Community Learning
Room 5 had a busy morning, visiting our local library at Northfield.
When we arrived, we spent some time exploring the library. We really liked the computers and colouring in table! We then met the librarian who gave us a library card for our class and we chose some books to take back to school.
We can’t wait for our next visit to the library.
We were delighted to be invited to the Aberdeen City Council Children and Young People’s Services Awards today which were held at the Beach Ballroom.
Arriving at the Beach Ballroom
The Makaton Choir, led by Emmeline, our Music Therapist, had been nominated for the Creative Learning Award. There was tough competition with two other schools nominated so we were delighted when Orchard Brae were announced as the winners.
Our Makaton Choir delegation with the Lord Provost
Well done to our senior pupils for representing the school today. It was wonderful to be present at the Ceremony, celebrating learning and achievements from across the City. Congratulations to everyone that was nominated!
The obligatory Awards Selfie
Our Certificate and Award
We have a new Makaton Word Of The Fortnight – STOP!
Below you will find a short video clip demonstrating how to sign STOP as well as an activity sheet with ideas for ways to incorporate the sign into a range of everyday tasks and games.
This has also been posted on the Orchard Brae School Makaton Support Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/orchardbraeschoolaberdeenmakatonsupport/
Happy signing 👐
At the end of term, we had our annual activities week, which was kindly organised by Emmeline, our Music Therapist. The week had the focus of exploring our right to access different genres of music, and what an exciting week it was!
On Monday, we were joined by Amy Strachan, a soprano singer and the B Naturals choir. Both completely captivated us with their amazing vocal talents and many pupils continued to explore the operatic genre throughout the week in their classes.
On Tuesday morning there was lots of fun as we played and danced along with the Aberdeen Strathspey And Reel Society, listening to a range of traditional Scottish tunes and dancing a few reels too! In the afternoon we were joined by the Confucius Institute who performed some popular Chinese songs as well as one from a Chinese opera as well. Both of these groups allowed us to investigate and have a go at playing their instruments and well all loved the Chinese harp and flute as well as the fiddle and accordion. It was a fantastic day allowing us to explore music from two very distinct and different cultures.
On Wednesday, we were entertained by Duncan and Bill who performed a range of folk music for us. The hall was full to the brim and everyone had a brilliant time listening to Duncan and Bill’s wide variety of music.
On Thursday, we had hoped to have a picnic in the park but unfortunately the Scottish weather had other ideas! Instead we had an improvised fourth of July picnic in the hall with musical accompaniments from the Fyvie Folk Club. The Folk Club played a wide variety of music and their leader Bernie had even written us a specific song and poem in the spot!
On Friday we rounded off our musical activities week with a Makaton sing-a-long in the morning and a disco in the afternoon.
It was a truly magical and musical week which gave all the students (and staff!) the opportunity to experience a wide range of music genres and we all discovered something new and exciting. A huge thank you to all of our special guests and performers and thank you to Emmeline for organising such an amazing experience for us.
Room 4 have been reading ‘The New Friend’ by Alex Scheffler for their book study this term.
In the book, the main characters Pip and Posy make a new friend at the beach and they work together to build a sandcastle.
We enjoyed the book so much that we thought we would have a go at making our own sandcastles! We visited the beach and worked together to build our own sandcastles. We thought we did a good job. What do you think? We even made our own new friend when we went looking in the rock pools!
This Summer Active schools will be running a Summer Camp for the 1st 4 weeks.
To sign up for activities please complete the survey link.
On Tuesday, our Makaton Choir hosted some very special guests in school as part of a choir workshop organised by our Emmeline, our music therapist.
The two choirs that visited us were ‘The Kitty Choir’ from Kittybrewster Primary School and ‘Singing Hands’, an Aberdeen based BSL signing (British Sign Language) choir. We all had a wonderful afternoon sharing our different approaches to choir.
The Orchard Brae Makaton Choir performed “Happy” and “Summer Holiday”, Singing Hands performed “You’ve Got A Friend In Me” and “Give Me Sunshine” and The Kitty Choir performed “Sing”.
The three choirs then collaborated and sang our Makaton signed version of “You’ve Got A Friend In Me” alongside the BSL version. It was very interesting to see the differences and similarities between Makaton and BSL. We then rounded of the afternoon by all learning the Makaton signs for “Shotgun!”
Everyone had a wonderful afternoon and Scott, the hearing dog was a big hit with all of the pupils! It was wonderful to have the opportunity to share our learning and learn from others too.
Pupils and staff had an amazing time performing our unique sensory piece ‘Season’s Change’, created in collaboration with Aberdeen Performing Arts, at the Lemon Tree earlier this month. We would once again like to say a huge thank you to everyone who came along and supported us and joined in the fun.
We were fortunate enough to have had a professional photographer there documenting the evening and we are delighted to share their images with you.
Some of our primary pupils took part in a very special outing on Wednesday at the SRUC Aberdeen Campus at Craibstone, participating in a range of activities organised by various Rotary clubs in Aberdeen City and Aberdeenshire for their annual Kids Out fun day.
Despite the gloomy weather, we all had a fantastic time. Some of the highlights of the day included bouncy castles and face painting, magic shows, Aberdeen Science Centre, a disco and the very noisy police van and fire engine. However, the best bit of the day for many of our pupils were the animals and there was great excitement over the numerous pony rides, bird displays and Therapet dogs.
Thank you so much to everyone in the local Rotary clubs for organising such a wonderful day and we can’t wait for next year.
Last night a group of pupils from across the school performed their piece, Seasons’ Change in the Lemon Tree Studio as part of Aberdeen Performing Arts ‘Light The Blue’ festival.
The pupils (along with some friends who unfortunately couldn’t make the performance) and staff members have worked extremely hard throughout a series of workshops in school, where we worked collaboratively with Kate from Aberdeen Performing Arts, class teacher Jessica and Emmeline our music therapist, in order to create our final performance.
There has been lots of fun along the way as everyone fully engaged their senses to develop a piece of drama which allowed the cast members and audience to move through the seasons. We used a wide range of stimuli and there were lots of surprises along the way.
All of the pupils were a true credit to themselves and the school in last night’s performance and the audience’s participation was fantastic. We are so proud of everyone involved and would like to thank them all for all their hard work and effort in performing a truly magical and unique performance.
