This week in Literacy we were have been learning ‘oo’ and ‘ew’ as in grew. We have found that ‘oo’ is mainly found in the middle of a word and ‘ew’ is mainly found at the end. We have also been practising our new tricky words – her and of.
We have been learning about Spring this week and had fun going outside to look for the first signs of Spring around the school. We found some flowers and saw buds on the trees and bushes and were excited to find a nest high up in one of the trees. When we got back to the classroom we did some fantastic ‘Spring Writing’ which you will be able to see on display when you come in for your Parents’ Evening appointment.
In Numeracy we have been continuing our learning about subtraction within 10 and have focused on subtracting from 10, 9 and 6.
We found our work on Money a bit tricky this week. We were trying to work out which coins we could use to make up a given amount. We were good at working out numbers which made the amount we needed but got a bit muddled deciding which coins were real. We had lots of discussion about whether there was a 3p, 4p, 6p, 7p or 8p coin! We enjoyed playing an online money game, working on sorting, ordering and counting coins (single coins to 10p and 1p to 10p). You could play this at home too – https://www.topmarks.co.uk/money/coins-game.
Within our Transport topic we managed to finish our junk modelling. Everyone chose a form of transport to design. There was lots of discussion and problem solving during our building as we tried to work out the best way to structure our models. Everyone used their imaginations very well indeed and successfully worked out how best to fix their models together.
In Health and Wellbeing, we have begun to see our plant life cycle in action. Our sunflower seeds have already started to grow into seedlings. We have been looking after them carefully and have been very good at taking turns to water them.
Our learning this week has progressed from angles to compass points before rounding off the week with coordinates. We have been reading and plotting points in a single quadrant which we discovered is called a Cartesian grid system, based on the theories and work of mathematician René Descartes. It was important to remember to mark our x and y axes with an evenly distributed scale, label them and plot our points precisely. The line where the two lines meet is called the origin (0,0) and a point will never be named O to avoid confusion. We extended our learning to reading and plotting points in four quadrants using negative coordinates before reflecting across both the x and y axes.
L finding the missing coordinates of quadrilaterals.
F has drawn 3D shapes using coordinates.
M has drawn a picture using a list of coordinates.
Literacy and English
The two reading techniques we have explored this week are pathetic fallacy and dramatic irony. We found that dramatic irony is when the reader of a text is aware of something that the character isn’t. For example, in Boy in the Striped Pyjamas, we used context clues to infer that Bruno should not enter the concentration camp but he was naive as to the dangers that this entailed. We found that pathetic fallacy is when the author reflect human emotions and the mood through inanimate objects, such as the weather. In the penultimate and final chapter of the novel, John Boyne builds tension and atmosphere through persistent heavy rain and a storm approaching.
In writing this week, we have been compiling book reviews of Boy in the Striped Pyjamas that incorporate persuasive techniques and include the main features of this genre of writing. We used questions at the beginning to hook the reader and ensured there was a short summary of events within our initial paragraph. Without giving away the ending, we described the plot and main characters through the use of powerful verbs and adjectives. To conclude, we provided the reader with our personal opinion on the text and gave examples of what we had particularly enjoyed. I think we’d all agree that Boy in the Striped Pyjamas is well worth a read for older children and adults alike!
Health and Wellbeing
In P.E this week we have been developing the accuracy of our slingshot and underarm throw within dodgeball whilst incorporating some thinking skills through Better Movers and Thinkers work. We played in 1v1 situations to strike a central target using both our stronger and weaker arm to throw before moving up or down the league depending on our success. Whilst exchanging dodgeballs we had to ensure that both our feet were off the ground as we received the ball. This led to some interesting methods of catching, including sitting on the ground with our feet up to do so!
The Sports Committee were defining ‘achievement’ this week within a sporting context and coming up with examples of what this may look like. For example, Ellie has achieved through leading her peers, Callum achieved by showing bravery and courage to try a new discipline within fencing and Sarah achieved by persisting for over a year to master a move in gymnastics. We collated our ideas on the board and came up with a ‘recipe for success and achievement in sport’ at Springfield Primary School. This will be displayed in our gym hall in the coming weeks.
Developing accuracy in dodgeball during 1v1 games.
F and J developing their throwing and catching.
Sports Committee defining achievement and collating the ingredients for success in a sporting context.
Learning Across the Curriculum
Here are some photos from our learning across the curriculum this week, including STEM and Skills for Learning, Life and Work…
M testing his buggy on a gradient.
LR and SW piloting female engineering!
