Monthly Archives: February 2019

Classes, Primary 3, School News

P3 Weekly Update

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In Numeracy this week we have been learning about fractions and have been calculating halves, thirds, quarters and fifths of shapes and numbers.  We know that if we are confident counting in 2s, 3s, 4s and 5s this will help us to calculate fractions of numbers.

 

Our teachers did some training on something called ‘Reflective Reading’ and they taught us some of the skills that they learned and the skills that we need to make us better readers.  We did things like ‘Blankety Blank’ where we had to work in groups to think of words to make a sentence make sense.  We also did a ‘Picture It’ and had to read a gruesome description of The Bloodbottler from our new novel ‘The BFG’ and we had to draw a picture of him.  Lastly we did a ‘Spot the Silly Word’ where we had to replace a silly word with a sensible word.  We did this through our topic The Ancient Egyptians.  We realised that we already know lots of interesting facts about The River Nile and the pyramids.

Last week we finished our class novel ‘Charlie and the Chocolate factory’ and this week we have been enjoying watching snippets of the original movie each day and have been comparing and contrasting the book to the film.  We realised that there are quite a few differences between the two.

We visited the library this afternoon and enjoyed choosing a new book to read.

 

In our Digital Learning we were using an app called Stickbot Studio and we were creating our very own animation projects.  We realised that we had to move our objects little by little in order for it to look like it was actually moving.  It was great fun doing this and working as a team.

We had a visit from Fr Jeremy and a visiting priest from Nigeria called Fr Francis.  He told us all about Nigeria and he will be helping us when we make our First Reconciliation.

What a busy week!

Primary 4

P4b’s Wonderful Week!

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It may have been a short week but we have managed to pack a lot of learning in.  What have we been up to ?

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Well firstly, we welcomed a new friend to our class, Natan.  We are delighted to have another friend in P4b, welcome to Saint Nicholas Natan.Related image

In maths we have spent more time on how to tell the time using all of the numbers on the clock.  We are becoming really good at this.  We have also been practising counting up and back in 7s.  Quite challenging for some of us but we know that we will become experts soon enough.

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In literacy, we have been learning how prefixes can change the meaning of a word.  We have also revised nouns, adjectives, verbs and alliteration.   We have also been reading more texts for inference and have enjoyed listening to Mrs Macdonald reading our class novel, ‘The Witches’ by Roald Dahl. It is sooooo funny !

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In P.E with Mr Muldoon and Mrs Smith, we have been perfecting our gymnastic skills which has been fun too.  As part of our digital learning, we worked together in groups and used the Ipads to record us reading a story for the P1s.  We will finish it next week and then use a QR app to make a code which we will then stick inside the book so that the P1s can scan it and hear us read !

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Sadly, our topic, ‘Famous Scots’ has come to an end. However, we are excited to start our new topic next week although we do not know what it is yet , it is a surprise !

What have we enjoyed the most this week ?

 

Haroon – I have enjoyed P.E  because it has been fun in gymnastics and learning how to balance.

Oliver – I have enjoyed learning about time.  I find it cool how every number represents five minutes.

Lucas C – I have liked designing my famous Scots poster because it is fun learning about the different famous Scots.

Ethan – I have liked reading ‘Kipper’s Balloon’.

Natan  – I have enjoyed learning about the time and have had fun in my new school.

Primary 6

Learning and making 😁

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We have been taking part in a drawing and engineering contest.

In the drawing contest we had to draw what ever we want and John Byrne  would pick and it’s a Scotland competition and there is only 1st 2nd and 3rd.

in the engineering contest you have to think of something that people mmay struggle with daily and draw that invention then write a letter to Clydesdayl University to  persuede them to make your invention and win. 👍 🏅post by Maisie and Ethan

School News

Families Connect – Focus on Feelings (Week 1)

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Have you ever tried to tackle a tricky job whilst feeling angry? Ever tried to engage in a meeting at work when something at home is really worrying you? It’s hard to concentrate when emotions are running high. That is what it’s like for our children. For them to concentrate on their learning, this requires managing a whole range of, often uncomfortable, feelings; it requires them being in a ‘good headspace’. We all know the horrors of tackling homework when they are too tired, too frustrated or even too excited about something else!

