Storytelling and a Pyjama Party!

We are working on storytelling and Tom Muir came in to tell us a story. P1 enjoyed hearing him too.

We're working on our own stories now - we'll be recording traditional Orkney tales and sending them to our link school in Canada. We're looking forward to hearing some of their traditional tales too.

When the canoe family were in Orkney in the summer Tom Muir paddled with them in the canoe to Hoy and he told them some stories. They all used to be pupils at Outma Squilx Cultural School. Some of them went to Outma and read the pupils there some stories from Mr Muir's book. We're excited to find so many links to our Canadian school.

We had storytelling in drama as well. Miss Persidou told us a Greek myth. She told us about Perseus and Medusa.

Then we went into groups and acted out different scenes from the story so that we retold the whole story.

In language, P4 had fun making up headlines.

They were enjoying themselves so much that they didn't want to stop for lunch!

On Tuesday we had a pyjama party and bake sale to raise money to send to Haiti to help the children there.

Tuesday was the last day we had to go to school this week as it's the mid-term break now. Have a good holiday, everyone!

Our land art

Last week we looked at some land art made by Richard Shilling. We're hoping to make our own land art when we do some beach visits next term, but the snow inspired some of the girls and they spent break time making their own land art, and lunchtime repairing it!

Team work.

Reaching high to put the final pieces on.

Look at it - isn't it high?

"It's even higher than Mrs MacNab".

The rest of the class went out to see it in the afternoon when we went out to look at how our shadows had changed.

Snow closures and science

It was a funny week last week. Some days we were at school as usual, one day school was closed because of the snow, and one day school got shut early and we all got home to play in the snow! Even the teachers.

In school we were getting on with our work. Here we are doing spelling and using the dictionary to help us.

In drama we were role playing lots of different scenes (scenarios) where we had to show what we thought would happen next. Then everyone talked about whether the characters had acted in a good way or whether they could have done things better. This helps us to try to respond appropriately to other people.

We got some new games for the smartboard - they're VCOP games and we're really enjoying them. We've only played 2 so far but there's lots more we can try. This one is Victor Van Cleef the Punctuation Thief.

On Wednesday Mrs MacNab took us outside to do music. We loved it! We recorded lots of different sounds that we could hear or make in the snow.

We went into the courtyard to listen to find out if the sounds here were the same as the sounds at the front of the school. It was very peaceful in the courtyard. If we were very quiet we could hear birds singing. We saw a starling on the roof. When we listened carefully and concentrated hard we realised the snow made a different sound when we walked in the courtyard than when we walked on the grass.
Do you know why that was?

We did some science outside too. We looked at people's shadows. They were very long.

We went back outside later and looked at our shadows again. They had changed. We're going to be thinking about this more over the next few weeks as part of our Solar System topic.

We did some other science too. Here we are doing an experiment to try to find out why rockets have to carry oxygen as well as fuel. The oxygen isn't just for the astronauts to breathe - the engine needs oxygen too.

Did you know that? Do you know why?

The Space Shuttle has launched!

Today we watched the launch of the Space Shuttle Endeavour. We saw the crew get ready and get strapped in and then we watched the launch. We wrote newspaper articles about it. We hope you enjoy reading them.


The Endeavour takes off               by Rosie

About half past nine this morning the Space Shuttle went at 1800 miles per hour to the International Space Station. It went to deliver some new things to experiment with. It was going to go a few days ago but the weather was too bad but today the Space Shuttle left. By now it will be there. On it there were five men and one lady.



The Space Shuttle takes off          by Amy

The Space Shuttle is called Endeavour. It took off at about half past nine and it took off in Florida. Then it blasted into the International Space Station. It went to the International Space Station to do more science experiments.


Space Shuttle launch            by Ashleigh

This morning the Space Shuttle took off in Florida. The Space Shuttle’s name was called Endeavour. It was going to the International Space Station. It was gigantic and noisy. They were taking potions to the space station. It was going at 1800 miles an hour. They did a countdown.



Space Shuttle takes off                 by Joe

On Monday morning at half past nine the Endeavour took off to go to the International Space Station to put a new science lab on the space station. It took off from Florida in the United States. It went at 1800 miles per hour.


Off to space                  by Alanah

This morning at half past 9 our time in Britain a space ship was launched in Florida. Florida is in USA, the United States of America. There were 5 men astronauts and 1 lady astronaut. The astronauts are going to the International Space Station to do experiments in space. They counted down from 10 to 1 and after 1 they all said LIFT OFF! The space ship went up to 1800 miles per hour. The space ship was called the Endeavour. The space ship was very very very loud. The space ship is whitey grey and it said United States on it. I think that it was very fun to watch.


NASA Rocket Takes off!                by Molly H

On Monday the Endeavour (one of NASA’s rockets) launched in Florida at about 9:30. We saw a clip on Mrs MacNab’s laptop there was tons of smoke and flames. The reason they went up is to add a new room to the International Space Station. Endeavour took off at 1800mph and to get into their seats the spacemen and women climbed onto their seats and they were lying down but when they were in space thankfully they would be the right way round. There were 5 spacemen and 1 spacewoman. When the Space Shuttle lifted off it made a really loud noise like thunder. I wonder where the rocket is now?