E delighted with his progress made!
FA engrossed in his STEM work.
Sergeant B maintaining order!
Sergeant R ready for action!
Sergeant MacKenzie from Police Scotland visiting P7a.
Lawyer J and Procurator Fiscal N.
Lawyer F and Procurator Fiscal LR.
Coming Up…
Here are important upcoming dates for the P7 diaries…
11.3.19 – Relationships, Sexual Health and Parenthood lessons begin in Health and Wellbeing
12.3.19 – Grant Armstrong and Scott Brown visiting P7 for S1 transition talk
12.3.19 – Deborah Paton (Sustrans) visiting P7 for SfLLW programme
12.3.19 – Jennie King (NHS – Nurse) visiting P7 for SfLLW programme
12.3.19 – P7a pupils to St. Michael’s Day Care Centre (x4)
13.3.19 – Scottish Opera performance from 2.15-3.00pm (1 x guest per child)
14.3.19 – P7 Information Evening for children, parents and carers at Linlithgow Academy
What a busy week in P7a! Here’s what’s been going on…
Numeracy and Mathematics
Our learning this week has allowed us to extend our knowledge of angles. We started on Monday by recapping on our prior knowledge of angle types and identified examples of these in school, the playground and the wider built environment. These were acute, right angles, obtuse, straight lines, reflex and complete turns. Following on from this, we were able to measure and draw angles of varied sizes using a protractor. Angles can be named using the letters representing the arms (lines) and vertex (where the lines meet). The vertex must always represent the middle letter, e.g. < ABC where B is the vertex. We have also been introduced to complementary, supplementary and vertically opposite angles. Complementary angles add up to 90°, supplementary to 180° and vertically opposite angles are always the same.
Joseph M finding vertically opposite angles.
Zara confidently measuring, drawing, naming and labelling angles.
Nicci successfully measuring and drawing angles using a protractor.
Literacy and English
Yesterday, we finished reading Boy in the Striped Pajamas, which has been our shared reading text over the past few weeks. We discussed different symbols within the text and the themes that they represent. For example, Ethan commented on the fact that the striped pajamas symbolised the persecution and dehumanisation of Jewish people. A fantastic and worthy contribution! There were a number of context clues within the final chapters which we used to infer what was going to happen. We found the ending to the story incredibly powerful and rather upsetting. Although it was hard to listen to, we all agreed that the key learning point to take from the story relates closely to the final line; “Of course, all this happened a long time ago and nothing like that could ever happen again. Not in this day and age”. Always be kind to others and treat people fairly. Race, religion, skin colour, gender, physical appearance and sexual orientation are irrelevant. We are all human beings, so celebrate diversity and allow equality to prevail. On Thursday, Miss Baillie and Mr. Ritchie visited class to see what a writing lesson looks like in P7a. We were writing letters from the perspective of a child evacuee in WWII whilst attempting to portray their feelings and emotions during this traumatic experience. Finley was chosen as our Star Writer for February and we’re incredibly proud of him. What a great addition he has been to our class and school!
Finley was chosen as our Star Writer for February for his evacuee letter.
Health and Wellbeing
Our football season kicked off on Tuesday at Xcite, with 30 of our footballers in action. Mr. Logan was incredibly impressed with the positive attitude, enthusiasm, sense of fair play and skill level demonstrated by all children. He’s incredibly confident that it will be another successful year for our football teams, as they follow in the footsteps of last year’s trophy winners. Thank you to Miss Baillie, Mrs. Tomczynski and our former pupil Robbie Tomczynski who assisted with the coaching on Tuesday afternoon. We couldn’t have managed without them!
In P.E this week, we were continuing to develop our skills in dodgeball before applying these in different match adaptations. Below you can see some of us practising our throwing and catching. In between each throw, we had to create a finger-tap sequence (our fingers were numbered 1 to 4) before catching the ball. As we improved our ability to do so, we added in 5th and 6th numbers to our sequence before sharing these combinations with a learning partner. In game situations, we developed the accuracy of our throw by not only trying to eliminate opponents but also striking targets on our opponents’ side of the court. Next week we aim to further improve our peripheral vision, spatial awareness and positioning.
JB increasing the height of her throw to allow time for a finger-tap sequence.
PM creating a finger-tap sequence to teach a partner.
