caterpillars – Carmondean Primary School Blog

Primary 4 23.5.19

Hello everyone

It was lovely to welcome the children back after the long weekend. They had lots of lovely stories to share 🙂

In PE we are beginning some work on different aspects of Athletics. So far we have been discussing and working on the skills of short and long distance running. The children also used a baton during relay races which required lots of team work and communication. Hurdles have also introduced while running short distances and this has provided extra challenge! We look forward to seeing the children grow and improve in this area this term 🙂

Last week everyone wrote an imaginative piece of writing all about the adventures of Charlotte and Wilbur from our reading book – Charlotte’s Web. These stories were very detailed and full of interesting adventures! The children are now developing the skills of redrafting their work, with excellent spelling and handwriting being very important. Well done everyone for working hard on this!

Our caterpillars are in their chrysalis’! Over the long weekend some of the caterpillars attached themselves to the roof of their container and transformed into a chrysalis. Some did their transformations on the ground. Mr Shanks helped us to move them all from their small container to their much bigger netted container which will hold them when they are butterflies. We are loving watching them grow and develop! Stay tuned for further updates.

Thank you for all your support. Have a lovely weekend when it comes.

Miss Clark & Miss Donaldson

Primary 4 17.5.19

Hello everyone

This week has been an exciting one in Primary 4. We are really enjoying watching our caterpillars grow and grow. They are so much bigger than they were last week and we hope that by the time we are back to school on Tuesday that they will each be in their chrysalis! See the photo below to see how much they have grown.

In maths we have been continuing to develop our knowledge of fractions. We have been using whiteboards, pens and coloured counters to help us to find fractions of amounts (such as 1/4 of 24). The children have worked very hard with this and most are now also able to find 2/5 or 7/9 of a number too! Well done P4!

Show rehearsals are continuing and our dress rehearsal in front of the school is in 3 weeks time. If your child has a script at home and still has words to learn can you please encourage them to have their words fully learned by Tuesday. We really appreciate all the support you are providing your child with at home.

Our first homework share today was a huge success! Many children were able to share fantastic pieces of homework and tell us all about what they have been doing at home this week. This learning experience would not be possible without your help so thank you so much for working with the children on this at home. We look forward to homework share again next Friday!

Reminders
PE days – Tuesday and Thursday
Homework share – Friday
Reading pages – Read pages before Friday 24th

Thank you for your continued support.
Have a lovely long weekend and we look forward to welcoming back the children on Tuesday 21st May.

Miss Clark & Miss Donaldson

Primary 4 10.5.19

Hello everyone

We hope you had a lovely long weekend. We enjoyed welcoming the children back to school on Wednesday and hearing their weekend news.

This week we welcomed some exciting additions to our classroom. Five caterpillars have been delivered and we will be watching them grow and develop over the coming days and weeks. They are in a small container just now with food at the bottom. When each caterpillar turns into a chrysalis they will be moved into a much bigger container, ready to turn into butterflies :). Once their transformation is complete we will then release them into the wild. The children are very excited to watch as the caterpillars are already much bigger now than they even were on Wednesday. We will continue to add pictures to the blog as they transform.

Show rehearsals are now in full swing. Please continue to practice any words your child has to learn with them at home. The show performances are on Thursday 13th June at 1:30pm and 6:30pm. More details will be provided about tickets for this event soon.

Your child should have received a P4 newsletter home with them which gives further details about what your child will be learning this term. Today your child will receive a new homework sheet and reading book home too. The children have until next Friday to complete one spelling activity related to week 1 words, read the set pages in their book and complete 1 other activity of their choice. Please see the sheet and class newsletter for further details.

Thank you for your continued support. Have a lovely weekend.

Miss Clark & Miss Donaldson

Primary 4 24.5.17

Wowee, what a brilliant week for us to be going to Auchengillan! The sun is shining and it looks like it will be a great two days!

We have been busy whilst the others are away planning Day for Change. This is a UNICEF charity occasion which Primary 4 are in charge of leading.

We had lots of ideas of what we could change for the day and have decided on “Opposites Day” which will take place on the 16th June.

We will be gathering spare change in the bottles in the classroom and hope to have enough coins gathered to spell out “Day for Change,” in our new hall. More information will follow.

CATERPILLAR UPDATE: Our caterpillars have transformed into chrysalis and are now hanging upside down in our net, ready for the big transformation.

Reminders:

Please bring in show costumes.

Summer Fair is on 3rd June. Please get in touch with Parent Council if you are able to help out at all.

Homework Due Friday 2nd:

Reading

Spelling

Maths – New activities uploaded to Studyladder to work on at your discretion. We are now measuring length and capacity.

