Whole School – Page 2 – Springfield Primary School and Bonnytoun Nursery School

March 6, 2020March 6, 2020

World Book Day 2020 in P3A

There has been a lot going on in P3A this week. We had a lovely outdoor yoga session, led by some P5 children, on Wednesday. There were different yoga stations for us to try out, they involved stretches, breathing exercises, and meditation. There was also a station where we did some art work using natural objects. The P5 children were really good at helping us at each of the stations and we really enjoyed being outside.

As it was world Book day on Thursday, we have had lots of different book activities this week. For writing we wrote a book review on a book of our choice from the school library. We enjoyed being critics, giving the book a score out of 5. We then wrote a synopsis about the plot and characters and what we liked or disliked about it. We also decided if we would recommend it to others.

We did some drama in the school hall, working in groups to decide on a book to act out to the rest of the class to see if they could guess what the book was. There was lots of really good acting and we were pretty good at guessing too.

We also shared our favourite books with each other and made new designs for the front cover. These will be displayed in the school library.

Here we are in our World Book Day costumes:

We also had a visit from author Lynne Rickards on Thursday. She read us her new book Willow the Wildcat. We enjoyed the story and had lots of questions to ask about it and on what it’s like to be an author. Lynne also really enjoyed hearing about the stories we have written too.

On Friday we had a BEAR (be excited about reading) event, thank you to all the family members who came. We heard the story ‘Wanted: Ralfie Rabbit, Book Burgler.’ We then did some of the activities we do during our Reflective Reading sessions. Normally we would do one activity per lesson but today we had four activities to show examples of the different things we do when we read a book to help us improve our understanding of text. The activities we did today were:

Spot the Silly Word – read a passage taken from the book and spot the 10 ‘silly’ words that do not belong.
Jigsaw Jumble – Rearrange the parts of sentences taken from the book so that they make sense.
Textplorers – read the book and write down any nouns, adjectives and verbs that you find.
Picture It – Read the description of Ralfie Rabbit – draw a wanted poster and write a description to help the police to find Ralfie.

After our visitors left we had one last book week lesson with Mrs Fleming. She read us a book called The Disgusting Sandwich, then we made disgusting sandwiches! Yuk!

All children were given a token today to allow them to get a free book, it should be in their school bag.

Have a good weekend everyone, P3A and Mrs Kennedy

March 6, 2020

EaRL, Toy Museums and Book Day (P2B)

We have had a very busy week in P2B!

As part of our IDL focus on Toys, we looked at programmable toys. Miss Harrison introduced us to a programmable toy called EaRL. We discussed his instruction buttons and Miss Harrison showed us how to program EaRL. We also learned what ‘algorithm’ and ‘debug’ mean. In groups, we planned routes for EaRL on the different mats. If we encountered any problems then we had to fix them.

This week we learned to write a recount. On Tuesday, we listened to a story called ‘Lost in the Toy Museum’. We discussed the characters in the text, the main events and what happened at the beginning. middle and end of the story. To plan our writing, we drew pictures of the beginning, middle and end. On Wednesday and Thursday, we used our plans to write our recounts. We made sure that we put the main events in the correct order and we used different joining words.

In our Short Read lesson this week, we completed a Jigsaw Jumble activity. We listened to the audiobook ‘Aliens love Underpants’ and then we looked at sentences that the aliens had jumbled up! We had to rearrange the sentences using clues from the text. We knew that the word beginning with a capital letter would go at the start of the sentence and we knew that the word which had a full stop after it would go at the end of the sentence. Working together, we were able to rearrange the sentences.

This week we revised the sound ‘o-e’. We drew and wrote ‘o-e’ words and we used picture clues to write ‘o-e’ words on our whiteboards. At play, we made ‘o-e’ words with Lego. Some of us were also revising our common words. We played Bingo and a memory game to practise identifying our common words.

In Numeracy and Mathematics, we learned to tell times one hour later and calculate durations in hours. We played a game on Education City called ‘Stig and the Bus’ where we had to calculate time durations. Using analogue and digital o’clock and half past times, we also found the times one hour after. This week we also started to look at money. We revised identifying coins and then we learned to sort the coins from the least value to the most. Some of us were given a coin and we have to sort ourselves according to our value. Afterwards we learned to add coins to 20p. We used our knowledge of number bonds to help us to add money amounts.