Learning Across the Curriculum
As part of the Developing the Young Workforce initiative (DYW) our Skills for Learning, Life and Work programme continued this week with four more visitors in class. We welcomed in Marlous Peterse (a Theatre Manager), Ben Johnson (an aircraft engineer), Joe and Claire from Sygenta (agrochemicals) and Iain Fyfe (volunteer in school, retired HR Manager and ex-professional referee). These visits have been a fantastic learning experience, allowing us to extend our knowledge of the variety of careers, occupations, business and workplaces out there. The important message this week was not to assume that everyone leaves school, goes to college or university then finds a job in that field. Our visitors alluded to the fact that everyone’s journey into work takes a different route and there really is no right or wrong way to get there. Find something which is suited to your unique skill set and make sure you’re passionate about it! We look forward to hearing from more visitors next week including a Procurator Fiscal, Defense Lawyer and Policewoman.
Ben Johnson, an aircraft engineer with JET2, presenting to the P7s.
Joe and Claire presenting from Syngenta who produce agrochemicals.
Marlous Peterse delivering a SfLLW presentation about Theatre Management.
Coming Up…
Here are important upcoming dates for the P7 diaries…
4.3.19 – Deborah Demick (Procurator Fiscal) and Neil Hay (Defense Lawyer) visiting P7 for SfLLW programme
4.3.19 – After school football outdoors from 3.15-4.15pm
This week we have been extending our knowledge of capacity and volume. We started by establishing the difference between the two concepts and found that capacity is the maximum something can hold where as the volume is the amount of space that a substance or object occupies. We can now confidently compare and order different volumes of liquid using millilitres (ml), centilitres (cl and litres (l) and can successfully convert between these units of measure. We found that there are 10ml per 1cl, 1,000ml per 1l and 100cl per 1l. Having developed this knowledge we then applied our skills to play some estimate, check and record games against a partner. We chose measuring cylinders depending on the volume of liquid required and noticed that our estimates became increasingly accurate we the game progressed. Finally, to round-off our learning for the week we made ‘mocktails’ using recipes and instructions provided. In order to do so successfully, we used measuring cylinders with 1ml scales, ensured they were flat to the table and recorded the liquid line, rather than the bubbles or froth. Have a look at us in action…
Z, G and J checking their total volume of ‘Orange Fizz’
JM and JB making a ‘Blue Wave’
S and L measuring ingredients for a ‘Berry Blitz’
Literacy and English
Now that we have began learning about World War II, all of our Literacy and English work in class is based around our shared text, ‘The Boy in the Striped Pajamas’ by John Boyne. Last week we made predictions and assumptions about the plot and storyline, and continued this week with a focus on characterisation and profiling. We discussed each character in detail, including their relationships with others, behaviours, personality traits and developing roles within the story. During our discussions, we used inference to analyse each character at a deeper level and provided evidence or quotes from the text to support any statements we made about them. By skimming and scanning the text, we were able to find some context clues that clarified our thinking and highlighted some key themes. These included; persecution of others, discrimination, racism, naivety, innocence of youth, conflict, relationships and moral justice.
In writing this week, we analysed the story from Bruno’s perspective and considered the impact that moving to Out-With has had on his happiness. We wrote informal letters using the features of an email to one of his three best friends (Karl, Daniel or Martin) or his Grandmother in Berlin. Within these pieces of writing we were able to structure our work appropriately using an email format, build detail through the description of Bruno’s surroundings, apply our skills developed last week to write in the ‘first person’ and share his feelings and emotions to create reader empathy.
With Mrs. Gordon, we continued our learning in French this week by presenting our own ‘la météo’ forecasts to discuss the weather.
Health and Wellbeing
It was Safer Internet Day 2019 this week, and we have been continuing to learn about the ways in which we can stay safe online and use the internet responsibly. Our focus this week was on passwords and security to protect online accounts and data. We understand what a strong password is having looked at examples of weak ones and predicted the passwords people may choose based on some basic details about them. A strong password must contain symbols, upper case letters, lower case letters and numbers. A lot of us admitted that we may have to go home and increase the security of our social media accounts.
In P.E, we have continued with our block of dodgeball. Now that we understand the rules and roles of players within a team, we have been improving our throwing technique and playing variations of the end game to apply the skills we have developed. P7 have really enjoyed this so far, and we may well need to extend the initial 6 week block!
Maintaining possession
Spatial awareness, movement and positioning
Social Studies
This week we have been creating a World War II timeline and learning about the uses of propaganda. For our timeline, we researched key events that took place during the 6 years and a day of World War II with the aim of placing them in a chronological sequence on our wall. We heard Neville Chamberlain’s radio broadcast declaring war on Germany after Hitler refused to withdraw troops from Poland and the events which took place as a result of this. After being introduced to the definition of propaganda and discussing the themes and messages behind some examples of it, we started creating our own examples. These are looking fantastic and we will share them with you once completed. You can see our blacked-out World War II living room below with some interesting objects and artifacts from this era.