Primary 4, 5.4.16

What an interesting week we have had with lots and lots going on!

We had two V.I.Ps in our classroom and two V.I.Is… We will begin with the V.I.Ps. After we sent our letters out to the community, we had three responses to our letters, one from PC McMahon who will be visiting us in the next couple of weeks and Mrs Vance and Mr Cowan, parents of children in our class. I wish to take this opportunity to thank you both for coming in to chat to us and tell us more about the part you play in your communities. We found it fascinating and asked lots of questions. Both visits led to fantastic discussions afterwards with the children too. We did some research on John Newland (after a few google searches for his correct name) and found out a little more about his part in the Bathgate community and their Galaday. We are looking forward to finding out more about free pool too! It was very good of you both to give up your free time and we thank you.

Also, today I received an e-mail from Livingston F.C in response to the letters sent to them. The children do not know this yet but they are going to try to send a player for a meet and greet with the class, as well as someone who can explain a little more about what they do in our community. We shall see if any of the children read the blog and mention it tomorrow!

Now for the V.I.Is…(Very Important Insects) we have been lucky enough to acquire 35 worms and 5 caterpillars to help us study mini-beasts for our topic. We have set up a worm farm at the back of the classroom and have been watching them wriggle their way down into the soil. The caterpillars have been very lazy so far, at times we have had to check whether they are still alive, but all 5 are doing well and have grown so much over just 4 days. We are excited to see what they will look like as butterflies.

Next week we are off Monday and Tuesday, and on Friday we have our Day for Change. Children will be fundraising for UNICEF on this day and are looking forward to not having to get ready for school. They tell me they are going to roll out of bed and come in wearing their pyjamas they slept in!

We have a talent show at the end of the school year being organised by the house captains. We will be holding a contest in the classroom very soon to decide who goes through to the final, so be thinking about a talent you can showcase if you wish to take part! Watch out for reminders in diaries to find out when this will be.

We have also been working on the acting and songs for our school show with lots of practice dates in the diary. Costume letters will also be coming out soon so please look for these in bags. If there are any problems with any aspect of the costume required, please do not hesitate to get in touch with us and we will do our best to help out.

Reminders

Monday 2nd and Tuesday 3rd – holiday

Wednesday 4th – return to school

Friday – Day for change. Bring any spare change you wish as a donation to UNICEF and come to school in your pyjamas.

Homework

Reading due Friday 6th May:

Red Chapters 5 and 6
Blue p.33-45
Green p.28-40

Please begin collecting appropriate junk for our mini-beast challenge. Children have chosen a mini-beast to do a class talk on (information to follow) and in class are being asked to create a mini-beast from junk with movable parts. Any junk for this would be greatly appreciated.

Primary 4, 23.4.16

What a busy week it has been, getting into our new topics and recovering from the fantastic Auchengillan!

The children were excellent and their behaviour and manners were commented on by everyone, from the kitchen staff to the outdoor staff as well as the administration staff so a big well done to everyone who came.

We got very muddy on the last day as it had been raining prior to our visit. We had a very quick change before heading onto the bus to go home. See below for a few sneaky pics! We have made a video of all of the photos taken by staff which the children will see very soon.

Whilst we were away at Auchengillan, the people who stayed with Mrs Wallace did a fantastic job of organising Primary 4’s event, ‘Day for Change.’ This will take place on the 6th of May whereby children can mark the event by getting dressed in their pyjamas and slippers to come to school. If they wish they can bring in a donation of change, as much or as little as they want.

It has been a busy week for our staff and colleagues this week in Bulgaria too! I hope you have all been catching up with their activities on the F.L.A.G Blog page. In class we have been reading it every morning and discussing similarities and differences as well as talking about their experiences.

Look out for our newsletter for this term. It highlights up and coming events, current topics as well as reminders. We will be welcoming a few new visitors to our class next week as well as part of our Science topic, Mini-beasts. Caterpillars and worms will be making their way into their enclosures at some point for us to observe over the next few weeks.

This week we sent off letters to members of our community to invite them in to chat about their role in our community. We sent ten letters to various people the children considered to be important in our community and have one visit booked in for next week already! Fingers crossed more people reply to make our learning all the more interesting and relevant.

Reminders:

Please sign homework diaries

Indoor PE kit – Monday

Outdoor PE kit – Tuesday

6th May – Day for Change

Homework:

Due: Friday 29th April

Reading book pages:

Red – Ch 3 and 4

Blue – p.21 – 32

green – p.15 – 27

Corresponding activities (first one to be completed by next Friday 29th as they have two weeks to complete an activity.)
Miss Smith’s Maths Class – Multiplication / division sheet.