Author: WLlisa.stanway@glow

Health

In Health we have been discussing the different impacts that jobs have on society and what the salaries of different jobs are. We were surprised how much a pilot earns compared to a mechanic even though people seem to use mechanics more regularly.

STEM

We watched a live online broadcast as part of the Scottish Leadership Engineering awards competition that we are entering. We listened to a presentation by Graeme Ralph, Principal R&D Engineer at Spirit AeroSystems. Afterwards we posted questions which he answered.

P.E. – Hockey

Miss Stanway was blown away by our dribbling skills!

Literacy

One of our class targets is to improve our punctuation and so we have been learning about the use of apostrophes which are necessary when using contractions.

Writing

We finished our Dinosaur stories that we had written COLLABORATIVELY in pairs and then learnt how to peer assess them using a West Lothian writing target grid.

Numeracy

The table fact we are presently focussing on is x4.

We are much more confident at using the grid method to multiply 2 digit numbers by two or one digit numbers.

In addition this week we learnt about factors and prime numbers.

Topic

Our new topic is Mary Queen of Scots. Using her family tree we learnt about who her relatives were.

Using role-play we learnt about key moments in her life.

Eva – Being executed was a sad way to die.

Emma – Marrying Darnley was a mistake because he was mean.

Chloe – She should not have married The Earl of Bothwell as people thought he was a murderer.

Keris – Bella was great at being Queen Mary.

Lacey (The Earl of Bothwell)  – I expressed my meanness through my face and body.

Art

We practised using a variety of tools to create different types of lines.

Class Environment

Having discussed our class layout and how we could improve it we have started to make changes. We thought that it would be a good idea in the library to change our display in order to encourage children to read our new books. Some of us designed book covers and others created book reviews by some of our favourite authors. This is what it now looks like:

Mrs Stewart discussed what changes we could make to the library in order to make it more inviting with a small group of children.

Watch this space!

Dinosaur Park

We are presently reading Dino Egg by Charlie James in class. We are enjoying the novel and have created a role-play station. Here you can be a scientist, park keeper, van driver, dinosaur or tourist!

Maths

We learnt about chance and probability to describe the likelihood of events happening. As a class we discussed certain scenarios and then had to hold up a card describing if we thought the event was impossible, unlikely, likely or certain.

Georgie – It was fun holding up the cards.

We disagreed about some events.

Mason – It is impossible that England will win the next World Cup.

However most of us agreed that it was just unlikely.

Lewis Duckworth – It is impossible that I will eat cornflakes for breakfast tomorrow. His justification was that there was none in the house.

However some of us argued that his mum might go out and buy some!

Eva – It is certain I will have cornflakes.

Some of us thought that might be a problem if they had all been used up. We tried to persuade Eva it was ‘likely’ she would have them.

Liam – We learnt that there could be different answers to the same question and both would be correct.

For example the likelihood of it snowing depends upon where you live in the world.

Numeracy

We continued to practise our tables including making use of loop games.

Literacy

One of our class writing targets is to use a variety of connectives. We played ‘Connectives Blockbusters’ to practise using connectives in sentences.

Writing

Emma – I enjoyed drawing and decorating my dinosaur egg and it has been fun making up the story about what happens to the dinosaur.

R.M.E.

We used our research skills to find out about the life of a famous Scottish Christian – Eric Liddell.

Chloe – We learnt that he was a famous Olympian.

Georgie -He would not race on a Sunday because of his faith.

 

Although this week has been shorter than usual we have still been busy!

Maths

Using our knowledge of angles and clockwise and anti-clockwise turns we answered questions involving using an 8 point compass.

Lewis – It was challenging.

Numeracy

We revised multiplication learning from last year and then practised a new skill : multiplying a 2 digit multiple of 10 by another 2 digit multiple of 10 or a multiple of 100.

Number Talks

Our subtraction skills were revisited and we practised using various strategies with our talking partner.

STEM – Science

We learnt about the 3 main states of matter – solids, liquids and gases. In addition we learnt how materials can change from one state to another.

In the photo below we are in role as the molecules of a solid – tightly packed together and vibrating slightly.

We then pretended that we had been warmed up and this heat energy caused more vibrations so much so that we expanded and then we moved further away from each other because we had melted into a liquid.

Then we pretended that we had even more energy and we began to vibrate even more so much that some molecules started to escape.The photo below shows this process of evaporation when a material changes from a liquid into a gas.

Keris – Learning about the 3 states was fun.

Lacey – It was fun moving around the room as a gas.

Health

As we have started a new year we thought about our future dreams and wrote these ideas onto little fluffy clouds which we have displayed in the classroom.

Bella – I want to become a fashion designer and a famous singer.

Chloe – I want to be a Hearts player or a contortionist.

Lewis – I want to be a professional footballer and in my spare time I would like to practise Mindfulness.

During this Health session we were practising the social intelligence skills of COMMUNICATING and FEELING. We have COLLABORATED to create ‘Our Sky of Dreams and Goals.’

P.E.

We continued to improve our basketball skills.