Our blacked out WWII living room with games, paperwork, news articles and artifacts
Our display beginning to come together with leader sketches and timeline skeleton
Coming Up…
11.2.19 – Skills for Learning, Life and Work programme begins
11.2.19 – After school football for P6 and P7 outdoors from 3.15-4.15pm
14.2.19 – Rotary Quiz for selected pupils
25.1.19 – Academy staff to visit P7 re. S1 transition
26.2.19 – Football league meeting (1) at Xcite from 4-6pm
5.3.19 – Scottish Opera workshop for P6 and P7 pupils
13.3.19 – Scottish Opera performance of 1719 for parents, carers and families at 2.30pm
14.3.19 – Parental Information Evening at Linlithgow Academy re. S1 transition
26.3.19 – Football league meeting (2) at Xcite from 4-6pm
27.3.19 – Ford Castle P7 camp information evening in school hall at 6pm
3.4.19 & 4.4.19 – Parents Evenings
4.4.19 – Skills for Learning, Life and Work programme ends
In grammar and punctuation, we have been consolidating our knowledge of past, present and future tense verbs this week. After reading jokes written in the past and present tense we were asked to convert and rewrite them in the future tense. Following on from this we came up with some of our own jokes using varied verb tenses.
Ahead of November 11th, we extended our knowledge of Remembrance Day and the reasons as to why this commemoration came about. We explored different informative texts before responding to varied questioning to demonstrate our knowledge of events that took place. It is important to remember those who died in the line of duty and sacrificed their lives in order for us to live as we do today. We read For The Fallen, a poem by Robert Laurence Binyon, which stirred our emotions and promoted our thinking on the subject. P7 will be coming round classes each day over the next 3 weeks to sell poppies for the Scottish Poppy Appeal. Please give generously to support war veterans and their families. Minimum donation is 20p.
Next week we will be beginning our literacy book focus on Holes by Louis Sachar. We are looking forward to reading this text and will begin by analysing the initial chapters and predicting events in the story next week. Why are the boys sent to Camp Green Lake being asked to dig Holes in the searing Texan heat? We will find out in due course…
Finally, a quick shout out to Joanna who wrote an essay titled ‘My Inspiration’ for the Rotary essay writing competition. Joanna structured her work well and explained in great detail why she has been inspired by Elaine Thompson, a famous sprinter, to take up athletics. She has been chosen as P7a’s Star Writer for October. Well done Joanna! We’re very proud of you! Have a read of her essay below.
JB’s fantastic essay entry for the Rotary’s ‘My Inspiration’ competition
Numeracy and Mathematics
This week we have been reintroduced to fractions, which we will be learning about alongside decimals and percentages in the lead up to Christmas. We began by finding the fraction of a set using Skittles. After counting the number of each colour we were asked to write this as a fraction before simplifying it if possible and answering word problem type questions based on our findings. We have been ensuring that we use mathematical language at all times; the top number is the numerator, the bottom number is the denominator and the line separating the two numbers is called the vinculum. As well as finding the fraction of a set, we have also been ordering and sequencing fractions. Next week we will consolidate our learning of simplification and equivalence.
During Big Start activities we have been applying our learning of our times table facts. One example we tackled this week was a Mystery Matrix. Well done to Lily, Millie, Luke and Sophie who managed to solve the matrix and fill in every missing value. Next week we will begin to discuss this year’s Christmas Fayre enterprise work. Once we have considered who we would like to work with, we will be deciding on our product or service and beginning to put together a resource order form. Each group will be working on a strict budget of £20 with the aim of making the greatest net profit. We are aiming to develop our entrepreneurial skills, experience running a small business and increase our financial awareness. The Fayre will be on Friday 7th December, so please put it in your diaries to come along and support P7. All money raised will be put towards our Leavers 2019 events.
MH and LG worked hard to solve the Mystery Matrix
One of this week’s Big Starts
Skittles fractions
Skittles fractions
Health and Wellbeing
Below you will see us participating in our third session of futsal. This week we were developing the ability to pass accurately to our peers through the use of varied parts of the foot and communicating effectively. Next week is a games week where we will be able to demonstrate the skills we have developed so far in small-sided match situations.
