We have got a new Teacher. She is called Miss Barradas. She is really nice and has got some great ideas on what we need to do.

We all had a trip to Reawick beach. Mrs Smith had a  really cool toilet that looked a bit like a photocopier.

We had some really good fun

We were lucky to get a visit from one of the big fire tenders.

We all got to have a go at the hose as well as having a good look around the vehicle.

Mr Renwick got very wet helping us squirt the water.

Today was a bit of a sad day as we had to say goodbye to Miss Thomason we will all miss her.  She was our Student Teacher for seven weeks.

Primary 5, 6 and 7 made her a lovely necklace out of resin.

We did some experiments over lockdown to reduce friction and to make things travel further.

When we were all back in school we discussed the science behind friction (as well as when friction is beneficial). We undertook some experiments using some of the amazing resources that came from SSERC.

We had to find out if friction would help our wind up dinosaurs climb the slope.

We made our hypothesis and set to work.

We were in three groups and  to begin with we left the plastic track flat. We measured how far the dinosaur got. We then raised the track onto a block and measured how far it went. Finally we raised the track onto two blocks and measured. We then used various materials to try and increase the friction  to allow the dinosaur to pass the first measured distance.

To make the test fair we  wound the dinosaur the same number of times and used a piece of paper so that blocks and track were in the same place each time. This meant that the slope would be the same each time.

Well after our first eggsciting experiment we were ready for part two.

For this one we had to design a launcher  to chuck our egg the furthest and the egg had to still survive the impact.

We decided on three things that we got points for…

These were:

points for furthest distance

points for egg survival

we also wanted points for the best looking egg protection system or launcher.

Once again we worked hard on our designs, choosing suitable materials for the launcher and the protection system.

Some launchers and capsules were very good looking indeed!

Some designs were complex and others simple.

We even had an elastic powered  rocket!

Once again we had great fun, Miss Thomason said that she was very impressed at how hard we worked on this.

We found that the simplest designs worked the most effectively. We also found out that we needed to spend time on both parts of the problem and not just on one.

As we really enjoy making things in Skeld Mr. Renwick decided that we should try and protect an egg from breaking. We had done a drop test during lockdown and were ready to try a more effective re-entry vehicle to save our egg.

The Great Egg Drop

Go to this Sway

Instead of dropping the egg, this time it would be thrown into the air to test our capsules.

We worked in teams to design the most effective and, in some cases, attractive egg protection system.

We had to think about the properties of materials as well as our work on parachutes.

Our hard work was then taken outside and Mr. Renwick threw them up into the air as hard as he could… he even left the ground!

Most of the eggs survived, but sadly we couldn’t save them all. 🙁

We really enjoyed doing this Eggsperiment and want to try some more.

Our topic this term was to be animation, with making an animated feature for our Christmas play. sadly it was not to be as the software was being uncooperative. We did make our own early animation devices though.

We made a:

thaumatrope

Flickbook

zoetrope

Phenakistiscope

there are some amazing phenakistiscope here

We decided to enter the  Young Writers Peculiar Pets competition. All of our poems were chosen to be added to the book.

Here we are with our certificates…

We used our knowledge of nets to make different shaped boxes and crackers. we boxed up our sweeties in some awesome snowmen.

We added toys, jokes and a snapper to the crackers. We found Mr Renwick’s  new favourite joke.

What is E.T. short for?

Because he only has little legs!

We also used our creativity to decorate the classroom.