On Thursday it was World Book Day. We created big front covers of some of our favourite texts that we have read in P2. These are going to be displayed in our school library. On Thursday morning we had a special visitor. Lynne Rickards, a children’s book author, came to visit to read us her new book ‘Willow the Wildcat’. She is the author of ‘I Do Not Eat the Colour Green’, ‘Never Bite a Tiger on the Nose’ and ‘Harris the Hero’. We also asked her some questions about being an author. On Thursday afternoon, we went to the P1 assembly on World Book Day. During play we created our own Book Day bookmarks and some of us were also working on writing our own books!

On Friday we had a BEAR event. Our families came in to our classroom to look at what we have been learning in our Short Read lessons. Together we completed activities such as Blankety Blank, Text Marking, Picture It and Integrate It. In Blankety Blank, we had to work out which words should go in the empty spaces in the story ‘Lost in the Toy Museum’. Using description from the text, we drew the character in Picture It. For Integrate It, we had to use key information from the text to complete the diagram. In Text Marking, we had to spot common words in books from our reading area.

Thank you for reading our blog post.

We hope that you have a lovely weekend.

P2B and Miss Harrison xxx

March 1, 2020

80s Mad in P3A!

A different week in P3A this week, we had a ball on 80s day! It was great fun seeing everyone dressed up. We learned about life in the 80s – the music, fashion, technology, tv shows, films, toys and cars. The children were most surprised by TVs that were box shaped and you had to change the channel by pushing buttons on the box, they were also amazed at mobile phones that were huge and had no screens – although some did say they thought their grandparent’s might still have a phone like that 😉 In groups we compared the 80s to now – some great discussion and super work on our ‘graffiti wall’ sheets.

We also played some 80s board games – Guess Who? was a big hit, we danced to 80s music and learned some new moves including the moonwalk and the actions to Agadoo! We had a snack of cheese, pineapple and picked onions on cocktail sticks – the onions didn’t go down too well but we enjoyed the cheese and pineapple.

A brought in her mum’s Brownie uniform from the 80s – a real trip down memory lane for Mrs Kennedy! The girls didn’t think it was a very good outfit as it was too thin and didn’t look very comfortable or easy to run about in – Thank you for bringing it in A.

Here are a few photo’s of us in our 80s outfits 🙂

On Wednesday we had a visit from Jess, a retired farmer who gives talks for the Royal Highland Education Trust. She told us about the dairy cows on her farm and taught us about wheat, barley and oats. She brought some samples we could look at close up and examples of what the grains are made into. She also brought a huge carrot from one of her fields and a carrot from the supermarket. We did a taste test on each and most of us preferred the taste of the large carrot. We did a little bit of data handling to display our results.

We also had a lovely bit of news from I this week, she received a Blue Peter Badge for sending in the picture of the Queensferry Crossing she made at school along with a written piece about the problems the ice had been causing recently and that engineers were working to solve the issues. They wrote back to I saying they had heard about the problems in the news. They liked her design and letter so much that they sent her a Blue Peter Badge – she can now get into lots of places free until she is 18 years old! Well done, a great achievement.

In other work we have been learning about past, present and future verbs, writing more imaginative stories and are now coming to the end of our subtraction topic in maths before moving onto multiplication.

It is book week next week and we’ll be doing lots of book themed lessons. If anyone would like to pop in to read to us at anytime please let me know – any members of the family are welcome 🙂 We’re looking forward to more dressing up and another busy week ahead 🙂

P3A and Mrs Kennedy

February 29, 2020

Our Assembly and 80’s day in P4B

Yet another busy week in P4B, culminating in our assembly yesterday. Our assembly was on the Vikings and we split into groups of 4 and researched an aspect of Viking life. We then presented our power points in the assembly. Mrs.Burton thought we did brilliantly and worked really well in our groups of 4. We learnt a lot from this work and enjoyed presenting it to the school and our parents. I think you will agree, they did brilliantly. Great costumes as well. Thank you for all your help and thank you to Mrs.H for your great job on the face paints.
On Thursday we really enjoyed our 80’s day and yet again made a fantastic job of dressing up. We got to show off our costumes in a fashion show in the hall and also did a Jane Fonda workout. We learnt about various aspects of life in the 80’s including the cars, inventions, fashions, toys and music. We then researched one of these in more depth. We loved discussing which toys we still play with now, as well as which games and which tv programmes.