Congratulations to PM below who brought in his Linlithgow Fun Run achievements to share with me. He placed highly in the race given his age and continues to excel in all things sport. P is one of our new Sports Leaders, a member of the Sports Committee and integral part of our school football team. Well done P!
Finally, FB and RD have also won medals for their efforts at rugby. They attended at tournament in Musselburgh recently; winning every game, scoring tries and working well as part of a team. Excellent job boys, keep up the good work! RD is our current Sports Committee Chairperson whilst FB is an enthusiastic member of our Sports Leaders group. Great examples of young sportsmen for their peers from P1-6.
Communicating with peers to pass the ball successfully
Futsal passing exchanges
PM Fun Run achievement
RD and FB rugby achievements
Learning Across the Curriculum
Lastly, we ended the week with a trip to Lady Haig’s Poppy Factory on Thursday. We had a brilliant day and found the experience to be incredibly informative and thought-provoking. The morning began with a WWII presentation from Peter, an ex-Sergeant Major, who put us through our paces and certainly woke anyone up who may still have been half-asleep! This included Mrs Manlove, our parent volunteer, who was dressed up as a paratrooper deployed behind enemy lines. JS demonstrated confidence to come forward and dress up as a Commando and was one of our values certificate winners this week. Well done JS! We then went back downstairs and managed to manufacture over 2,000 poppies in a short space of time. ZP and SK gathered these in a huge box as these poppies will be sent out during next year’s Scottish Poppy Appeal. Some of the boys asked to be shown round the factory and had a look at the various pieces of machinery used to create poppies, wreaths and other items. We’d like to say a huge thank you to all of the workers here for being so friendly and welcoming during our visit. P7a demonstrated our school values throughout the morning and were an absolute credit to us all! Have a look at the happy, smiling poppy makers pictured underneath.
“Can we stay here for the rest of the day?”
Happy boys at this table
Working hard to manufacture poppies for the 2019 appeal
Next Week
SNSA testing all week in P7
Monday 29th October – Homework grids (term 2) and Sharing the Learning Overviews in school bags
Monday 29th October – NO school football
Tuesday 30th October – JASS Parent Launch event (see app)
Wednesday 31st October – P7 NHS dental checks
Thursday 1st November – Mr Logan in class, futsal session
Friday 2nd November – Deadline for skiing EE2 forms, payment can be made before Tuesday 27th November
P7a have been writing essays this week on deforestation and extending their knowledge of how human behaviour is impacting on the natural environment, particularly in the Amazon rainforest. We were staggered to learn that 13 million hectares of rainforest are destroyed worldwide every year which equates to 8.5 million football pitches a year, or 23,483 per day! It’s safe to say that we were united in our disapproval of this and used our essays to further discuss; what deforestation is, why it is happening, the impact of it and what can be done to protect these areas. Finally, after considering the information found from our research, we offered our own viewpoint and suggested potential solutions to this global issue.
We have also been continuing with our group novel studies in guided reading. Take a look below at what we have created at home. These shoe boxes hold items that represent key themes within the text we are studying. For example, in Tales of Beedle the Bard friendship and good vs. evil is prevalent, the Hunger Games explores power, identity and politics whilst Anne Frank’s Diary exposes sacrifice and religion.
Novel study theme shoe boxes
Numeracy and Mathematics
In Numeracy and Mathematics this week we have continued to consolidate our learning of formal written methods. After finishing our block of work on multiplication, we are now studying the inverse operation of division. We have been using both short division and mental strategies to tackle various questions and problems this week. Next, we will be applying our learning from division when developing our knowledge of fractions, decimals and percentages. In the collage below, you will see that Paul has already been finding real-life examples of fractions at home and converting these into percentages.
When learning about Brazil in our ‘Near and Far’ comparison, we found that the currency used in Brazil is the real (ray-al). One Brazilian real is exchanged for approximately 20p and you’ll see below that we have been creating a currency conversion chart for someone travelling here. We have also been drawing a comparison between Scottish and Brazilian culture and society using a Venn diagram. Well done Nicci, whose examples are displayed below!
Venn diagrams, currency conversion and real-life fractions
Health and Wellbeing
Our current block of basketball is coming to an end next week and we have been beginning to apply our skills developed in small-sided game scenarios. The key focus this week was on inclusion and passing within our team, ensuring that all players received a pass before points could be scored. We also played took part in some 1v1 scenarios to develop both our attacking and defending skills as well as our hand-eye coordination. In the pictures underneath, you will see us taking part in our first futsal session delivered by Kieran from West Lothian’s Youth Football Foundation. Futsal is a Brazilian variation of football which is both fast-paced and exciting to watch. We developed our dribbling skills and close control of the futsal, ensuring it remains on the floor. This is made easier by the fact it has fluff inside to weigh it down!