But it’s even harder than that for our children. We know the words to use to describe feelings. We know how they might impact our bodies, faces, our thoughts, even our actions and behaviours. Our children are still getting good at this. They need help to associate with, recognise and name all the feelings that they might experience. They need practice in talking about their feelings. When they become more confident naming and understanding feelings, then they are better able to manage them and focus on their learning. That’s got to be easier all round!
We cheated! We had some tools to help us talk about feelings with our children – a magnifying glass to hold over parts of our body that might give us clues to our emotions. Held over a ‘washing machine’ tummy, as one mum brilliantly put it, for example when we are anxious. In time children learn that this feeling doesn’t mean they are unwell, but scared about something and that is the first step to dealing with those feelings.

We also had the help of a feelings fan, a set of cards showing drawings of children with the 6 universally recognisable feelings – happy, angry, scared, surprised, sad and disgust. As you know there are many more feelings! But these are a good place to start when talking to your children. You can see our fans in the picture below….you might like to make your own feelings fan at home and use it as a prompt when chatting about your children’s feelings or even your own!

Primary 4

P4a’s Week of Learning

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We have had another busy week in P4a.

In Topic and Literacy, we wrote about Famous Scots who inspire us.

Michael – Andy Murray inspires me because he is a very good tennis player and when I grow up I want to be the same.

Kaylan – John Logie Baird inspires me because when I grow up I want to be an inventor too.

Lara – Saint Margaret inspires me because she helped the poor and when I grow up I want to help others by being a teacher.

Leon – Andy Murray inspires me because when I grow up I want to help children play tennis too.

We have started making giant posters about all the ‘Famous Scots’ we have learned about the past few weeks, bringing together our skills in ICT, reading, writing and research.

In Numeracy we have changed our focus to ‘Time’. We learned about using a calendar and we made our own, adding some important events such as class birthdays and the February Break! We played games with the clocks too, recapping o’clock and half past times.

On Tuesday, Archbishop Leo Cushley came to visit our school. His Grace came to our classroom and we sang him some songs about the 12 Disciples. We also prayed together for all the people who help us in Primary 4, especially as we prepare for the Sacrament of First Holy Communion.

Finally, in Music we played ball games, sung songs and learned about the rhythm names: ta and te-te.

Have a lovely weekend!

 

 

 

 

Primary 5, School News

P5b’s week

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Primary 5 have had a busy week.  Here are some of the things we have been doing and learning.

Mirin – this week we made an emotions timeline thinking about how we felt at different points in our lives.

Marwa – we started to learn about the Titanic.

Ciaran – we learned that the Titanic was on her the first trip from Southampton to Nee York.

Daniel – we thought about we what know and what we want to learn during the topic.

Lucas – we have continued to practice our cursive script.

Max – we started to look at the timeline of events that led to the sinking of the Titanic.

Mirin – we typed our learners statements and shared them on Teams for our parents to see.

Sam – we reviewed our guided reading books.

Phoebe – we went to the library and read to the nursery children.

Marwa – we completed our entries for the engineering competition. Good luck everyone!

Paula – we went to Broxburn Academy to play Handball.

Leo – we were learning how to use the halving and doubling strategy in number talks.

 

 

Primary 4

P4b’s Fantastic Fortnight !

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We have been very these last two weeks!

In literacy we have continued to brush up on our grammar skills.  We have become very competent at identifying adverbs, verbs, nouns, adjectives and homophones.  We also had fun with alliteration. In reading we have been making good progress with our chapter books.  Some of us are reading a book that has been written by Chris Hoy, ‘Flying Fergus’. Chris Hoy is actually one of the famous Scots that we have learnt about , however, we did not know that he had written a book !  We have also read lots of texts and completed reading comprehensions which have focussed on inference which some of us have found challenging, however, we know that these will become easier the more we practise.