In our writing this week, we continued our block on instruction writing. We listened to the story of “A Disgusting Sandwich” and then wrote instructions on how to make our own disgusting sandwich. We had some revolting ingredients but did really well.

We had our first hockey session this week, with Fraser and really enjoyed it. We learnt how to hold the hockey stick and how to balance the ball on it. Then how to manoeuvre the ball around cones. Very impressive skills.

In Maths we continued with our block on money. We continued to work out amounts and what notes and coins would be needed and then what change we would get from certain amounts. Next week we will go onto fractions.

Hope you all have a great weekend. Photos to follow.
From P4B and Mrs.Burton

February 28, 2020

28th February p5/6

We have been busy this week in literacy, planning our comic strips. We have chosen our favourite infant books to summarise and read to primary 1. As next Thursday is World Book day, we have written invitations to invite Primary 1 up to our classroom , which we are going to transform into a cozy reading area.

We are helping to develop play in our school grounds and are training up to help teachers in infants lead mental health and yoga activities outside. We are evaluating the activities with Mrs Tulloch and will be adapting them to suit our grounds and pupils.

Thursday was 80’s day! Our costumes were brilliant. We all looked amazing and really got into the groove with a dancing parade round the gym hall. There were quite a few enthusiastic teachers. In class we danced the “macareena”.

We played 80’s games in the playground helped by Primary 7 and did a ” Jane Fonda ” type work out in the hall led by the sport’s captains.

We played 80’s music while we worked. For maths, we played musical chairs before then tackling a chair problem for rabbit and hedgehog. We also did problem solving on Tuesday, ” Pooch Police”, where we had to recognise and explain patterns and relationships. Here is the extension challenge for anyone who would like to try it. Using the the numbers 1,3, and 5 make three digit numbers to make 999 . We will put the solution at the end of the blog.

Primary 6 continue to work hard on Fame. The dress rehearsal went well at the Academy and now we have a better idea about the spacing, layout, exits etc. Photographs are being taken on Monday and then we will have a full dress reheasal at the Academy on Tuesday. I know we are all looking forward to the show next week and look forward to showing you our efforts.

We continued making our Sphero assault courses. We are hoping to programme them next week to complete the courses. We will need to reassess some of the moves as there are tight corners and some uneven surfaces to travel across.

Solution 153 +315=999 and 351+135=999

Have a good weekend.

From Mrs McVay , Mrs Tulloch and P5/6

February 28, 2020

Primary 6 – w/e 28th February 2020

This week has been a very busy week, with rehearsals for Fame happening every day and our technical rehearsal at Linlithgow Academy on Wednesday.

In literacy, we explored inference through a text about Theodore Roosevelt and the story of the ‘teddy bear’.

In maths we have begun to look at money and during 80’s day we looked at the cost of living in the 1980’s compared to today.

80’s day also saw us exploring life during the 1980’s, inventions, toys, cars and historical events.

We are looking forward to our performances of Fame next week.

Happy Weekend

Kind regards

Primary 6 and Mrs Kerr

February 22, 2020

Vikings are still present in P4B

We have had the usual busy time in P4B over the past 2 weeks with a nice little break in between. We are now busy preparing for our assembly which is a week today. We are looking forward to showing you what we have been learning. We have been finding out about Viking longships and also longhouses. We have designed our own longships and they are fantastic. Instructions have been written explaining what we needed and then step by step how we did it. We also did a comprehension exercise on longships. This week we learnt how to take notes from a video clip on longhouses. We all paid attention and listened very well. Next week we will be designing our own longhouses, so if you have any shoe boxes or that sort of shape box they will be gratefully received. We enjoyed creating Wanted posters for a naughty Viking. Some great portraits as well.
In Maths we have started learning about what change to give from £1, £2 and £5 and what coins and notes we would need for our change.
P.E has involved learning skills for playing volley ball which will continue for the next few weeks and next week we start on a block on hockey as well. At NYCOS we have been walking the beat and clapping the rhythm and are getting very good at it. We played a game with the rhythm cards and then a rhythm game. In the rhythm game we were split into 4 groups and a 4 beat rhythm was clapped and we had to work out how many people were needed to show the rhythm in rhythm people.
Have a lovely weekend everyone, albeit wet I think.
Love from P4B and Mrs.Burton

February 21, 2020

Primary 5/6 week beg. 19th February

Even though it has been a short week P5/6 have been super busy!