We have been continuing to work on ‘Keeping Ourselves Safe’ with Mrs Newton and for homework, we created flow charts that illustrated how to respond in varied dangerous situations. Mr Logan has shared a few examples of these below because the standard of work and effort put into them was so incredibly high. Ewan carefully detailed how to respond when smoke is detected in your home and Joseph M when you find a casualty who is unconscious. Excellent effort boys!
Futsal week 1
Dangerous situation response flow charts
Learning Across the Curriculum
Our leadership groups are now up and running as we undertake different activities to lead learning across the whole school. Our Numeracy Leaders have been setting challenges for the younger classes, Literacy Leaders preparing to start paired reading with the infants and Digital Leaders creating posters to be displayed in all classrooms that promote internet safety. As well as this, our Buddies have been working within our infant classrooms to support their learning, and similarly, the Sports Leaders led two sessions of P.E for both P1 classes. We can also announce that the first edition of Springfield Times will be coming your way in November courtesy of our hard-working Newspaper Team. For homework, Rory also took the time to write about an inspirational leader of his. He chose Scottish rugby captain John Barclay and listed the skills and qualities that he demonstrates in his role. Great effort Rory, and well done to you and Finlay B for your victory last weekend!
In Science with Mrs Tulloch during term 1 we have studied animals and food chains, and we consolidated this learning at home by drawing our own annotated food chains to represent the network of links between different species. We will also be moving on to study plants in society, and as you can see below, we have already began working on this with our labelled diagrams of plant structures. Our STEM challenge has been to create junk model shanties and we have since turned the back of our classroom into a Brazilian favela. A special mention to Millie for the graffiti and artwork on her outside walls and to Luke for the level of detail in his design.
Leadership in action
Food chains
Structure of plants
Inspiring leaders
P7a junk material favelas
I look forward to seeing you all at parents’ evening next Wednesday and Thursday.
Have a great weekend everyone! We’d also like to wish the lovely Millie a Happy Birthday for tomorrow!
We are absolutely delighted to inform our pupils, parents, carers and families of the exciting news we received today. Springfield Primary School and Bonnytoun Nursery have been awarded a sportscotland Gold School Sport Award for 2018-2021!
The Gold School Sport Award is recognition of the school and nursery’s achievements in putting sport at the heart of our school’s planning, practice and ethos. It highlights that as a school we have shown excellent practice across the core areas of the Award and demonstrated an ongoing commitment to increase our young people’s opportunities and engagement in physical education, school sport and leadership. We aim to build upon and further improve our existing provision of sport whilst creating clear pathways for lifelong participation.
We would like to say a huge thank you to everyone who has played their part in achieving this award, we really couldn’t have done it without you. This includes; our wonderful staff and P.E specialist who ensure that our children participate in 2 hours of high quality P.E per week, those who volunteer to give up their time every week to provide an extra-curricular club, the parents and volunteers who assist with school sport and our committed P7 Sports Leaders. Last but not least, thank you to our Sports Committee for all of their hard work towards achieving this award and to all of our pupils across both the school and nursery for their boundless enthusiasm towards all things sport at Springfield.
“It’s not always the team with the best players that win. It’s the players in the best team that win. Together, everyone, achieves, more.”
To tie in with our Brazil learning, this week we have been creating rainforest tankas in writing. Tankas are Japanese poems, similar to haikus, but have two additional lines. They have 5 lines split over 2 verses and always add up to a total of 31 syllables. Often tankas are written about nature, love or sadness and portray strong feelings or emotions. We discussed deforestation and the feelings that this may evoke for both the animals and indigenous tribes living there, as well as the impact that this is having on the natural environment. When reading examples, we also identified the regular use of simile, metaphor and personification within tankas and were encouraged to incorporate figurative language into our own work. Please read one or two of our efforts below:
We have also been working as groups to research the Brazilian city that our tables are named after. Firstly, we had to identify the location of our city on the Brazilian map before marking this on our class wall display. Using our notes and relevant information from our research, we started creating informative posters about each city that detailed various aspects of life in that location. Some of us chose to focus on landmarks and places of interest, whereas others opted for a focus on the natural environment or the artistic influence that can be seen there. These will be completed next week and we will share some photos of the finished articles in our next blog post.
