P6 travel back in time for our Victorian Day.

This Monday P6 traveled back in time to 1900, in the final years of the Victorian era. From the first bell at 9.00am, we were back in Victorian times, showing the utmost respect for all school staff from fear of a whack with the tawse, a leather strap used for disciplining children or the dunces hat and stool for ridiculing any child that couldn't follow instructions.
We started our day in our new seats and a bible reading, as was common in Victorian times. We then went outside for some PE or 'drill' as it was call. After some strict physical exercises and marching we came back in to work on our handwriting.  We learned a poem by recital, as was often done and then split into boys and girls to learn different lessons.
The boys learned technical drawing as might be used in a careen in engineering or architecture.



The girls, however, learned skills to be used in the home like baking and made biscuits instead.

At the end of they day we said goodbye to our Victorian School. We had some fun with making conkers, as they would have played with back then, and had a little tournament. 

What a fun day in P6!

Whoopsie-daisy Angel

Last Wednesday and Thursday, our gym hall was transformed into a theater for the performance of 'Whoosie-Daisy Angel', a pantomime performed and supported by all the pupils here at SPS.

We had a lovely song from the children in our nursery, who sang 'Little Donkey' wearing adorable donkey ears. 

Then, for the main event , we had Whoopsie-Daisy Angle performed by P 1 with singing from P2 and 3.
This retelling of the nativity, told from the perspective of the angel messenger brought us songs, dances and a heart-warming story told.

Our show finished with Christmas carols sung by P4 and 5 and then by P6 and 7, who sang well and gave a great finish to a great show.

Bravo, SPS!

It's beginning to feel a lot like Christmas.

There's been lots happening over the past 2 weeks here at SPS to make us all feel a little but more Christmassy.

'Christmas Crafternoon'

To start us off, last Monday was our Christmas Craft Afternoon, or 'Crafternoon', as we began calling it.
Our craft activity was making cards and decorations with scratch paper. While making our own designs on top of snowmen, angels, reindeer, Santas and more, we made some fantastic decorations for home and some for the classroom too.

Christmas Dinner

On Friday we all pulled crackers, read jokes, stuck on our little paper hats and tucked into a lovely Christmas dinner with the rest of the school. Whether or not we were a fan of the brussel sprouts there was plenty to get excited about.

Children in Need at SPS

Today was children in need at Stromness Primary School and all over Britian. To make this day a bit special and get us in the mood we came to school in our pyjamas. We kicked of our day with a magnificent assembly by P5. They showcased their talents with music, gymnastics, dances and circus tricks. 

Instead of our usual activities this afternoon we had loads of 'children in need' events throughout the school to help us give our money to charity. We had competitions, a mini-cinema, cup-cakes and home baking for sale and even a disco going on in the hall.  We raised hundreds of pounds for a good cause and had bags of fun while doing it.  

Well done SPS!

Surprise Party!

Last week some of the sneaky Primary 6s found out that Mr Cowan was having a birthday over the weekend. They got their planning hats on and under Mr Cowan's nose put together a surprise party with a bit of help from Mrs Johnson.
We had home baking, a cake, birthday decorations and even a personalised party playlist. A small break from topic made for a great Monday afternoon and a huge surprise for Mr Cowan.

  Thanks guys!

Bye Bye, Bike Ability

Over the last 2 terms P6 have been going through their Bike Ability 2 and we are happy to say that everyone in the Class has passed!

During Monday's achievement assembly the class were awarded their certificates. Here we can see P6 receiving their awards from our instructors, Thorfinn Johnston and Mrs Lietch. Thanks for all the help and well done P6!

Be Safe Be Seen!

We started our Friday with a great assembly by our Junior Road Safety Officers telling us all about how to stay safe at night. With the days getting shorter and our walk or cycle to school becoming darker we know that it's important to be visible. Our JRSOs told us how important our reflective vests are and what might happen if we don't wear them. So, let's stay safe and stay seen when

walking to and from school. Thanks JRSOs!

Term 2 well under way

Well, we've reached the end of our first week of the second term in primary 6. We've shared stories of our exciting holidays and we are once again well settling into school routine.
   We've all had the good fortune of gaining a new pupil in our class to mix things up a bit. I think we'd all agree she's a great fit for our great class and having an even number helps things out as well.
Let's have a great term!

Dahlicious Dress Up for Roald Dahl Day

Today, in celebration of the author, Roald Dahl, P6 and Stromness Primary School joined in with schools across the country in dressing up as our favourite Roald Dahl characters.

We had Charlie Bucket, Danny, the Champion of the World, Violet Beauregarde, Mrs. Silver, Verruca Salt, two Matildas, and two Mrs. Twits; a bunch of characters for sure.