In Numeracy, we consolidated our learning on decimals, in particular adding and subtracting them. We hope to move on and look at fractions soon. Hopefully our understanding of decimals will help us identify a connection between the two.

Last week the class completed lots of research about the Battle of Stirling Bridge. This week we wrote newspaper articles about the battle. We focused on including a catchy headline, quotes and writing in the past tense.

We have organised ourselves into small groups and are in the middle of planning obstacle courses to drive the Sphero’s through. Hopefully we can then transfer these skills to creating a course that we can then code the Sphero’s to travel through on their own.

While P6 have been busy with FAME the Primary 5’s researched the armour and weaponry that was used during the Scottish Wars of Independence. They then created life size drawings of soldiers, showing the clothing worn and some of the weapons they would carry. They are huge and look amazing on our classroom wall!

Have a lovely weekend,

Primary 5/6

February 21, 2020February 21, 2020

Revision and fact families in P1B

A short blog for a short week 🙂

In Phonics this week we have been revising the digraphs we have learned so far. Mrs Bell was very impressed with how well we remember these!

I’m Numeracy we have been linking addition and subtraction and learning about fact families. A fact family is a group of 4 number facts (2 addition, 2 subtraction) that use the same 3 numbers. Here are some examples we made using numicon to help us:

We will continue to work on these next week as they are tricky! Here’s an online resource to practise fact families at home:

https://www.topmarks.co.uk/number-facts/number-fact-families

We were very excited to begin our assembly practices! Scripts have gone home (these don’t need to come back to school) so that you can help us to practise our lines. As you may have already discovered, it’s going to be a very unique assembly! We have some lovely Primary 4s helping us…you might recognise them 🙂

Admin for next week:

Monday: Please bring in the book that the character you are going to be in the assembly is from. Throughout the week we are going to read them during milk and story and take photos for our assembly. Don’t worry if you don’t have the book, please don’t go out and buy it, we can improvise!

Thursday: Please bring in a soft toy for a (pretend!) toy sale.

Have a lovely weekend!

Love P1B and Mrs Bell x

February 7, 2020

Primary 5/6 week ending 7th February

Our confidence and understanding of decimals is growing each day! This week we have focussed on using our mental arithmetic strategies to add and subtract decimals with one decimal place. We have answered questions, created questions for each other and played loop card games to help consolidate our understanding.

When we were doing our written mental maths we were able to make connections with fractions and decimals on a number line.

In maths, we played Connect 4 with angels. We were able to estimate within 10 degrees of acute, obtuse, straight line and reflex andgles.

This term, as part of our Number Talks, we are focussing on a different strategy each week. This week we looked at making ten within a calculation.

In our Literacy lessons this week we explored note taking and how we can gather information in different ways and from different sources. In pairs, we researched the Battle of the Stirling Bridge in preparation for writing a Newspaper article about the battle next week.

In grammar we have been looking at connectives and we are going to try to incorporate them into our writing

This week we celebrated ‘Scotland Loves Languages’ by playing lots of games to help with our French. Our language ambassadors helped teach games to primary 4. In the playground we played ” Quelle heure est-il Monsieur Loup?” Monsieur Loup ate a lot of children !

The P5’s in our class did a great job helping the upper school with the show on Wednesday. We used their art skills to help us make props. They even got a sneaky peek of some of the dancing and singing!

Well done to those in Primary 5 that braved the weather conditions and walked to the Leisure Centre for their swimming trial.

Great engineering skills were developed making spaghetti bridges. One group’s bridge managed to hold 2.8kg. They originally estimated that it would hold 250g. There was a lot of team work and cooperation need for this activity. And it was fun!