Stout | 0 comments
Last week was Children in Need week, so we decided to host a coffee morning for the isle on Friday 17th November. We decided to raise money for two charities: Children in Need and UNICEF. We are learning about children’s rights this year. Through no fault of their own, children’s rights are not always met around the world. This might be because of war, natural disasters or poverty. The situation in Gaza/Israel is devastating. UNICEF is one of many charities helping to bring aid to people who need food, water and medical supplies. We are proud that we can do something to help.
For the coffee morning, we designed games such as: guess how many sweets in the jar, guess Pudsey’s birthday, an IRN BRU coin slide and an amazing raffle! Lots of people in the community gave us raffle items. Staff and parents made mouth-watering cakes and we made some tasty shortbread in school. The day before the coffee morning, we walked to the shop to buy all the ingredients plus some prizes, some raffle items and sweets for the jar. Later on, we made up the mixture and baked it in the oven. It was delicious!
On Friday morning, we set up the hall with UNICEF posters and pictures of Pudsey, along with all the tables and chairs needed. We got to wear our fantastic Children in Need T-shirts which were special because… we got to colour them in which was fun, although we don’t know what will happen to them when we wash them!
As it was Triona’s birthday, the whole hall sang happy birthday to her and she had a little cake with a candle to blow out. She turned 79.
Ander won the coin slide (again as he won this at the Harvest festival one). Neil got the closest answer for the number of sweets in a jar (96 when there were 94). Andrew won ‘guess Pudsey’s birthday’ and got a box of chocolates. Many people won raffle prizes. Eileen and Amy got huge boxes of school veg. Luca won the Fair Isle knitted hat. Gillian won the Shetland tea towel (that she put in!) and Dave and Elizabeth seemed to have very good luck! Some BT workmen came along too which was nice of them and one of the workmen won the Terry’s Mint Chocolate Orange – he kindly gave it to the school kids to share between them… yum yum!
People bought many raffle tickets and gave generous donations on the door. Thank you to Ross Thomson for his amazing donation from afar. In the end, we raised an incredible £600 that we split between the charities! What an amazing community!
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