Art

We are reading Dino Egg by Charlie James and designed our own colourful dinosaur egg and modern dinosaur. We are going to use our ideas to write a story about a dinosaur hatching in our own homes; just like in the book. Watch this space!

Movie Treat

Our highlight this week was watching the movie Horrid Henry and eating pizza in class!

We also received a gift in the present dash!

Maths

This week we practised visualising shape nets and predicting if they would make a 3D shape or not. Then we used the polygon equipment to test our theories.

We learnt that not every net makes a shape.

Numeracy

We practised recall of table facts using online games on the laptops.

Literacy

Talking and Listening

We listened to Carla’s Sandwich by Debbie Herman and wrote a short summary. Then we expressed our opinion about the text.

Topic

As part of our topic on Europe we compared Scotland with France. We used the laptops to research famous art galleries, castles, mountains and rivers.

   

P5 would like to wish everyone a Merry Christmas! Happy Holidays!

Christmas Lunch and Christmas Jumper Day

We enjoyed our special meal on Tuesday!

 HO HO HO!!!!

Some of us helped with our new Christmas Tree!

 

Maths

This week we learnt how to visualise 3d shapes from 2d drawings and built 3d shapes using nets.

 

 

Numeracy

We have continued to practise our multiplication skills and reinforced how to multiply numbers by 10, 100 and 1000.

Lewis – I enjoyed doing this.

Eva – I learnt that the x9 table has lots of patterns.

Nakeal – We used our skills to multiply a single digit by a 2 digit multiple of 10.

Number Talks

During these sessions we have reinforced our subtraction skills. We have discussed various strategies such as counting on, partitioning and adjusting numbers to make them more ‘friendly.’

Literacy

We have now finished our group reading novels and are ready to move onto another book.

On Thursday we practised our letter writing skills. Some of us wrote to Santa Claus; others chose a Naughty Elf and some chose a famous person.

Topic

We combined our numeracy skills with our topic this week when we practised adding up various euro notes and coins.

Science

We continued learning about our senses and this week watched a video about the inner ear.   Here is a model of the eye.

Art

The magic pictures we created were very colourful. Using a scratch tool we revealed colours underneath the blackness and made various impressive designs.

 

Restondene

Last week during Participation Friday Mrs Wood came to visit to discuss recipes we could make for the residents at Restondene.

This week we used the laptops in groups and using our COLLABORATION and COMMUNICATION skills used online shopping sites to calculate how much the cost of the various ingredients would be for the different recipes.

 

We couldn’t believe how expensive butter was!

Classroom Environment

We discussed how to improve the class and one suggestion by Lewis was to change the display in the library to make it more inviting. So everyone thought about what was their favourite book and either designed a book cover or completed a book review. Here are two ready to display:

Lewis – I enjoyed writing the book review. The scaffolding frame we used was helpful.

Health

As part of our ‘Celebrating Difference’ Jigsaw unit we continued to learn about bullying and strategies for dealing with bullying. This week we learnt about the difference between direct and indirect bullying.

Craft

We practised our cutting and sticking skills and made a Christmas card using various materials.

 

 

 

Maths

This week we continued to learn about the properties of 3d shape and consolidated our learning through playing online games on the laptops.

The class went outside to hunt for 2d and 3d shapes.

Lewis – I have improved my ability to name 3d shapes.

Numeracy

During the week we have been practising our maths and numeracy skills on Sumdog and have been involved in competing against other schools.

We came 262nd out of 2184 schools.

We also learnt about negative numbers and practised placing them on scales and counting forwards and backwards using negative numbers.

Eva – I liked learning about negative numbers.

When practising our multiplication skills we have been discussing how to work out calculations using various strategies. These have included arrays, grouping and counting in regular steps.

Watching funny videos has also helped with our learning.

Nicholas – I am getting better at recalling my times tables.

Literacy

Reading

We used various strategies to improve our fluency and expression in group reading.

Writing

We completed our information fact file about Christmas in Spain and learnt about the different features that information texts have. These are fantastic!

Science

Georgie – I enjoyed the eye experiment and learning about the structure of the eye. We watched each other’s eyes and when the lights were turned down our pupils got bigger!

Health

P.E.

We were unable to use the hall on Monday and so practised our fitness and Zumba skills in the classroom. However on Wednesday we were able to practise our shooting and dribbling skills during a basketball session.

Circle Time

In circle time we discussed bullying. We learnt that name calling and spreading rumours can be just as hurtful as physical bullying. We discussed strategies in order to handle bullying.

Finally…

We talked about how to improve our classroom and playground  environment and came up with some great ideas. Watch this space!

Health

This week we learnt that racism was unacceptable. In order to raise awareness of racism we made  ribbons.

Literacy

Reading – Metalinguistics

We used various strategies to work out the meaning of tricky words in our group reading books.

Writing

We chose a character from our novels and created an informal letter in which they wrote to another character in the book.

Talking and Listening – Philosophy

We designed the following thunk to debate and discuss:

What do you prefer gaming or reading?