In numeracy, we have moved on from fractions and are now learning how to tell the time using all of the numbers on the clock.  We have used lots of interactive games to help us with this.  Our favourite one is called, ‘Beat the Clock’.  You have to read the time sentence and press the buzzer to stop the big hand and make sure that it is in the correct place.  It is great fun !

Our topic, ‘Famous Scots’ has almost come to an end which is a shame because we have really enjoyed it.  We are in the middle of making a HUGE poster which will showcase our learning.  We will post pictures as soon as we have finished them.

Wednesday was very exciting because Archbishop Cushley visited us.  He gave us a special blessing and spoke to us about our First Communion.  It was lovely to meet him.  As part of our learning, we have also studied the life of Saint Margaret.  She was a special queen and led by example.

The last few Fridays have also been fun as Mrs Curle from NYCOS has been in to teach us about rhythms and beats in music.  We have learnt some great songs including: ‘I Like Coffee’  ‘Starlight’ and ‘Lemonade’ and now know one beat in music is called ‘TA’ and two beats are called ‘TE TE’.

What have we enjoyed the most ?

‘I have enjoyed learning about what all the numbers mean on a clock’ – Freyja.

‘I have liked doing my times tables in maths this week’ – Holly.

‘I have enjoyed making my poster  because it has been really interesting researching people’. – Cameron.

‘I have enjoyed learning using the computers’ – Lucas L.

 

 

 

Classes, Primary 7, Pupil Voice

Primary 7s Week

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Primary 7 have had a very busy week.

Maths:
We have been working on data handling this week. We enjoyed collecting data and deciding what graph or chart to present our findings. We also worked on reading and interpreting data.

Literacy:
In true valentines spirit we analysed and wrote our own love poems. They were very creative and we used techniques like similes, metaphors and personification to enhance our writing.

Topic:
This week we’ve been learning about evacuation. We wrote an information text about evacuation and designed ourselves as evacuees which was lots of fun!

Other:
This week we had a visit from Andy Weir who has been teaching us about presentation skills. He left us with a ‘wee gift- WIIGFT’ which taught us when giving a presentation always include what is in it for them to engage the audience.

We’ve also been working on evaluating How Good is Our School (HGIOURS). We self assessed how good our school is at relationships and identified what we could do to improve.

Primary 2, School News

P2 Weekly Round up!

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We have had a fantastic week in Primary 2. Here are our highlights:

Rebecca- I liked learning about tally marks! We made a tally chart of P2’s favourite pets.

We also started to use tally marks to record our group points. We are enjoying our ‘information handling’ maths focus.

Daniel- We learnt a new skill in literacy. It’s called note taking! A note is writing something short, we used bullet points. You don’t write a big long sentence.

Jacob- We were learning the sound ‘ph‘. Like elephants, dolphin, phone, phonics and alphabet. This is a quiet, lip sound.

Sophie- We starting singing songs to get ready for our assembly.

Our assembly is on the 1st of March at 11.15am. All P2 parents are very welcome! 

Sadie- Mrs Thompson, our dinner lady, came in to talk to us about what children ate for school dinners before we were born. She has been cooking school dinners for 27 years!

Sara- My dad came in. He spoke to us about when he was little and what it was like in school for him!

Joshua- He liked the team Hearts when he was a boy.

Lena- In Mr Sanderson’s school, f you were very healthy and always took the green tray, you got to win a prize! Like going bowling.

 

 

School News

P1 Estimation

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P1 were very excited to find that some dinosaurs had visited our playground and left some footprints. We have been learning about estimation and we decided to estimate how big the dinosaur footprints were. We estimated how many P1s we could fit inside some of the footprints, how many cubes long the footprints were and how many steps it would take to get from one side of the footprint to the other. We then checked to see how close our estimations were.

