Category Archives: Sciences

Community, Expressive Arts, Maths & Numeracy, Sciences, Uncategorized

P4’s Amazing Dinosaur Assembly!

Leave a comment

Primary 4 enjoyed presenting their Dinosaur Assembly today and had lots of fun sharing their learning from last term!

The boys and girls enjoyed:

  • Learning scripts and adding their own special touch to them!
  • Taking on different roles like dinosaurs and explorers.
  • Sharing facts with the audience.
  • Showing the audience how to sort dinosaurs into carnivores, herbivores and omnivores using a Venn diagram.
  • Talking about the different stages of the fossilization process.
  • Sharing their stories about ‘A dinosaur in my classroom!’.
  • Managing ICT equipment by becoming Technical Troopers.

Well done Primary 4 for bringing dinosaurs back to life!

Interdisciplinary Learning, Primary 2, Sciences

Dinosaurs

Leave a comment

Today, as part of our new IDL Topic, Primary 2 went to the National Museum of Scotland to learn about Dinosaurs.

We began by learning about the work of a Paleontologist, and we heard how they  uncover clues which help them to learn new things about different types of dinosaurs. We looked at some of the different shapes and patterns of fossils and heard how they were formed  a very long time ago. We soon spotted some of these shapes and patterns on the floor beneath our feet, so we went on our own little fossil hunt!

In smaller groups, we settled down to explore some dinosaur related items. We learnt that some dinosaurs were huge, but others were really quite small. Some dinosaurs were  herbivores and others were carnivores.

There were replicas of different dinosaur parts for us to handle and to make clever guesses about what they were, and what they could tell us about the dinosaur they belonged to.  We carefully handled the spike from the end of a tail, a thumb, a jawbone and even some dinosaur poo! We all managed to stand together on an enormous dinosaur footprint too.

 

Achievement Awards, Community, English & Literacy, Events, Maths & Numeracy, Nursery, Primary 1, Primary 2, Primary 3, Primary 5, Primary 7, Sciences, Technologies, Uncategorized

Term 4 Celebration Assembly

Leave a comment

Today we had our final Celebration Assembly. The Technical Troopers past and present were recognised for their contributions across our whole school community, from supporting teachers to setting up for CEMs, presenting to WL Head Teachers and staff to organising our Digital Award Accrediation. They have worked very hard to embed digital learning across our school and nursery.

We awarded Remarkable, STEM Superstars and Top Scorers for the term. Congratulations to everyone who received an award.

 

 

Congratulations to Cunigar for winning the house cup this term.

Expressive Arts, First Level, Outside of School, Primary 2, Primary 3, Sciences

Ice-Cream and Fun in the Sun! by P2/3

Leave a comment

P2/3 and P3 set off on a mystery tour to North Berwick on Monday. It was a long journey and a last-minute change from the planned trip to Yellowcraigs at Dirleton but fine weather and a good team spirit meant that we had a fantastic day out together and managed to complete a team sandcastle building challenge.
Some of our LIs were:
Expressive Arts
I can create and present work using the visual elements of line, shape, form, colour, tone, pattern and texture. We did this by creating sand sculptures and there are two of the winners in the pictures. The winners enjoyed playing with their mini-kite prizes.
EXP 1-03a
Sciences
I can distinguish between living and non-living things. I can sort living things into groups and explains my decisions. We looked at different types of shells and learnt their names – limpets, clams, winkles, cockles but we didn’t find any cowries or the elusive Pelican’s Foot.
SCN 1-01a
As Class Teacher it was great to explain to some children about the different edible sea vegetables such as kelp, sugar kelp, sea lettuce and bladderworts. Some of these can make a delicious miso soup. Next time they go to the beach they might remember what they looked like.
PICTURE EDITORS
Annalise said, “Before I went for the bus I loved my vanilla ice-cream. My favourite bit was going into the paddling pool and collecting shells. On the way back we got stuck in a traffic jam.”
Lauren said, ” My favourite bit was the sandcastle contest because me and Myah worked as a team.”
Amorie explained, “Going in the paddling pool was a little bit deep and it was fun.”
ICE-CREAM DREAM TEAM
Jessica and her team found out that ice-cream is made from many things such as milk and sugar. We went for the best ice-cream with dairy ingredients from Lucas in Musselburgh. It was scrummy! Jessica’s Mum organised a great deal with Mr Whippy and Lucas but the ‘healthy’ ice-cream was the best choice even if it did cost more.
SEA MONSTER TEAM
James and Rory said ” In the paddling pool everyone thought it was freezing and the rules were we could not go any further than up to your knees and we were not allowed to swim or push. We were playing tig in the water and it was really fun.”
Rory saw a crab in the water and they saw unusual pink stripy small jellyfish. What could they have been?
SEAHORSES TEAM
Cara imagined that she was a mermaid on the beach and created imaginary play with friends about exploring the seaworld full of fish and shells. Great imaginations indeed.
SANDCASTLE TEAM
Brandon said, “When we were working in teams we were building sandcastles.”
Aidan said, “It was a race to build the best sandcastle.”
Nathan made a moat and a hill and built up the sides with wet sand in a bucket.

