Hello Everyone

We had great fun yesterday when Alan Maybury from Hibs Football Club came to give us a football skills session.  It was a bit cooler outside but we soon warmed up with lots of running around and games.  A big thank you to Mr Maybury and his colleague Andy for coming in.

More hard work was on the cards today when we became gardeners.  The whole class was involved in tidying the playground and spreading out wood chips in the garden area at the side of the school.  With the nice weather we have been using the area for Golden Time so it was good to be able to give it a spruce up.  We were rewarded with delicious ice lollies from Mrs Jamieson.  The ice lollies were great because they helped us think extra hard during our writing planning session about a flashback story about being stuck in a bottle.

Bye for now P4l

Time really is whizzing by, it is hard to believe there are only 3 weeks left in P4.  This week we have been reading our class novel Four Children and It.  We are enjoying the book as lots of things keep happening.  The story is all about 4 children who have wishes granted my a strange creature called a Psammead.  The Psammead is a sand creature which is in a sand pit in a park.  We are planning to go for a picnic over at the park in the last week of term and see if there are any Psammeads in Balbardie Park.  In writing this week we went all spooky carrying on a story starter called ‘The Ghosts’.  We had to carry the story on in the style of the author, it was a tricky job but we did our best and had great results. Maths was all about division and we took it to the next level looking at dividing numbers with remainders.  Because we have worked so hard on our times table it was no problem for us.  We finished with Golden Time in the sun and here we are enjoying ourselves.

This week has been short yet packed with different things to do. We learnt how to make sentences more interesting and exciting in writing.

We saw the difference between a healthy lung and a cancerous lung. It did not look godd. We definitely want to have healthy lungs and heart and found out how to do that.

We worked in groups for our topic. working as a group meant we had to listen to each other, everyone had to have a fair turn and we also had to cooperate with each other. We used these skills in our topic work where we finally finished measuring our lung capacities and also whilst working in Health & wellbeing with our ‘Cool in School’ topic. We’ve found that we work well when we listen to each other.

We went bowling this week and found that we had all improved with our skills. Whoever got the closest to the jack with their bowl, went first and also got to roll the ‘Jack’.

Enjoy the weekend!

As we have been learning about ‘Being Cool in School’, some of us have tried to use these skills in and around school to successfully resolve issues.

In maths we are learning about measurement as this ties in with finding out the length of our limbs and our lung capacity. We have measured and marked our bottles for our experiment to find out our lung capacity so next week we will complete the experiments.

In writing we are still working on comics and having great fun in the process.

Bowling has been great fun. we have improved so much in just two sessions! Some of us can get very close to the ‘jack’ although Mrs Ghafoor could not get anywhere near the ‘jack’!

Enjoy your weekend!

Hello Everyone

Thank you to everyone who commented on our blog last week, it was great to hear about the things people are enjoying. 

This week we are going to have a blog home learning challenge.  Below is a short sentence and your challenge is to extend it by adding a chunk on at the end. Use your skills from class, thinking about VCOP. You might use on a connective or add on a chunk using ‘who, when, where, before, after’, etc. So the sentence start is:

           The boy closed the curtains. 

An example of adding something might be:  The boy closed the curtains before the fireworks started. Or you could improve it further by saying: The scared boy closed the curtains before the noisy fireworks started.

Please remember to keep it to one comment post per person but you could try out a couple of sentences in your post.

Other News

Another great bowling session this week.  We had our class photographer Lily there but unfortunately she chopped off most peoples heads so bowling photos still to follow.  Our 6 class i-pads were in action this week with people recording themselves reading aloud to help work on fluency and expression.  People had lots of fun listening to themselves and we have some very expressive class members.

Bye for now and happy blogging.

P4l

Hello Everyone

First of all a big well done to Becky Houston who was our class winner for the in school Park Smart t-shirt design competition. Becky created a fabulous design and we were very proud of her  when PC Arnott and Mrs Madden came in to award her with a goodie bag.

Lots going on this week.  In maths we have all been focusing on division and it  has been great to see so many people using their excellent times tables knowledge to help them.  In writing we tried something a bit different and worked with a partner to create a playscript based on a picture.  We were focusing on question making  in reading and watched a short film called the Happy Duckling to practise our prediciting and questioning skills before moving onto working on our group novels.

Now it is over to you at home.  It would be great if people could add to our blog at home.  At some point over the weekend or next week please can you add a comment to our blog.  You click on the box at the top of the post that says responses and type away.  It could be something you have enjoyed in school, something you have learned or something that went really well.  It would be great to see lots of people commenting on our blog.

We look forward to seeing some comments soon.

Bye P4l

We have been learning about ‘onomatopoeia’ and its use in comics. This is how we ‘hear’ sound on a page, in a book or comic. We have found lots of different ones and have created an art version of onomatopoeia! We have also created ‘frames’ for a comic using our reading books.

