Category Archives: Science

Health and Wellbeing, Science, Social Skills

more polycrub produce

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The beetroot is amazing this year. The children pulled it up and it has been picked and put in jars. They will get a taste after the holidays.

The carrots – not so amazing. They didn’t get the attention they needed and didn’t get thinned out as the seeds had been sown too close together. The children enjoyed laughing at how small they were but did manage to crunch a few of the bigger ones.

All the children got a sunflower and tomato plant to take home and there were plenty for some of the other classes too. More peas have been eaten and the other plants are getting cleared out before the end of term.

The children thought that next year they would like to have a plant sale and raise money to get some new trowels and tools for the polycrub.

Health and Wellbeing, Science, Social Skills

Sunflowers and Peas!

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Huge excitement today in the polycrub as the children discovered several of the sunflowers had opened up.

A lot of the peas were also ready to be picked. The children tried a few and Conan brought a tub back to the school canteen. The cooks were delighted and will serve them up with the picnic lunch on Wednesday.

Health and Wellbeing, Listening and Talking, Science, Social Skills, STEM

On Our Doorstep

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Another Monday afternoon exploring our amazing local area. A walk in the Strom Road and down to the little beach to complete  todays task…….’what can you make?’

Some groups decided to do dam building…….

Others diverted the water flow into new channels….

the children came up with so many different ideas………..

There was also time to explore the shoreline and find out what lives there.

 

 

Art and Craft, Expressive Arts, Listening and Talking, literacy, Science, STEM

The Crow and the Pitcher

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The children loved the Aesop’s fable called the Crow and the Pitcher. The primary ones made crow puppets and used jugs and glass pebbles to retell the story. They loved being videoed on the class ipad and watching it back.

The primary 2”s wrote the story and then read it to a partner who acted it out using props. This is Conans story. He did a fantastic job of spelling and remembering to include all the important parts of the story in sequence.

Health and Wellbeing, Listening and Talking, maths, Science

Polycrub Progress

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The radishes were the first thing to be ready for harvesting. They have grown really fast. The children got to take some home and the cooks at school chopped somefor the children to try at lunchtime.

The sunflowers are getting very big. The children have re-potted them and are keeping an eye on the flowers at the top to see which ones bloom first. They are measuring Laurie’s one everyday as it is the tallest at the moment.

 

They have also cleared out all the spinach. They got a little bag of leaves to take home and try and the rest has been frozen ready to add to a recipe soon.

Willum did a great job of tying up peas onto the canes. It is really exciting seeing the peapods growing now. The children are desperate to start popping them open.

The children finally got to try some peas today. So many growing now.

The polycrub looks amazing and the children work hard to water and look after the plants daily.

Art and Craft, Expressive Arts, Health and Wellbeing, Listening and Talking, Science, Social Skills, STEM

Colour in Nature

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As part of our On Our Doorstep IDL we went to explre the areas nearby the school and find different colours of plants.

The children were vary careful and only picked what they needed to work in their IDL groups to create Colour in Nature pictures. They talked about and named different types of flowers and plants they found.

The results were beautiful…….and fun!

Art and Craft, Expressive Arts, Listening and Talking, Science, Social Skills

Dandelion Art

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The children went out and looked at dandelions in the nature garden. They saw them at different stages of their lifecycles.

They looked at the dandelions using magnifying glasses to see the different parts and especially the little seeds. They watched the seeds float and fly around and learned about wind dispersal and self seeding.

They created these wonderful pieces using cut paper and paint.

Listening and Talking, Science, Social Skills

Sowing Wildflowers

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At the end of last term the children sowed wildflower seeds into pots. These have been looked after in the polycrub and were now ready to be transplanted outdoors in the wildlife garden.

Every child in the school helped to sow seeds and many of them helped to plant them out amongst the trees in the afternoon.

Health and Wellbeing, Listening and Talking, Science, Social Skills, STEM, technology

Outdoor Learning with Loose Parts

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Great teamwork  from the children working together to create a ‘hot tub’ which became a ‘chocolate flavoured hot tub’ with the addition of some mud!

The children had a snack area and enjoyed sitting together outdoors in the sunshine.

Lots of engineering going on to make the water flow around bends and pour into different containers. Also  using the water as a force to push objects down the pipes and figuring out how to make the water flow faster and slower.

Children’s imaginations are wonderful….these vehicles were taking them all over the world and beyond!

And there is always time to do a bit of climbing amongst the trees. The children learn how to do this safely and are really good at helping each other.

Art and Craft, Expressive Arts, Listening and Talking, Science, Social Skills, STEM

Lifecycles

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As part of our ‘Changes’ IDL learning the children loved the activities around lifecycles and metamorphosis. It all started with a visit to our school pond when we spotted several frogs.

The children worked in groups to create a 3D collage of a pond showing the different stages fo the lifecycle of a frog. it was lovely to see them collaborating and supporting each other with this.

The final ponds looked fantastic……..

As part of their  learning about lifecycles they discussed the transformation of a caterpillar to a butterfly. It was so much fun learning this through drama.

These are the eggs!

