Author: Rosy Mccaw

Awesome Australia in P4/5!

Over the last couple of weeks we have been enjoying devoting most of our days to our whole school Australia topic. 

On week one lots of thinking  was involved during our research lesson on note taking and then again to create a leaflet on an Australian animal to educate British tourists when holidaying in Australia. We all worked so hard and enjoyed choosing our own book and type of animal to study! Well done to Allister, Katie and Struan for being selected by the class as star writers and writing incredibly interesting and detailed reports. In ICT we are in the process of using Publisher to turn our reports into professional looking leaflets.

Last week we build on our note taking skills when listening to and watching a clip on traditional Aboriginal games. We then choose a game and worked in a team to compare resources we have today, adapting it before planning and teaching it to the rest of the class.  During our sharing session we all thought that Oscar and Jasiu demonstrated particularly excellent leadership skills.  We used our P.E. lesson to evaluate what we thought we had been doing well in co-operative learning and also suggested next steps. We did this for leadership skills too!

We are all looking forward to one final week of Aaaaaaaaaustralia!!!

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http://photopeach.com/album/d219jm

 

Pop Art

Pop Art on PhotoPeach

In golden time today P1-4 worked on their own and in groups to create fantastic abstract eye art! We developed drawing and painting skills such as blending oil pastels and mixing tints and tones of paint and experimented with the wax resist technique. We enjoyed painting and singing to our favourite pop tunes and some break dancing (from the boys) in the last 5 minutes! Check out our creative little artists and our dance moves too!!!

P2/3s Slideshow Showcase

Yesterday, in ICT, P2/3 worked with a partner to create a slideshow on their chosen learning from last term or this term. We enjoyed using photopeach to copy, paste and organise our photos into a slideshow. We also thought of our own title and added music. Some of us then reflected on our learning and added comments.

Gymnastics Festival by Jasiu and Tommy.
We went to Dunbar Grammar School for a gymnastics festival and we also practiced some gymnastics at our school. We learnt to balance, jump and land using different equipment. There were jump stations, balancing stations and running stations. I think everyone enjoyed it!

Trip to John Gray Center by Poppy and Allister.
We worked in groups and with our writing buddies to explore and measure different objects, read information and write down ideas for the different quizzes. I liked going to the centre to find out different things about history and objects.

Forces Friction Experiment by Chris and Oscar.
We made up an experiment to test friction on different surfaces. We worked in groups inside and outside. We used measuring skills learnt in maths to measure how far the 2p coin had travelled. The 2p travelled the furthest on the table so it has the smoothest surface and has the least amount of friction. The 2p travelled the least on the rough surfaces which had the most amount of friction. It was fun!

Writing Instructions for Making a Mummy by Caley and Blair.
Last week we learnt about how the Egyptians made a mummy. In drama we acted out making a mummy with salt and bandages. In reading we answered questions about making a mummy by reading and highlighting key words in bits from non-fiction books. This helped us to learn more to write detailed instructions for making a mummy. We worked with our writing buddies. I liked it when Mrs McCaw read us Horrid Henry and the Mummy Curse.

P2/3 Story Writing Through Drama

Last term and this term we have been throwing ourselves into the wonderful world of story writing! Shonagh Davidson, a drama teacher from East Lothian Arts Services, visited us to deliver a drama workshop on fairy tales. We built on drama skills from the workshop to help us write a Celtic fairy tale and a Roman warrior story. We enjoyed using the Roman and Celtic weapons and shields that we had made when acting out our story ideas!

Story Writing Through Drama on PhotoPeach

This term we have chosen to study Jeremy Strong’s science fiction novel ‘Krazy Cow Saves the World’ as our class story. During the second week of term we chose a character in the story and developed the character in the same style as the author. We were amazed at the amount of adjectives and fantastic wow words we were able to think of when working with our writing buddies! During the third week of term we chose a really funny part of the story to stop at and then continued the story on in the same style as the author. Last week we wrote a letter to Jeremy Strong to ask if he could give us feedback on our story writing. Well done Lucy Townshend and Ryan Dunn for being voted writing stars of the week and getting your excellent letters on the wall of success!!

Wonder Room Project – Art from Ecuador

Artist, Eileen Hall, visited to share her experiences and objects from Ecuador. P2/3 enjoyed telling Eileen about their ‘Wonder Room’ and why the objects that had been taken in were special to them. The carved wooden dolls, paintings, images from books and ideas from a story were all used to help P2/3 create a chalk pastel drawing of their representation of Ecuador. When Eileen left P2/3 talked about how they could develop their imaginative and observational pastel drawings by blending pastels in different ways and adding detail. We shared our work in groups and liked the fact everyone’s pictures were completely different!

Ecuador Pastel Art on PhotoPeach

Archaeological Experts in P2/3!

This week P2/3 chose learning that they wanted to share on the blog. Here is some of their fantastic work and experiences from the last eight weeks or so!

In October, to link in with our Celts and Romans project, we ventured to Bothwell Castle to work alongside experts on an archaeological excavation! We worked in teams to find objects like bones, teeth and pottery. We enjoyed listening to spooky stories about what was thought to have happened in Bothwell castle and nearby areas of Haddington long ago. It rained all morning but the weather didn’t stop us from having fun!
On Thursday afternoon, head archaeologist, David Connelly came into class to share more of the weird and wonderful objects that had been found by archaeologists. He helped us work together to write a poem on archaeology.

Archaeological Excavation! on PhotoPeach