In maths we have been learning about time and it is tricky! We are also trying to do our times tables very quickly for Big Maths.

This week we learnt about our heart – the cardiovascular system. We learnt how to take our pulse and then checked it after different activities to see if that made an impact on our heart rate. The more we excercise and run around, the faster our heart beats. We could hear it thumping after running around!

 Have a great weekend

P.S next week we go bowling on Wednesday, so remeber to bring a waterproof jacket. (Just in case it rains!)

This week we have enjoyed learning about skeletons and muscles. We learnt the function of them and also the names of some of them. The funniest muscle name we found was ‘Gluteus Maximus’ and it sent us into fits of laughter everytime it was mentioned!

We had the opportunity to go bowling. Some of us were not sure if we would enjoy it but we all did. It was great fun. The trickiest part was trying to control the ball as it wouldn’t roll the way we wanted it to! We will have another four sessions to hone our skills!

We also had our Celebrating Success assembly. We loved the performances of the other classes and also enjoyed performing our song.

Enjoy your weekend!

P.S Come along tomorrow morning, 10:00am – 1:00 pm, to help with tidying up the playground. See you there!

Hello Everyone

On Wednesday this week P4 were invited to try out bowling at Bathgate High Bowling Club.  Everyone had a great time and the coaches even laid on drinks and snacks.  We are going to go for 6 weeks and learn how to be good bowlers.  Here are some of our thoughts,

It was good because we got a snack and they taught us the basic things we need to know. Shaun B

I like it because it was fun.  I didn’t know there was another type of bowling other than ten pin. Rachel

I liked it because we got to have lots of turns, we put the mat down and throw the jack. Catherine

We had a think and lots of us thought that Joe was showing signs of being a really good bowler.

Everyone is looking forward to going again on the 22nd May.

Bye

P4l

This week we have been learning about comics; we learnt that our eyes see a lot of information which helps us to read and understand what is going on in the story. We used this knowledge to describe everything in a picture from the comic and we actually wrote screeds!

In maths we are learning our times tables and also about time. This week we learnt how to read information from a block calendar.

In topic we have been learning about the skeleton and its function. Abby very kindly brought in a skeleton which Mrs. Ghafoor put up onto the wall along with Lily’s poster. We know that the skeleton supports us, helps us move and protects our organs.

Enjoy your weekend

Hello Everyone

P4l were very pleased to welcome Emma from the SSPCA in to class on Monday.  Emma talked to us about caring for pets and how important it is for people to be prepared before they get a pet.  She also spoke to us about some sad cases where animals had not been looked after but thankfully the SSPCA stepped in and rescued the animals nursing them back to health.

Well done to Mhairi for her excellent performance at Balbardies Got Stars in Their Eyes.

Comments from our Review Jotters

This week we were reviewing things that we found tricky.

I found handwriting tricky because it was hard to join the letters neatly. Lily

Handwriting was tricky because the joins were new to me. Eve

This week we found our reading task tricky because we were writing diary entries as characters from our books and it was hard because we did’t know what it is like being someone else. Ava and Rachel

I found maths tricky as it was hard working out the right change from £1. Anais

P.E was tricky because we were climbing and the wall had very little hand and foot grips. Catherine

This week l found it tricky in maths to give change from £1 and £2. Lucy

Bye for now P4l

Wee Reminder – swimming kit needed for Monday 29th April

This week we have started our new Math topic. We looked at time and the different dimensions of time! In writing we are going to be looking at comics and how they work. We have already started this and Erin H brought in comics for us to look at. (Thank you Erin!) We are loving our Health and Wellbeing topic and this week we looked at ‘Cool Body Language’. This is helping us to realise how we can and should act. It is also helping us to realise how other people are feeling and how we can help them. A busy week already ended.

Have a great weekend

P4a

This week in P4l   in our Being Cool in School work we looked at body language.  We learned about what it is and how people show weak, cool and aggressive types of body language.  We are really enjoying using this resource and it is helping us to think of ‘cool’ responses in our behaviour.  In maths we have all been learning about money, looking at calculating amounts and change. We all got new reading books and lots of us have read some already.  In writing we wrote about our personal thoughts on either ‘The Best Day Ever’ or ‘My Dream Day’.  Mrs Leamy is very pround of the progress everyone is making. 

Hope everyone has a good weekend.

Bye for now.

P4l

We are getting music lessons from NYCOS. We are really enjoying these as we are learning about rhythm and beat while having fun.

Our Topic of Mary Queen of Scots is now complete, (almost!), and we have really enjoyed it. We were really shocked to receive a letter from the Director of the Museum to ask where we were at a given time as the Tomb of Mary Queen of Scots had been damaged. We had an airtight alibi though and wrote back to the Director telling him where we were at that time.

