Category: Tay
Book Week Scotland Sumdog Competition – Results So Far!
Leader board so far …
Mull, Shetland & Orkney
1 – Dylan S
2 – Max
3 – Leah
Bluebell & Bramble
1 – Rachel
2 – Euan
3 – Poppy S
3- Amel
Ness, Rannoch, Tay
1 – Cameron Fe
2 – Max
3 – Ananya
Bens
1 – Belle
2 – Mateo
3 – Jaxon
Calderwood Tackles Climate Change
Ness, Rannoch and Tay clan have been learning about COP26 together, finding out what it stands for, what it is, why it is happening, and what it means for us and have been learning about climate change with Miss Christie in our STEM lessons. Through our learning, we wanted to explore climate change even further.
Today, Ness, Rannoch and Tay clan were visited by Miss Connor, our RAISE Primary Science Development Officer in West Lothian, who gave us an introduction to the science behind climate change.
We discussed what the words climate and climate change meant and why climate change is happening. We then looked more deeply into greenhouse gases that are released into the atmosphere such as carbon dioxide, learning about the links between CO2 and climate change.
Following this discussion, we all carried out an experiment to see if we ‘could see CO2’. After making predictions of what we might see happening in the experiment, we added sugar to a test tube of warm water and mixed it till the sugar had dissolved. We then added some yeast to the mixture before, finally, placing a balloon over the top of the test tube. We waited for approximately 10 minutes to see what might happen. We found that the balloon inflated, showing that a gas had been created. This helped us to understand how carbon dioxide is released into the atmosphere and trapped, causing the planet to become warmer. We really enjoyed carrying out the experiment and checking our predictions.
After completing the experiment, we discussed why climate change matters to us and what we can do to help. We look forward to looking deeper into this in the coming weeks. Thank you so much to Miss Connor for allowing us to learn and think more about climate change.
#WL_STEM
Home Learning Choice Boards Term 2
Term 2 Learning Letters
As part of our Communication @ Calderwood strategy, please find below a learning letter for your child’s clan. This will give you an overview of some of the learning taking place in and across clans from now until the Christmas holidays.
Term 2 Learning Letter Mull Orkney Shetland
Term 2 Learning Letter Bluebell Clan
Term 2 Learning Letter Bramble Clan
Term 2 Learning Letter Ness Clan
Term 2 Learning Letter Rannoch Clan
Term 2 Learning Letter Tay Clan
Term 2 Learning Letter Ben Lawers_Lomond
Calderwood Goes Planting!
Today all the Clans had the opportunity to get outdoors, braving the rain, and plant bulbs. We were really excited to spend time with different Clans – Ben Lawers and Ben Lomond should be so proud of the support they gave to younger children in our community.
We did this to play our part in the nationwide Edina Bulb Project – you can find out a little more about this by clicking here. We were really excited to explore our learning about the needs of a plant even further and cannot wait to see these bulbs begin to sprout in spring!
In Calderwood Learning
In Calderwood: Opening Week
STEM – Into Calderwood
This week we have been extending our skills, knowledge and understanding through exploration, investigation and play in STEM.
In Orkney, Mull and Shetland we have been learning about toys whizzing faster or slower down a ramp, depending on the angle of the ramp and the force applied by little hands. We have lots of great photos to show us learning through play and collaborating with others in our gallery. I wonder if you could explore: ‘how does the surface of a ramp (whether it is rough, shiny, smooth or bumpy) change the speed or distance a toy travels?’ at home. You could give it a go with a car, train, bus, lorry, any mode of transport which takes your fancy or even see if this movement changes if the toy doesn’t have moving wheels. We can’t wait to see how you get on!
In Bramble and Bluebell we put on imaginary wellies and headed off to the beach to extend our learning about under the sea to explore food chains at the seaside. We learned new vocabulary such a predator, prey and tides. We applied this new knowledge through imaginative play and games outdoors and had such fun doing this! We also took time to sort different types of animal and plant we would find at the seaside and learned a bit more about carnivores and herbivores at the shoreline. If you want to extend your learning you could click here to find out more about rockpools. We can’t wait to hear about your research next week, in Calderwood!
In Ness we were imaginary intrepid explorers in the Amazon Rainforest this week. Last week we managed to conceal ourselves well enough to go unnoticed on the Amazon Rainforest’s floor; as we lay in hiding we watched Capybaras grazing, Caimans lurking in the water nearby and Goliath Tarantulas hiding in their burrows until nightfall. This week we fashioned camouflage from cocoa tree leaves and, when satisfied with our disguises, steeled ourselves to venture out of our hiding spot into the Understorey. Our first encounter was with a Praying Mantis, hunting prey with deadly precision. We had a few too many close calls with a jaguar so decided to make a speedy getaway into the Canopy Layer ready to explore further in Calderwood, next week!
In Rannoch we donned our imaginary rock pooling gear and waterproof jackets (to make sure we didn’t get splashed in the spray zone!) to explore the intertidal zone. We clambered to high ground as tide rushed in and the wave action caused conditions like a washing machine and as the tide rushed out we watched as crabs burrowed into soft sand and hid in small holes in the rocks. Through this imaginary exploration we were able to understand the specialist adaptions afforded to animals and plants which reside in this extreme environment. We used this newly-acquired understanding to put our sorting skills to the test – deciding which animals and plants would live in the high, mid and low tide zones. At home could you explore the types of food webs and chains which can be found in these environments and share all your great ideas with your adults in school next week, in Calderwood!
In Tay we built bridges to round off our amazing research into types of bridge and bridges in the world around us. You can find some great shots of us with our bridges in the gallery. We have had great fun exploring shapes which make a bridge stronger and the sorts of problems civil engineers need to overcome to build structurally sound bridges. We think the smiles on our faces definitely show how proud we were when applying our research!
In Ben Lomond and Ben Lawers we explored the concept of Algorithms. We learned that algorithms are sets of precise instructions used with digital technology. We then extended our understanding, and put our coding skills to the test, by creating our own written algorithms for different tasks. We had great fun acting out these instructions to check how precise they really were. You could explore this further at home by using free online coding games – we can’t wait to see how you get on next week, in Calderwood!
Writing: Where would you take your invisible string?
In Tay clan, we have been learning to use conjunctions to join our sentences together. We learned how to use the conjunctions: and, because, but, so. We also learned alternative conjunctions and tried to challenge our learning by using these in our sentences.
Last week, we played conjunctions corners where Miss Redmond read out two sentences and we had to decide what conjunction we would use to join the sentences together. We had to dance and then go to the corner with the correct conjunction.
We then practised using conjunctions in our own writing. We had to think of a place that we would want to take our string to. Some of the places we decided to write about were: Australia, the jungle, the ocean, fidget land, Fortnite land, space and America. We had to describe what our place would look like and explain what we would do there.
We read our writing to Miss Redmond and others, and we noticed that we all tried really hard to use the four different conjunctions in our writing. We have discussed as a clan that we need to work on reading over our writing, making sure that we are using full stops and not writing too many conjunctions in one sentence.
To help us continue learning about conjunctions at home, Tay have come up with some ideas. We could spot conjunctions when we are reading at home. When travelling in the car, we could go on hunt for conjunctions around us. We could also write postcards to our friends and family.