Z and J passing on their knowledge of tanka poetry to M, J, L and F
Numeracy and Mathematics
This week we celebrated Maths Week Scotland as well as continuing to extend our knowledge of multiplication. On Monday and Tuesday, we consolidated our learning of multiplying 4 or 5-digit numbers by a single digit using a standard written method before applying specific rules to effectively multiply by 10, 100 and 1,000. To build on this further, we multiplied decimal numbers by 10, 100 and 1,000, paying particular attention to how many places our decimal place would move to the right. Next week we will continue to strengthen our knowledge and understanding in multiplication before making the link the the inverse operation, division. As part of Maths Week Scotland, we took advantage of the good weather on Wednesday morning to team up with P7b and do some multiplication orienteering. Various multi-step word problems we positioned in 15 different locations around the school grounds where we worked with a partner to solve these using the written method taught earlier in the week. If we failed to do so, or did not include units of measurement, we were given a time penalty or asked to recalculate. Zak and Ambra were our winners, just pipping 2 other groups to the prize.
Health and Wellbeing
We have been focused on one value this week in P7a, resilience. Throughout the week we took the time to refine our class assembly and develop our confidence when presenting to an audience. We hope that you all enjoyed it and would like to thank you for coming along to support us. If you couldn’t make it along today then please feel free to have a look at our presentation by clicking the link (P7a Class Assembly). Resilience is something we are all looking to build during P7 as we prepare for our transition to S1. Next week, we are looking forward to a visit from the RNLI to speak to us about water safety as part of our Keeping Myself Safe learning with Mrs. Newton. We are hoping to further our knowledge of how to respond in an emergency situation near water.
On Wednesday, we teamed up with those in our leadership groups to finalise what our remits will be for this year. From newspaper writers to sports leaders, we’ve got a number of areas in which we will be working hard to develop across school. Each group will be allocated one hour per week to carry out their responsibilities and we’ll keep you updated with our progress over the coming weeks and months. As our new upper school display states there really is a leader in all of us, and we’re beginning to demonstrate the skills and qualities that a great leader might possess:
Effective communication
Enthusiasm
Boldness
Self-assurance
Intuitiveness
Teamwork
Empathy
Charisma
Thank you for all showing up in such numbers for both Meet the Teacher and our class assembly this week. Both the children and I appreciate it.
This week we have been consolidating our learning of addition and subtraction. We understand the importance of using particular written processes and were able to select those which would be most efficient and save us time. When reading word problems, we have been demonstrating our understanding by identifying which operations and approaches we need to use. We were able to articulate our choices with clarity and explain our reasons for doing so. Mr Logan has been pleased to hear the increased use of mathematical and specialised vocabulary in numeracy lessons. We have a greater knowledge of the words and phrases which can also mean add or subtract, for example, find the total or find the difference. In mental maths, we have been doing 10-a-day to become more confident in our ability to use a range of strategies and discuss these. On Thursday, we carried out some problem solving exercises with Mrs Newton.
Literacy and English
Our Guided Reading timetable began this week and we have all been given some reading to complete as part of our home learning for next Monday. We are studying fictional texts to develop our reading skills, for example, skimming, scanning, predicting, clarifying and summarising. Alongside this, we shall be using Yammer in class to discuss and analyse these texts in greater detail with members of our reading group. Not only should we be able to answer literal questions, but we should also now be developing our ability to respond to inferential questions by reading between the lines and evaluative questions by offering our own opinion.
In grammar, we have been using the thesaurus to find synonyms, or similar words, before putting these into a contextualised sentence. We were asked to apply this skill when producing a creative and imaginative piece of writing on Wednesday. Mr Logan revealed a stormy picture of Rio de Janeiro as a stimulus on the SMARTBoard and we were tasked with writing a story around this image. We ensured that our writing was presented well, that we incorporated detail through description of both setting and character and that our writing was structured to include a suitable opening, turning point and climax or cliffhanger ending.
Our Literacy Corner and library area in class have been re-organised after deciding on the texts we would be most inclined to pick up and read. So far, none of P7a have managed to solve our Literacy Corner riddle or conundrum. Can anyone help them?
Riddle –What do an island and the letter ‘t’ have in common?
Conundrum – U D R S U C I L O
Health and Wellbeing
We have been continuing to complete our Daily Mile as we work hard to increase our lap count, and ultimately our fitness levels. It was lovely on Wednesday to complete this alongside some of our Buddies from P1a.
