It’s hard to believe that we are now in our last term at Bankton. This week we have started reading over the script for our show ‘Pirates of the Currybean’ and are attempting to get to grips with our roles. We’ve finished our WWII project and are now beginning our work on The Commonwealth which is our transition topic. Next week we are looking forward to health/eco week and have lots of interesting activities planned like street dance, acro gymnastics, fencing, a waste audit and we will even be trying out our cheerleading skills! We would also like to say a big congratulations to Maria in our class who was selected as one of 9 winners in the West Lothian ‘My Scotland Now’ competition. Well done!
Monthly Archives: April 2014
P1b Update – again!
P1b Update
Wednesday 3rd April 2014/1941
Dear Diary…
It was not a normal day today. In fact, I didn’t even wear my normal clothes for school today because today was WWII at Bankton!
I dressed up as someone from Britain during WWII. When I got to school I saw lots of other people dressed up too, it was as if I had gone back in time! People were dressed up as soldiers, evacuees, war mums, doctors, black market profiteers, land girls, Winston Churchill, Vera Lyn, nurses and an ARP warden.
Not only did we look like we were from 1941, we had to eat like it was 1941 too, complete with rations. I didn’t even get to bring my own tuck. Instead we were given jam and bread and 1 square of chocolate only….there is a war on after all!
I took part in lots of activities to help with the war effort such as making my own gas mask box, digging for victory, make do and mend by sewing on a button, filling in my identity card, up-cycling which is making something new out of something old, WWII A-Z, creating a VE day menu, working in the munitions factory, making a VE day party hat and designing a card game to pass the time in the shelter during air raids. Phew, being at war is hard work you know!
Not only did I have to help with the war effort, I had to shelter (a.k.a hide under the table!) when the air raid siren sounded. I had to make sure that the windows were blacked out before going to my shelter. It felt scary, tense and cramped! I could only come out of my shelter when the all clear siren sounded. Sometimes the air raids lasted longer than others.
The day felt tiring but there was 1941 music to boost our morale and some extra rations as the day went on!
In the afternoon, people came to visit our Blackout café to hear all about our WWII day and we all had a singalong to keep spirits high.
It was an exciting day but sadly we had to return to 2014 even though Taylor’s evacuee tag had requested that he didn’t return home at all!
P7a – World War II in pictures!
Lots of fun was had during P6 & P7’s World War II day. The costumes were fantastic and the children worked very hard as they participated in a number of different activities such as make do and mend (sewing buttons onto fabric), making hats and bunting out of old paper to celebrate V.E. day, baking some war time recipes (thank you Mrs Reilly) and digging for victory in the garden to name but a few! Rations of bread and jam were provided for snack (thanks to Mary in the kitchen who helped with these) and there was the odd square of chocolate to keep energy levels up too. Thanks also go to our parent helpers who helped with the gardening. Here are a few photos of our fun filled day.
Destination goals…
With only one week to until the holidays, we managed to squeeze in a huge range of learning this week.
We were visited by Nathan MacQueen this week as part of the Champion in schools programme. He talked about his career in sport but also how he came to be a wheelchair athlete. He taught us about setting goals for our future and about how we might get there by setting journey goals to reach our destination goal.
Elise – “I thought it was inspirational because despite all the injuries he has been through, he keeps going.”
Sean – “I found it very interesting because he has tried a lot of different sports.”
Megan – “I found it amazing that he had broken so many bones but was still able to take part and do well in sport.”
We are all now working on our journey and destination goals.
On Friday, the cricket festival took place and Bankton came second out of five schools. It took a lot of energy and it was a really fun (and cold) morning!
We have all prepared class talks this week and we are sharing them with our class, one by one.
Louis “The class talks that I heard were very interesting.”
Erica “It was very nerve wracking and it was very hard to fill the time we were given in the success criteria!”
Declan “All the class talks I’ve heard were very detailed and I’m sure everyone else’s will be too.”
Katie “some people were able to talk with a clear loud voice but others found that more difficult.”
Since Spring is here, we decided to celebrate by enjoying the beauty of the spring flowers, daffodils and then…….tearing them apart or rather in science language, ‘dissecting’ them!
We managed to see the structure of the daffodil and we could then talk about the life cycles of the flowers.
During class maths we have been using our data handling skills to ‘interpret’ information from tables and present it in bar graphs and pictograms.
Declan “it was quite hard to find a scale without making it too simple and not precise enough for the big numbers we were working with.”
Chloe “I found the pictograms the hardest because it was hard to get precise numbers.”
Dylan “it was tricky because we had to use big numbers of deaths during WWII.”
WWII (in P6) is finally coming to an end and victory is in sight! We are finding out about VE day and how Britain celebrated.
We look forward to seeing you on Wednesday at the Blackout Café where we will be sharing some of our learning with you. Bring your singing voice with you, we can’t let morale drop, especially now that the end is in sight!