This year's theme was the book, The Twits. We spent some of our afternoon learning from Quentin Blake how to draw Mr. Twit's beard and hearing all about Roald Dahl.

Well settled into Primary 6

Settled in

It's the end of week 5 and we've all settled into a new classroom, with a new teacher.
We've got into our new routine, found our new route back from the toilets and know what to do when Mr. Cowan claps 5 time.

Over the past 5 weeks we've been learning about Europe and are much more familiar with our countries, our flags, mountain ranges and have even been learning all about how our coastal features are formed.

Bike ability

We're in our 4th week of Bike Ability 2 with Mrs. Leitch and are all doing great. We can successfully use our turn signals and practice our manoeuvres safely.

P6 raring to go!

Giving Nature a Home

We’ve been very lucky this term to have had a few visits from Lindsey Taylor from the RSPB.  She has been helping us look for different types of wildlife around our school.  Last Wednesday we went on a ‘Nature Walk’ up to Copland’s Dock.  We found lots of different types of wildlife from birds to bugs!  We were surprised at how much we found so close to our school and Lindsey was surprised at how eagle eyed we are!  Miss Shearer took her camera but unfortunately the battery ran out after about 10 minutes!  Ooops!  Here are a few of the pictures! 

Today we headed out to Cottasgarth Bird Hide.  We were all very excited!  We spent time in the bird hide using our binoculars to see if we could spot the elusive Hen Harrier.  Unfortunately we didn’t manage to see any – they nest in the heather and are often very difficult to spot.  We did see a Raven, some Starlings and a group of 3 bonxies out hunting!  When we arrived at the hide we found a cuckoo who had possibly banged in to the window and had become stunned.  Lindsey picked it up and we got a really close look at it!  It was great. 

We heard lots of information about Hen Harriers.  We got to play some games where we used our listening skills to try and catch people and we also did a quiz on the beautiful mural painted in the hide.  Finally we went stream dipping to see what wildlife we could find in a natural stream – we mostly enjoyed splashing around in the water!

 

 

Although we didn’t see any Hen Harriers we had a brilliant time.  Cottasgarth Bird Hide is open all year round and is a great place to go to see birds as well as other wildlife – we would all like to go back! 

A big thanks to Lindsey for all the visits she has done for us this term – we have enjoyed every one of them!

Brilliant Bikeability

This week we completed our Level 1 Bikeability.  We’ve had great fun over the last few weeks learning about how to check our bikes, how to get on our bikes safely, how to cycle properly and how to signal using one arm.  Mr Macleod and Mr Johnston have been impressed at how we have improved over the last 5 weeks and how well we have listened.  We will now get certificates which will show the areas we have passed (coloured green) and the areas we still need to work on (orange and red).  Mr Macleod reminded us that even if we have ‘green’ on our certificates we still need to practice sometimes! 

We were very proud of our class mate Caity who has been working hard to learn to cycle over the last few weeks.  She has made so much progress she has learned how to cycle her bike and was able to join in with our final session in the playground!  Well done Caity!!

We will do our Bikeability Level 2 in Primary 6 where we will learn how to cycle safely on the road and how to use roundabouts. 

Lovely Library

Today we visited the new Library in Stromness at Warehouse Buildings.  We were given a tour of the building and got to see around all the rooms in the building.  We saw the meeting rooms and where they are going to hold ‘Bookbug’ instead of at our school!  We went upstairs and saw some desks where we can do our homework or studying when we are older.  We also got to go into the George Mackay Brown room where there are lots of special books which used to belong to George himself.  There were also copies of old Orcadian newspapers – some from the 1930’s!  Miss Shearer looked in some of them and found Ruben and Lucy’s birth announcements!  Lots of us would like to back and have a look at all the old newspapers.  Miss Shearer said we should try and find her birth announcement from 1987!  We then had some time to look at the books in the ‘Junior Fiction’ section and read quietly for a little while.  We were really impressed with the light and airy library and are looking forward to visiting again.    

Bikeability Update

Yesterday we had another session of Bikeability.  We have been learning about how to check our bike is roadworthy and safe to cycle.  We have also learnt about getting on and off our bikes safely. Yesterday we had to cycle past Mr Macleod, take a small hoop from his hand, turn at the bottom and give it back to Mr Macleod on our way back.  It was tricky!  We had to think about lots of different things like our balance, putting our hand out and turning all at the same time.  This is preparation for when we go on the road and need to indicate which way we are turning. 

 

Mr Macleod and Mr Johnston are impressed with our cycling skills and how we are coming on.  We will hopefully achieve our Bikeability Level 1 before the summer! 

Beautiful Butterflies

Over the last few weeks we’ve had some additions to the classroom – Painted Lady Butterflies!  They started off as teeny tiny caterpillars and they soon ate all the food and made their chrysalides. 

