Today we were dropped behind enemy lines in the forest and we had to make ourselves a camouflaged shelter to stay warm and dry. During our shelter building we also made a fire in small groups and toasted some marshmallows (hard to find in wartime, but our platoon Tree Frog and Fox managed it!) and enjoyed a hot drink, made with boiling water from the Kelly Kettles.
Have a look at our learning from today’s session:
Behind Enemy Lines: Forest Schools on PhotoPeach
On Wednesday Primary 7s had our first Forest Schools session of the year. Our Forest School leaders, Tree Frog and Fox, had something special planned: we were training for battle!
We improved our fitness with several forest training stations that included a slalom relay course, star jumps and army crawl. We sharpened our observational skills and improved our fitness with a team relay to uncover hidden supplies in the forest. And finally we learned about camouflage (and experimented with it on our faces) to improve our chances of winning in Stealth, our favourite game in the forest.
Have a look at the fun we had!
Preparation for Battle on PhotoPeach
Next week: Behind Enemy Lines
Challenge: wear something you could have worn in WWII!
This term our topic is the Second World War. We started by thinking about what we already know and deciding what questions we have that we would like answers to. We wrote all this information in our KWL grids and they are displayed in our classroom.
Mrs Pearce and Mr Martindale have used our questions to plan our topic. So far we have learned about famous leaders of the Allies and Axis countries. We have also learned about some people who are perhaps not so famous, but probably should be. We have learned how to take concise notes while researching and how to use them to create an interesting report about a person.
We have created a timeline with key events for the classroom.
We have also found out about the Clydebank Blitz, Anderson shelters and the Dig for Victory campaign. We have begun creating our own adverts, based on the propaganda we have examined from World War II. We will finish these next week.
Have a look at some of our work so far:
World War II on PhotoPeach
On the 8th of May, Primary 7s from Sanderson’s Wynd gathered at Meadowmill to meet their peers from Pencaitland, Ormiston and Elphinstone. We had a brilliant time doing the activities and getting to know everyone!
Ross High Transition at Meadowmill on PhotoPeach
I was greeted in our morning line up with “I’m sick of this baby! I’ve had enough!” Some classmates echoed these sentiments while others were still happily doting on their ‘babies’. Another pupil had concerns about how to look after her baby properly when having a shower. After a class discussion we wrote down our thoughts and feelings about the project and I will share some of them anonymously here.
“I can’t kick a rugby ball or play games at break time because of my baby.”
“I love my baby but I am exhausted from looking after him.”
“It’s embarrassing when people stare at you and the baby in the street.”
” I can’t go out because of my baby.”
“It’s fun, but 10 days is too long to have to look after a baby.”
“I understand now why I would never want to have a baby when I’m young.”
“I now understand what my parents have done for me.”
We have also found that it’s a lot more difficult to get our work done in school while looking after our babies at the same time. Sometimes we put them in a creche in the classroom and sometimes we keep them with us while we are working.
This morning we gathered in line with our Flour Babies in tow. All that were finished in school yesterday managed to make it back in to class today. We finished nearly all the remaining ones today! Today our babies took part in World Maths Day, our Transition session, our lacrosse lession and RME. One baby even got to go with her dad to Forest Schools this morning! At the end of the day we created birth certificates for our babies using Publisher. Some of us are finding that it is much trickier to complete any task with a baby to care for.
Have a look at our photos:
Flour Babies on PhotoPeach
Yesterday we began making our 33 flour babies! Mrs Pearce vastly underestimated the time we needed for this, so we only finished 26. It was so much fun and for adults watching, it was quite amazing to watch P7s transformed into parents! There was fluff, bits of knee highs, scissors and tape all over the classroom at times, but by the end of our day, P7 pupils gathered with their babies in the reading corner and had their own Mummy/Daddy and me session. It was quite a spectacular sight to behold!
On Friday in P7P we drew slips of paper out of a box to find out the gender of our new babies…er, flour babies that is. Alongside our study of Anne Fine’s novel, Flour Babies, we are creating our own babies and caring for them for 10 days.
Our babies will be ‘born’ tomorrow afternoon and we will create their birth certificates on the same day. Meanwhile, their parents will be keeping a journal of their experiences as new parents. They will also be doing some shopping online for baby items, comparing prices for items their baby needs.
P7 pupils must be good parents and look after their babies 23 out of 24 hours every day, with only one hour of baby-sitting which must be logged.
Good luck, Primary 7s. I’m sure you will all be loving, caring parents!
We have spent the past five weeks working hard in writing workshops learning how to create interesting characters and settings. We have learned about showing character through dialogue and action instead of just telling about them. We have learned how to bring a setting alive by describing weather, time of day and using an interesting proper noun. We have learned how to build tension by using short sentences, mixed in with longer ones that contain detail. We have learned how to write openings that grip our readers and make them want to read on.
Click on the photos to enlarge to read excerpts of our first drafts.
We are now nearly finished with the first draft of our stories and when we return from the break, we will complete our evaluation/revision process before designing a cover for our book. We aim to publish our collection of stories on Amazon before the end of February, so please watch this space.
This week in Maths the Pythagoras and Einstein groups have been learning how to use BODMAS to solve maths problems with brackets. Can you remember what BODMAS stands for and post it here?
Could you work these out? Post the answers as a comment.
1. 6 x (7 + 9 – 10) + 5= ?
2. (7 -2 x 3) + 4 x (13 – 4) = ?
We have also as a whole class been preparing for our next Times Table Challenge with Miss Waddell. The results of our first challenge were: Miriam, Catrina, Keavi, Murray, Salman and Mrs Pearce finishing within five minutes. We are continuing to practice at home and at school.Our goal for the next times table challenge on February 28th is to have 8 more classmates finishing within the time limit.