A huge thank you to our wonderful sun-kissed parent helpers. It was a grand day of fun in the sun!

Primary 1, Primary 2, Sciences

Electricity in P2/1

Leave a comment

Learning Intention:

  • We are learning to identify objects that use electricity from the mains electricity or alternative sources (batteries, solar panels etc.).
  • We are learning to describe an electric circuit as a continuous loop of conducting materials.

Success Criteria:

  • I can talk about the importance of electricity in our daily lives and identify different sources of electricity (wind turbine, solar panels and hydroelectric dam).
  • I can suggest objects that use mains electricity or batteries.
  • I can build a simple electric circuit including a battery, wires, bulb, buzzer and a switch.
  • I can draw a simple circuit diagram using the correct symbols.

Last week, P2/1 started learning about electricity in science. First of all we discussed different sources of electricity, such as wind turbines, solar panels and hydroelectric dams. Then we used skipping ropes to help us role play the journey of electricity to our homes in order to help electrical objects work, such as a hair dryer, television and lamp. Finally we made and decorated our own wind turbine to add to our electricity learning wall.


This week, we had to use our problem solving skills to make a simple electric circuit in a group without the help of an adult. We then discussed our findings and we discovered that the circuit had to be complete in order for the electricity to flow through the wires to make the light bulb glow! We also explored the use of a buzzer and a switch in our circuits and shared our findings with the rest of the class.

In addition to building our circuits this week, we also learned about the symbols for the different parts of our electric circuit and we were able to use this knowledge to draw a circuit diagram on a whiteboard.

We enjoyed using the UK Power Network website to research and find out about electricity (http://powerup.ukpowernetworks.co.uk/powerup/en/under-11/).

 

Primary 7, Sciences

P7 trip to the botanics

Leave a comment

P7s went on an excursion to the Royal Botanic Gardens in Edinburgh. Their IDL topic has been ‘How does our garden grow?’ with a focus on plants. One of the outcomes they have been working towards is:

Through carrying out practical activities and investigations, I can show how plants have benefited society. SCN 2-02b.

At the Royal Botanics the groups each got a workshop with Ginger who worked on developing their understanding of how important plants are to the world and how almost everything we eat or use can be traced back to plants. We also got to explore the beautiful grounds. We may have had a very wet day, with some thunder too, but we didn’t let that spoil the experience.

Primary 7, Sciences, Uncategorized

How does your garden grow?

Leave a comment

LI: We are learning to explore the life cycle of plants.

We are learning to investigate what helps plants to grow.

SC: I can state the different ways that plants can reproduce.

I can design an investigation to test the effects of fertiliser on plants.

.

Last week we kicked off our new topic ‘How does your garden grow?’ and over the last fortnight we have been busy learning all about how plants grow and what might help them grow faster. Last week we looked at what a plant actually needs to grow, they’re not much different from us as they need food, water, air and sunlight. We thought that we could investigate whether fertiliser made any difference to the rate of growth so we planted our own sunflowers, watered half with just water and half with plant food mixed with water. We also decided to see if compost made any difference so we dug up some soil from the garden in the playground and used some that to plant too. It only took a few days for our sunflowers to start growing and we can see a difference in them every day. We will let you know the results of our experiment when they are fully grown. Once our sunflowers are fully grown we are going to plant them in the gardens within the playground.

This week we have been learning to explore similarities and differences between two outdoor areas. The children were split into groups and were each given an area of the playground to explore. Armed with a clipboard and paper and an ipad, the children had to explore what was in their designated area, draw a sketch and take some photographs. Back in the classroom the children mapped their area onto an A3 sheet of paper where they had to replicate their area using the information they had gathered. Each map had to have a key so that we knew what was on their map. The children all worked very hard on their map using all sorts of resources to highlight different areas and they all look amazing. Once the children had created their maps they then had to present their findings to the rest of the class. All of the children’s presentation skills have developed since the beginning of the year and were confident in presenting their findings.