 

 

After a week and a half they had changed into butterflies and hatched out.  We’ve kept them for a few days and have been feeding them some nice juicy fruit which they eat using their ‘proboscis’ which is a long tube like tongue which sucks up the sweet nectar from fruit and flowers. 

 

 

We released them in the trees just outside the school so they had somewhere to land before they flew anywhere.  They took quite a while to leave the net and two didn’t really want to leave.  Miss Shearer put them onto the pieces of orange and took them out and set them in the long grass. 

 

It has been really interesting to see the changes which have taken place throughout the life cycle!

Our visit to the Hamnavoe

Today we had a fantastic day!  We went on a visit to the Hamnavoe to see our Lego Model in place on the ship.  We were also very fortunate to get a tour of the ship which we were most excited about! 

We started our visit like celebrities by getting some official pictures taken by Ken Amer for the OIC!  We had to get into just the right position!  Then we started our tour with the Captain.  He took us up to the bridge.  We got to go behind the ‘staff only’ barrier.  We saw some cabins where the crew sleep and then we headed to the bridge.  We got a great view over Stromness and heard all about how they manoeuvre the ship into place when they come into the pier.  We sat in the Captain’s chair with a Captain’s hat on!  Who knows – some of us may sit in that seat again as a Captain!  We went outside to look at the lifeboats and liferafts.  We also looked at the sticker on the back of the boat which showed the ‘Stromness from the Sea’ landmarks which pupils from SPS created last year.  We headed back downstairs and found some juice and biscuits waiting for us!  Finally Cheryl from Northlink very kindly gave us a ‘Goodie Bag’ each which had a t-shirt and water bottle in it along with some other things!  What a treat! 

 

Our whole 'Lego Hamnavoe' experience has been brilliant from start to finish.  Although at times it was tricky it was worth it in the end and we are just delighted to see our hard work on display on the ship!

 

Here we are on our way back to school showing off our goodie bags!  We were most chuffed with them!

 

Thank you very much to James and Cheryl from Serco Northlink and the crew of the MV Hamnavoe for having us aboard today - we really did have a brilliant time!

Friday Golf

Last Friday we had a great opportunity to go to the Golf Club and learn some golfing skills from the Golf Club members.  It was very cold but we thoroughly enjoyed it.  We got the chance to try putting, chipping and doing some long shots.  It was good to have a go at this after our club golf.  There is training on Monday night which we can go to at the Stromness Golf Club if we’re interested in furthering our skills.  Here we are at the Golf Club with the member s and Mel Douglas who was up for the weekend. 

 

 

Sharing our Learning

This week we have been sharing our learning with Primary 3.  Like us, they are learning about living things so we researched a type of Orkney wildlife, created either a PowerPoint, poster or leaflet and presented it to a small group of P3’s.  It was a super chance for us to share our learning with P3 and have them ask us some questions about Orkney wildlife.  P3 thought the P5’s spoke loud and clear, had interesting facts and good pictures in their presentations.  P5 thought that P3 were an excellent audience who were patient, listened well and asked good questions.

 

Well done P3 and P5! 

Caterpillar Watch

Our caterpillars are now hanging down from the lid of the tub.  This is a sure sign that they are ready to make a chrysalis.  They have been hanging all day so we think that they may make their chrysalis overnight.  Hopefully we will get the chance to see one of them ‘spin’ and make their chrysalis.  Check back for another update tomorrow! 

Humungous Caterpillars!

Our caterpillars have increased vastly in size and we think they are going to make their chrysalis soon.  As you can see they have eaten lots of the food on the bottom of the tub and what they haven't eaten they have mashed up!  They have moved to the top of the peedie tub and were beginning to hang down when we left school today.  We had hoped they would spin their chrysalis’ when we were at school but we are looking forward to checking them tomorrow morning!   

Monday Madness

We’ve had a busy Monday today!  We had our final Tag Rugby session.  We joined up with P4 to make a bigger group so that we could play more games against each other.  We did some warm up games and then practiced our ‘line’ to try and make sure that members of the opposite team didn’t have any gaps to run through. 

We have really enjoyed our Tag Rugby sessions and have made really good progress with our Rugby.  Mark is impressed with how much we have come on and said we will be in a good position when we start next time!

As Tag Rugby finished our Bikability began!  This week we focussed on learning about checking our bike to make sure it was all in check and some general cycling tips.  Mr MacLeod and Mr Johnston went through the different parts of the bike and how we can check that each part is working correctly.  We also had to check our helmets – if you can fit more than 2 fingers under the strap then the helmet is too loose!  Some of us are needing a bit of help at home to adjust the straps before our session next week.  Mr MacLeod also set us homework to revise how to check the bike and is going to see how much we can remember next week!