Today we were lucky enough to host Craig Andrew Mooney, the author behind ‘The Rebel of Time’. It was a great experience to ask Craig our questions and hear a little extract of the book from the person behind the words.
Craig shared with us his inspiration behind the main characters and shared a fascinating insight in to the writing process. Everyone was captivated and participated in hands on writing exercise guided by Craig. Pupils had the chance to experiment with writing and illustrating in pairs, exploring their own creative ideas.
This is a great way to kick off our literacy book study and plant the seed of aspiring authorship in our pupils.
Despite the snowy weather, we’ve had a wonderful first week back in Primary 1-3. The class has been hard at work on a book study which has combined reading, creativity and hands-on learning. Our book study is focused on the book, ‘The Ugly Five’ by Julia Donaldson which explores five animals in the African savannah who are often called “ugly” by others.
After reading the book and making predictions on Wednesday, we explored the animals in the book in more detail and created fun character descriptions. We began by looking at real-life images of each animal using iPads, then we looked through the story to create our own descriptions which can be seen below. This activity helped us better understand the story and sparked our imaginations.
Our curiosity about the animals in the story and their environment led us to design and build our own habitats. Using a variety of materials such as LEGO and building blocks, we created models of environments such as a rainforest, a polar habitat, a garden and a city. We learned about the varying needs of animals and plants within different habitats, which then led to a discussion about the unique needs of the animals and how their habitats help them survive.
Building to withstand Artic habitats.A house in a city that is built to support people.A doghouse that includes a grass area and a place to sleep.Rainforest habitat with a small river and different plants.
Creating Games with Micro:bits!
On Friday, we continued to explore coding through Micro:bits during Creativity Hour and had an exciting time putting our skills to use! We learned how to programme the Micro:bits to function as dice – by shaking the device, a random number would appear on the screen! Once we completed this, we used our Micro:bit to create our own games.
Some of us incorporated the Micro:bit dice into board games we had in the class such as Connect 4. In this game, the children would shake the device to generate a number, which determined the number of tokens they could use to play for that round. Others, made up fun challenges where the dice decided different movements. It was a great way to combine problem-solving and teamwork while learning more about technology and coding.
On Wednesday, P1-7 had the chance to visit West Calder Library as part of Book Week Scotland. The trip began with a reading of There’s a Snake in my School! by David Walliams, which the children thoroughly enjoyed.
They then had the opportunity to explore the library’s wide range of genres and books, browsing both fiction and non-fiction. The children spent time discussing their favourite types of books and sharing recommendations with one another. They also got creative by making crafts such as bookmarks and posters. To wrap up the visit, the children selected a book to borrow, which they can keep at school to read. Overall, it was a delightful trip, and the children enjoyed discovering and engaging with different books.