In basketball we responded to both verbal and visual cues with and without the ball before pairing up for some passing and ball exchange work. We are continuing to practise our two step lay-up in order to get ourselves as close as possible to the net before shooting. During small-sided games, Mr Logan has been encouraged by the teamwork and effective communication shown. It is important that we always demonstrate a sense of fair play and sporting integrity.
With Mrs Begarnie on Tuesday, we created our ‘trusted hands’ (below) which detail the 5 key adults that we would speak to or confide in if ever we were sad, worried, anxious or angry. This ties in with our introduction of the 5 Point Scale across school and we will be making reference to these with class as and when needed. On Thursday we continued to work with Mrs Newton to explore the ways in which we can keep ourselves safe in a variety of dangerous situations.
Learning Across the Curriculum
Finally, a huge congratulations to Sahasra for her inspirational piece of writing which was judged to be the winner of Strangely Maigcal’s Fox and Gazelle Top Trumps competition. You can read her winning entry below in which she discusses the beauty of diversity of the power that kindness from those around you can have. She is also pictured collecting her values certificate at Friday’s assembly for confidence. Well done Sahasra, we’re all so proud and you’re a credit to Springfield Primary School!
Coming Up
11.9.18 – Meet the Teacher – 6.30-7.30pm
14.9.18 – P7a Class Assembly (Resilience) – 10.00-10.30am
17.9.18/18.9.18 – Holiday
10.10.18/11.10.18 – Parents Evenings (appointment info. to follow)
13.10.18 – 22.10.18 – Holiday
25.10.18 – Poppy Factory visit (EE2 forms to follow, parent helpers required)
Have a great weekend everyone, and I’ll hopefully see you on Tuesday at 6.30pm for Meet the Teacher!
We have been learning about weight and measure this week, firstly using the comparative size of familiar objects to make reasonable estimations, check these using an appropriate measuring device, read scales accurately and record our results in the correct unit. As we extended our knowledge of weight, we linked this learning to rationing during World War II by researching the amount that each person would have been allocated of specific items per week in ounces (oz). Ounces (oz), pounds (lbs) and stones are examples of imperial units of measure which would have been used in this era, which contrasts to the metric system of measurement used more regularly nowadays, e.g. grams (g) and kilograms (kg). Once we found out how much of each item was rationed, we used formulae to convert these amounts using decimal notation from ounces to grams by multiplying by 28.3, and then from grams to kilograms by dividing by 1,000. This allowed us to consolidate our knowledge of place value as we moved the decimal point three places left.
Literacy and English
Now that we have finished reading The Boy In the Striped Pajamas, our group text, we have been studying it in more detail to further extend our comprehension and understanding whilst developing our reading skills and strategies. We began by discussing the most prevalent themes throughout the story, coming up with some excellent suggestions such as the loss of innocence, friendship, relationships and family, division, good vs. evil, abuse of power, leadership, religion, war and conflict. From this we analysed a chosen theme in greater detail by examining where this was explored in the text. This week we accessed the story through an ebook to vary the way in which we interpret information. We were also introduced to the notion of cause and effect; the cause being why a key event occurs in the story and the effect being how this impacts upon characters and triggers other events as a result. This is often referred to as the ‘butterfly effect’. When reading various statements, we distinguished between fact and opinion before providing our own examples of these. Hitler expressed a number of strong opinions during World War II, but there was no evidence to suggest these were true or factual. Finally, we tackled a range of questions based on the text and word processed our responses within our reading group’s Yammer page. This opened up some interesting dialogue between the class to promote further discussion and debate.
Health and Wellbeing
The second workshop of our tobacco education delivered by Michelle from West Lothian’s Drug and Alcohol Service took place on Monday. We further explored the damaging effects that smoking can have on our bodies and were able to witness this first-hand. Through our research, we found that chemicals such as butane are found in cigarettes. Butane is flammable and also found in petrol, and is created as a bi-product of smoking to ensure a cigarette stays lit. ‘Smokey Sue’ was setup in the front playground with a test tube of water to replicate the moisture in our lungs before smoking one cigarette. We were shocked to see that the water was turned yellow as a result, and a build-up of tar could be found on the glass. Michelle also posed us with various ‘tempting situations’ and we were asked to move to the left if we were not tempted to smoke, or to the right if we were tempted to smoke. The idea of peer pressure was mentioned, and the children assessed the impact that risk-taking behaviour such as this could have on their health.
Have a relaxing weekend everyone! P7b, make sure you rest and recuperate before school camp next week! No late nights!
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