 

 

Out of the eggs hatch the little caterpillars

 

 

 

 

The chrysalis/cocoon/pupa hangs while the caterpillar transforms inside.

 

 

 

 

The butterflies emerge from the cocoons, dry their wings and fly away.

 

 

 

Then they lay eggs!

 

Art and Craft, Health and Wellbeing, Listening and Talking, Science, Social Skills, STEM

On Our Doorstep

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The children are learning about what is ‘On Our Doorstep’ this term so every Monday we are heading out to explore.

Our first trip out was down to Taing beach. 

During each trip out the children have a little challenge or activity to do in mixed age groups of four pupils. For this first visit the children had to collect 10 shells each and work together to create a design.

it was great to see the pupils of different ages working together on this task.

Art and Craft, Health and Wellbeing, Listening and Talking, maths, Science, Social Skills, STEM

Kites STEM Challenge

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The children worked in pairs to create a kite using a variety of materials. Lots of skills were being developed through this activity – for example collaboration, co-operation, problem solving, listening etc.

The wind was blowing so it was great to go and test the kites. The children soon found out that in order to fly the kites well they had to work together.

Listening and Talking, maths, Science, Social Skills, STEM

Measuring Rainfall

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The children worked in mixed groups to make rain gauges to measure rainfall.

They then had to find a suitable position outdoors to place their rain gauge and dig a hole to place it in to keep it stable.

There was a lot of excitement around the pond as they all spotted our very large resident frog!

We will go out at regular intervals to check on the rainfall and record the results in class.

Listening and Talking, literacy, Science, Social Skills, STEM

Water Experiments

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The children have loved setting up and learning about the properties of water experiments.

  • They had great fun doing evaporation experiments and talking about the results.
  • They froze little creatures and dinosaurs into ice blocks and spent time chipping away and getting the ice to melt to get them out again. Learning that water can be a solid, a liquid and gas called water vapour from the earlier experiments.

They have enjoyed investigating ice and creating habitats with the polar animals.

 

Art and Craft, Expressive Arts, Listening and Talking, literacy, maths, numeracy, Science, Social Skills, STEM

Halloween Fun

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Halloween is always so much fun and lends itself so well to the classroom with exciting fun learning opportunities. Below the children created a potion with many disgusting ingredients, using magic words and actually getting it to bubble up and overflow the cauldron. The potion made lots of weird and interesting things happen. Children are so creative and imaginative.

They wrote out their chosen ingredients and shared spells with each other.

The primary ones had to use their phonic sounds and choose the correct ingredients to read magic words.

The classroom has a Haunted House area with lots of Halloween creatures and costumes to use.

There have been a few disgusting days in the water tray with slime and goo, full of spiders and snakes. And other opportunities to measure weigh and create bottles of potions with different materials.

The children can’t wait to scare their parents with these ‘teethy’ symmetrical pumpkins!

and the spooky bat prints!

 

 

Listening and Talking, numeracy, Science, Social Skills, STEM

Making Boats Float

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After looking at different types of boats and discussing what it is that makes them float the children had the task of making their own ones. They focused on making a hollow shape that could balance in the water.

They worked in pairs to make their designs.

Then each boat was tested to see how well it could float as the load got heavier.

They practised counting the marbles that each boat could hold.

These are the results next to the names of their boats…….

Health and Wellbeing, Listening and Talking, literacy, maths, Science, Social Skills, STEM

Loose Parts in the Sun

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We are very lucky at Whiteness Primary to have such excellent outdoor spaces that provide  rich environments for learning. Today we focused on using the loose parts in the shed to build, experiment and play. It is amazing seeing how the children use the various resources to create, solve problems and develop more flexible thinking.

Firstly the children thought about what they needed and took the materials they needed to an area they wanted to play/develop.

There was lots of discussion, collaboration and physical work to gather materials.

The children worked together to solve problems, develop ideas and negotiate. The spaces they created were fantastic and they had so much fun.

We also had snack in the new polycrub, which was lovely but quite hot.

Lots of the children were involved in using a series of pipes and  guttering to get water to flow down a slope. There were so many peerie engineers helping and coming up with ideas and solutions to problems. They were so excited when each new section worked and they just wanted to make it even longer.

Health and Wellbeing, Listening and Talking, Science, Social Skills, Social Studies

Strom Road Wander

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Another beautiful morning in Whiteness so we set off along the Strom Road for a walk and a little adventure.

The children were so sensible when crossing the road and listened really well as we chatted and played games as we walked.

We listened for the yeti’s belly rumbling and the children had great imaginations for where he would have a bath or shower and where he lived.

We headed to the ‘mountain’ where the children loved climbing and exploring.

What a beautiful place we live in. The children took time to look around them and be aware of the plants, animals, colours and landscape in front of them.

River and Willum were first to the top of the ‘mountain’.

But we all got there eventually.

 

Art and Craft, Listening and Talking, maths, Science, Social Skills, STEM

Make it fly

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The children had a STEM activity this afternoon after discussing how birds fly.

First they had some simple instructions to follow . It was lovely to see the children helping each other with the tricky bits.

once they had made them they went outside to try them out.