 

Classes, Primary 3, School News

P3 Weekly Update

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This week we have been incredibly busy preparing for our class assembly which is all about friendship and forgiveness.  Our assembly will be tomorrow (Friday 15th February) at 11.15am and families are welcome to come and see it.

 

As it is Valentine’s Day we learned a little bit about the history behind it.

I learned that it was named after a priest called Valentine who helped soldiers to get married in secret. – James F and Alfie

I learned that Valentine got caught by the Roman Emperor, Claudius and he was put in jail. – Thomas, Toby & Isla

I know that Valentine’s Day is all about love. – James H

I know that some people give cards on Valentine’s Day but it’s not always the same tradition in every country. – Isabella A

 

In Spelling we have been focusing on the pattern ‘ou’ and we can read it and use it in our writing.

In Literacy we have been continuing to learn about poetry and we worked in groups to write our own rhyming verse to continue the poem ‘Going through the old photos’.  We used some of our own names but we discovered that not all of our names have words that rhyme with them.

In ICT we used Forms on the ipad and netbooks to make our own quizzes on something we knew lots about.

In PE we are continuing with gymnastics and we have been doing different stretches and counter-balancing.  This means that we had to put trust in our partner and work as a team.

We look forward to seeing you at our assembly!

 

Primary 6

P6 got a visit from Mr Sanderson

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Today P6 had a visit from Mr Sanderson. P6 had lots of fun learning about oil rigs and what you need to do to be a surveyor.

Mr Sanderson explained that there is a crisis for jobs in this area and encouraged us to think about a career in this field, especially the  girls.

You only have to work for two weeks and then you get four weeks off. You get the same wage as a footballer and the food on the oil rig is amazing and it is like a hotel with a football pitch,gym, swimming pool and a squash court.  The downside is that you miss your family.

You don’t need to go to university as you learn on the job but you need to be good at maths.

 

Primary 2

Busy week in primary 2!

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‘In Maths we have been learning about duration of time’- Jessica-Lily

‘We have been getting really good at telling the time quarter past the hour’- Leylan

‘There are 60 minutes in an hour.’- Neave

There are 30 minutes in half an hour’- Zuzanna

‘We are learning to take notes during literacy time.’- Sadie

‘Notes is when you write small things rather than big sentences’- Logan M

‘We have been doing lots of independent writing’- Wiktoria

‘We learned how to use Glow.’- Joshua

We learned how to use computers safely.’- Rebecca

‘Don’t click on the pop-ups.’- Jacob

‘Tell an adult if you feel unsafe using tablets, iphones and computers.’- Ethan

‘Don’t talk to strangers online.’- John

‘Mrs Baty told us that some games aren’t for our age group like Fortnite. You are supposed to be 12 to play this and some children are playing it in P2.’- Logan P

‘ In RE we were learning about important festivals and celebrations like Easter Sunday, Epiphany and Christmas.’ – Daniel, Weronika and Max

Primary 6

Bannockburn and Stirling Castle

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Primary 6 went on an AMAZING trip to Bannockburn and Stirling Castle yesterday.  At Bannockburn there was a lot of really cool things to do : you could explore the battle by looking at the 3D giant screens, we could touch the weapons and armour, and we could interact with digital people who were part of the battle. The Chiltern spears were 12 -15 feet tall. The chain mail was really heavy. We then went into the battle room where we split into the Scottish army and the English army. We then plotted the battle on an interactive map. On this occasion, England won the battle through the use of our strategic commanders. It was named the Battle of the Bowling Club, as that is the building on that piece of land now. The map could change from present day to the landscape of 1314. We also took a walk to the Rotunda and saw the famous statue of Robert the Bruce.