In maths we have been learning about directions and how a compass can help us with directions. We impressed Mrs. Ghafoor with how quickly we understood turning in different degrees and clockwise and anticlockwise directions. (I will have a challenge next week for you P4a!)

Snow early on in the week meant that we had to go home, not that we complained! It did mean that we didn’t get to make our Palm Crosses.

Bye for now, P4a.

Hello Everyone

This week we had a chance to work on the laptops.  We were looking at the life of John Logie Baird and researching a part of his life.  We worked with a partner to identify key information then shared it with the rest of the class.  We are all very pleased that this famous Scot helped to invent the television as it is hard to imagine what life would be like now without it.  We had our third session working with the National Youth Choir of Scotland.  Mrs Leamy is very impressed with how we are all picking up on the idea of bet and rhythm and it is good fun playing all the singing games.  On Friday we took part in the schools Earth Hour and to help us remember we painted giant flourescent pandas as it is the WWF that organise the Earth Hour event.

Bye for now.

P4l

What a jam packed week this has been!

On Tuesday we went to the Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh. We had two challenges to complete after our visit with Mary Queen of Scots. She was very impressed with how much we knew about her life!

On Thursday we walked to Bathgate academy to see the P6’s show called ‘Alice’. What a fantastic show. We walked back just in time for lunch and then had our own dress rehearsal for our asembly!

Today was our assembly and Mrs Ghafoor was very proud of us as we did a fantastic job! We had lots of fun and then also got a chance to see our parents afterwards. Our assembly was on Mary Queenof Scots.

Some of our comments about our assembly:

My favourite part was telling people what to do (as a queen)- Emma C

My favourite part was getting my head chopped off! – Ava

I was a prompter. My job was to tell people when to go on stage – Abby C

It is so, so fun with the class – Adam.

My favourite part was when my mummy came to watch me – Taylor

My favourite part was ‘Rizzio’ getting murdered because it looked real – Erin H

Good job P4a!

Hello everyone

This week our blog is coming from our Review Jotters, we thought about what went well and why.  Here are some of our comments.

l was good at maths because l am getting the hang of the times tables. Kelsey

In PE l was good at Don’t Fall in the Water because my team mates helped me. Josh

I think my writing went well because l didn’t put a capital letter in the middle of a sentence. Jamie N

I think my reading went well because l have been practising. Dave

My writing went well because l can change a boring sentence into an exciting one. Sasha

I think my spelling went well because l have been practising. Mhairi

My maths went well as l have learned how times by big numbers like 100 and 1000. Lily

This week l think my maths went well because l learned my 4 times table and l am really remembering it and they are really easy. Lucy

Please remember to look through your books to see if you have any spare for the book swap on Thursday.

Have a good weekend.

P4l

This week was ‘Internet Safety Week’ and we have been learning about communicating with people in various situations as well as keeping ourselves safe when using the internet.

We also got a chance to look at another website in which we can compete against people around the world in Literacy, Maths and Science. Our favourite is the literacy one! There is a competition worldwide on                                                           

5 March* – World Literacy Day
6 March* – World Maths Day
7 March* – World Science Day
22 March – Global award presentations begin with the Official World Education Games Awards Ceremony, to be held in 2013 at the Sydney Opera House.

We have started practising these games in school and also have usernames to use at home.

We are learning about scripts and how to use them and write them. This will come in handy for our assembly.

Today our parents/grandparents got a chance to come in and see what we do in class. This is what we thoughtof it:

It was fun, exciting and amazing.

The best part was showing what we have learnt.

The parents/grandparents seemed to enjoy themselves too!

Hello Everyone

Today we had our open morning and it was great to see lots of parents and grandparents joining in activities in our classroom.  One of the activities was to create a giant story with each person adding another sentence or two.  As it was such a wonderful story we have decided to publish here on our blog.  Each time the text style changes means it was a different person contributing.

John was bored. It was halfway through the summer holidays and he was fed up, so he decided to go exploring. He broke his piggy bank and took all his savings to spend on his adventure. John just had enough money to buy an aeroplane ticket to the rainforest. John had lots of fun doing this. Unfortunately he crashed and found himself surrounded by six gorillas. The gorillas liked him and thought he would be an active family member and they called him TARZAN! He liked it in the jungle with his new friends and also he made friends with a leopard.  The leopard asked him if he would like to come and meet his friends at the waterhole.  John and the leopard went to the waterhole, John met the leopards friend, the jaguar.  The jaguar thought John looked like a very tasty meal.  So John ran off deeper into the jungle.  John and the leopard were friends no more.  John walked deeper into the jungle for what seemed like ages. It was very dark, but in the distance he could see a light…. The light appeared to be coming from torches…held by poachers! John quickly hid as the poachers rapidly approached!  It was something, someone, someone wierd…

Thank you to everyone who wrote in our story book, the children thought you did a great job.  Here our some pictures from our ‘Open Morning’.