In groups we expressed our FEELINGS and then shared with the whole class. There were some very interesting ideas and the class was split in two – approximately half in each group.

Liam – I like gaming because the game never ends.

Monika – I like reading so I can imagine things in my head.

In the photo above we are listening to each other’s views and considering how to respond.

Maths

We revised the names and properties of common 2d shapes using mathematical language such as curved, straight, regular and parallel. In groups we used our skills of COLLABORATION to create 2d shapes using string.

We learnt about the properties of 3d shapes and then went onto use pipe cleaners  to build different shapes. The pipe cleaners were the edges of the 3d shapes.

Topic – Europe

We listened to the tale of the Pied Piper which comes from the German town of Hamelin. Then in groups we acted out the story using our role-play skills. It was great fun. Afterwards we discussed who had met the agreed success criteria and given the audience a good performance.

Her are our freeze frames. Can you guess which character we were?

Josh went on a shape hunt around school and found 3d shapes that we had been learning about.

 

 

 

Health

In Health this week we celebrated our uniqueness. We designed our own culture wheels and then shared our own cultures with others.

Georgie – It doesn’t matter how you are different to other people.

Nakeal – Culture means who you are.

Keris – I learnt Emma likes football!

Bella – I was surprised that Monika likes football.

Mason – I was surprised that Shantelle likes Ariana Grande

We continued practising our rugby skills but this week went outside in the playground!

We also played games inside. These games encouraged us to listen to instructions, think carefully, keep fit and have fun!

Georgie – I liked the ship game.

Maths

We have now finished learning about time and are about to start our new topic – ‘Shape’.

Bella – I am much better at using a time line to calculate time intervals

Literacy

In literacy we continued to read our group novels with our partner and practised using various strategies to improve fluency.

Then we drew a picture using evidence from the text in a visualisation task that allowed us to show our understanding of what we had read.

We wrote a summary of what we had read in our own words – only including key information – but we agreed this was a skill we needed to continue to practise.

 

Music

This week we made music using Boomwhackers. The different sizes represent different pitches. We tapped them on the ground and made a tune using different notes. It was great fun!

P.E.

We continued learning about rugby and developed our tackling skills this week.

Science

We learnt about the skeletal system.

Monika – I enjoyed labelling a skeleton. Some of us even challenged ourselves to use the medical names of the bones.

Lacey – I was surprised about how many bones there were in my hand! I thought there was only one!

Keris – I learnt that each forearm has 2 bones!

Georgie – I was surprised to learn how easily a dinosaur’s bones could break.

Mason – I couldn’t believe that giraffes have the same number of bones as humans!

Numeracy

We have been practising our mental strategies in Number Talks and we are now concentrating on our subtraction skills.

Maths

We are much more familiar with the concept of time and this week used timelines to help add and subtract time.

Our next steps will be to answer questions about timetables.

Literacy

We used various strategies to work out the meaning of unknown words in group reading.

When writing we practised creating a text from the perspective of a character in our group novel. In pairs we wrote what wish that character would like to receive and how it would effect their life.

Participation Friday

We are planning to hold a party for the residents at nearby Restondene.

We all have different responsibilities and are undertaking different tasks in preparation for the event.

 

Lewis wrote a formal letter to Mrs Wood asking her to help us prepare some food.

After School Clubs

Bella – I enjoyed Taekwondo; learning about the scissor kick was fun.

A Gentle Reminder !

Some children have still not returned the first reading books they were given at the start of P5. When they are finished and have been returned a new book can be given.

Learning Breakfast

Breakfast

• Keris –We enjoyed the breakfast.
• Bella – The croissants and pancakes were really good.

Activities

There were various activities. Through playing online games we learnt about internet safety and European facts. We acted out the digestive process, which is something we have learnt about in science. Games included matching the capital cities to their European countries and a flag quiz. Lewis and his mum were very engrossed in a jigsaw that was a map of Europe! Our craft activity was creating map collages.

• Lacey – Making the European Flag Collages was fun!
• Lewis – I enjoyed watching my 3-year-old brother do a flag collage even though he used the wrong colours!

The digestive system experiment was popular.

• Mohamad – My mum thought it was funny!
• Liam – My mum’s favourite part was squeezing the poo out of the intestines!

School Birthday Celebrations

Thank you to all the visitors who helped us to celebrate Dean’s 50th birthday.

Each class concentrated on a different decade and ours was the 1970s.

Activities

We played games that had been invented in the 1970s – including practising on a space-hopper. In the style of Andy Warhol we created Pop Art pictures, organised significant dates on a timeline and some of us even wore 1970s dress!

• Bella – My mum enjoyed the Pop Art.
• Emma – The Spirograph that Bella let us use was great fun!
• Mason – The Pop Art was really cool!
• Georgie – The Space Hopper was fun!
• Monika – I enjoyed the 1970s dancing.
• Lewis – I enjoyed dressing up as a mini Miss Stanway (we both had a similar costume.)
• Bella – Miss Stanway was a skilled roller skater!
• Emma- I liked drawing the roller skates.

Afterwards we all enjoyed our slushi or ice-cream!