A short journey away and we arrived at Stirling Castle where we spotted another statue of Robert the Bruce and we could see the Wallace Monument in the distance. We were amazed at how narrow the River Forth is at Stirling. We explored a room with a Scottish history timeline and recognised many events from our studies. We then explored the chapel where Mary, Queen of Scots had her coronation as a baby. Next stop was to the Great Hall where we sat on thrones which also incorporated a potty !! We then popped into the Palace and admired the famous Stirling Heads before spending time in the Queen’s Bed Chamber. The Palace staff told us about the history of the Castle and were really funny.

We enjoyed this trip and would highly recommend it to other primary schools.

 

Primary 6, School News

Arctic Return Presentation

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Mr Smith came into school to tell us all about an Arctic adventure that he is going on in March. He showed us all the equipment he will be using and even let us taste some of the dehydrated food that he will be eating on his expedition.

He explained that he has been training for the expedition by pulling tyres to build up his strength. He will be taking the same route as a historic Arctic explorer called John Rae, who was also Scottish. He allowed us to try out his clothing and equipment for the trip. His clothing will prevent him from getting frostbite as the temperatures will be minus 30 to minus 50 degrees ! There is also a risk from hungry Polar Bears so Mr Smith will use an electric fence to keep his tent safe at night. We learned LOTS of interesting facts and look forward to seeing his route progress online and he will try to contact us via satellite whilst on his expedition. Primary 6 will design a St Nicholas flag that he will leave in the Arctic Circle.

Good luck Mr Smith!

School News

P1 Dino Fun

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Primary 1 have been very busy over the past couple of weeks.

We received a very exciting letter from Pat who is a Paleontologist. He asked us for his help as he had heard that we had been asking lots of questions about dinosaurs. He informed us that there were 14 fossils hidden in St Nicholas and asked if we would be able to find them!

We were unsure of what a fossil or a paleontologist were so we brainstormed some ideas and made a mind map on the board. We decided to go to the library to get some non-fiction books to help us find out. At the library we looked through books and learned how an index can help us to find information on a certain subject. We also found out how to use kiddle and found out some great information from both the books and the internet.

After we knew exactly what fossils were, we headed off outside to find the fossils and we managed to find all 14! We watched a video which explained what tools were needed to examine a fossil. Some of us noticed that the paleontologists were using brushes and decided to use paint brushes to dust our fossils.

Pat then sent us another letter asking for our help as he to know about habitats. We researched what a habitat was and then looked at the differences between our habitats and the dinosaur’s habitats. We then drew pictures of our habitats and created paintings of the dinosaur’s habitats. Some of us thought it would be a nice idea to make a nice habitat for the dinosaurs in the area so we headed outside to collect lots of leaves, sticks and grass for their habitats. We then built them a lovely habitat which we are sure they love!

We are loving our new topic and can’t wait to see what happens next.

 

Primary 5, School News

P5’s busy week

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We have had a busy week in Primary 5.  Here are some of the things we have been learning  this week.

Leo – We have been learning about storytelling as this is NAtional Storytelling Week and we watched David Walliams talking about his novels.

Ellie – We have been learning about the 7 times table and practicing our other times tables.

Cerys – We have drawing entries for the art competition and also designing inventions to make life easier for the engineering competition.

Paula – We have been learning about the brain.  Your brain connects to your nerves and tells you what to do.

Ciaran – We have been practicing our tables and looking at different strategies for learning the facts we find tricky.

Mirin – We have photographed our latest and best pieces of Numeracy and Literary and tried to use teams to post them.

Poppy and Leo- We have been talking about our reflexes and we were holding each others’ shoulder to see how quick our hand reacted and squeezed the other person’s shoulder.  We also tried this with hands so see if it was quicker than our shoulders.  Shoulder reflexes were quicker as the shoulder is closer to our brain.

Erin – We worked on our estimation skills with Mrs Heather.  We learned that our guesses have to be reasonable.

Alexander – We have been thinking about our learning and completed our learners statements.

Leo – We were having learners conversations and talking about what we are good at and what we need to work on.

Ciaran – we have been completing our health and well-being check in and today is feel good Friday.

Phoebe – Mr Menzies came into school to read us a story for storytelling week.