Friday 1st February 2013
Hello! It’s Freya M and Olly here!

We have some news we would like to share with you about the playground. This week we were playing football. The people who were playing were: Freya M, Gregor W, Gregor T, Dillon, Ben, Hamish and Calum. The score was 0-0 but it was still really fun. Here are some comments from P5:
Anna; “I think it went well even though it was raining.”
Archie; “it was alright apart from we went in early.”
Hamish; “that game was really good and fun”
Freya M; “we got soaked!”
That is all hope you liked our web page update.

Monday 14th January 2013

Today we went to the John Bellany exhibition at the Scottish National Gallery. We had a brilliant day. Below is a slideshow of photographs so you can see what we got up to.

John Bellany Exhibition 14.1.13 on PhotoPeach

Wednesday 16th January

Today we had a free drama taster session from The Drama Mill. It was a really fast paced session with fun games and improvisation activities. All pupils were given a letter to take home from The Drama Mill about an after school Drama class. There is a slideshow below with pictures of our session today.
The Drama Mill taster session 16.1.13 on PhotoPeach

Monday 7th January 2013
Welcome to the P5 Page!

After the October holidays we started our topic on Africa. As part of this topic we took part in the Malawi Rice challenge. We had to sell 90 1kg bags of fairtrade rice which would allow one child in Malawi to go to High school for one year. Our challenge was a huge success and the children really enjoyed it!

Our main topic this term is the Jacobites, however we are kicking off the term with a mini topic on local artist John Bellany. This will involve a class trip to the Scottish National Gallery on Monday 14th January where we will have a guided tour of the exhibition and take part in a workshop. We will then have a follow up workshop in school on the 5th of February. The organisers of these exciting workshops are hoping to include the pupils’ artwork as part of an exhibition during the
3 Harbours Festival in May/June at Prestongrange Museum.

Our Jacobite topic will involve developing an understanding of what life was like in the 18th century, learning about Bonnie Prince Charlie and the Battle of Prestonpans. We will be going on a trip to Edinburgh Castle on the 19th of March to take part in a workshop called ‘Rebels and Redcoats’. We are also hoping to have 2 in school visits from the Battle of Prestonpans trust, but dates for this are still to be confirmed.

Literacy Focus
We will be focussing on creative writing and will be looking to improve our use of vocabulary, punctuation and structure to grab our readers attention.
In reading we will be learning to identify the main idea in a text and to summarise. We will practise answering literal and inferential questions and write some questions of our own. We will also be looking at some Scots poetry and will have a go at learning and performing a poem.
We will continue to look at the behaviours we should see and hear in a good quality audience and in good quality group discussion. We will also be looking at note taking while we are listening.

Numeracy Focus—set out below are the skills we will be focussing on this term.
Shape, position and movement.
*Investigate and discuss the properties of 3D shapes using appropriate vocab
*Investigate and discuss the relationship between the radius and diameter of a circle
*Create a circle pattern using compasses
*Know and understand the terms face, edge, side, corner, angles, vertices, diagonals, radius, diameter, circumference, scalene, isosceles, right-angled
*Know that the faces of 3D shapes meet to form edges, and edges meet at a vortex
*Investigate different nets for 3D shapes and make a variety of skeletal and solid models of 3D shapes using different materials
*Use methods and drawing implements to accurately draw 2D shapes
*Be able to calculate the area of a 2D shape and the capacity of simple 3D shapes
*Know the different types of angles (right, acute, obtuse) and be able to measure them accurately using a protractor
Number
*Continue to develop quick recall of multiplication and associated division facts.
*Continuing to develop a range of mental and written strategies for addition, subtraction, multiplication and division.
*Know which strategy to apply when tackling a word problem.

Health and Wellbeing

In PE we will begin by learning some Scottish dances. We will continue to have PE with Mrs Mason on Thursday mornings.

During our circle time activities, we will be:
Learning to develop a sense of our own skills, interests, abilities and targets and learning about the importance of valuing all members of the school community equally.
Identifying different emotions and thinking about when it is appropriate to and how to express our feelings.
Understanding how emotions are linked to behaviours.
Developing an awareness of dangerous substances.
Developing our knowledge of what to do in an emergency, basic first aid procedures and how to contact the emergency services.
Learn to develop a sense of their own skills, interests, abilities and targets
Learn to value all members of the school community equally

Important dates
Mon 14th Jan -Visit to the Scottish National Gallery
Tues 5th Feb –John Bellany workshop (in school)
Tues 19th March –visit to Edinburgh Castle -“rebels and redcoats”.
Fri 8th Feb–finish for half term.
Mon 18th Feb—Return to school.
Wed 6th March & Thurs 7th March—Parent consultations