Category: Literacy and Communication

Developing literacy and communication is a central focus of our school’s work.  We aim to enable all of our pupils to be effective communicators at their own individual level, starting with a positive and consistent affirmation.  With the support of Speech and Language therapists, we baseline our pupils skills using APEC bands and use targets to guide our focus on communication development.  We use an inclusive communication approach; our youngsters are supported through accessible low/high tech communication strategies and resources such as Eye Gaze, PODD and PIXON boards.  It is vital that our school community can communicate with one another, therefore Makaton is our chosen additional language.  We have a clear focus on developing literacy for all pupils.  Each BGE class plans a book study each term.  We have a focus on functional and environmental print.  Senior phase pupils are encouraged to generalise their literacy skills into work placements and through leadership roles.  Literacy and communication skills are required across all areas of the curriculum, therefore we practice and apply skills throughout the school day in many contexts and encourage the same within the home.

Story Of The Week: The Lighthouse Keeper’s Lunch

  By , , , , , ,

Our Story Of the Week is ‘The Lighthouse Keeper’s Lunch’ by Ronda and David Armitage.  In this story, Mr. Grinling, the lighthouse keeper, finds himself in a disagreement with some ravenous seagulls. See how he comes out on top with a little help from Mrs. Grinling.

You can read and listen along to the story at:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=46wCRq50Wwg 

There are also activities which you can complete each day which cover a range of curricular areas.  We would love to know how you get on and if you would like to share you photos, videos or comments with our school community, please email:

Amy Dunnett (Principal Teacher Primary)

adunnett@aberdeencity.gov.uk

Template For Lighthouse:

Story Word Mat

3 Dimensional Lighthouse Model

**Please note that these additional resources can also be downloaded from www.twinkl.co.uk**

You can currently join for free using the code UKTWINKLHELPS.

 

Volunteers Needed

  By ,

Are you able to help?

We have recently purchased a new electronic library system and we are looking for volunteers to help us catalogue our school library next Wednesday (18th March). Cataloguing will be happening at the school between 9am and 3.30pm but even if you can only spare an hour it would be greatly appreciated.
If you are able to donate some of your time, please contact Amy Dunnett (Principal Teacher Primary) on 01224 788950.

World Book Day 2020

  By , , , ,

We have been very busy celebrating World Book Day this week and classes have had lots of fun with a range of different activities taking place.

This year’s theme was Share A Story and we have had great fun sharing our favourite books with each other.

 

Room 3 have had a very busy week celebrating World Book Day.  Some of the pupils have been trialling a new bit of software on one of the brand new GridPads called Look to Read.  Here is a wonderful video of one of our pupils who is accessing the GridPad with Eye Gaze reading a story on it for the very first time!

As you can see, she understood very quickly that she had to look at the words as they turned red to hear them and then watched the animations closely.  This is very hard work and despite this, this young lady then proudly shared this work by reading the whole story to her friends in class.  We are excited to share this software with more friends in school.

They also enjoyed a trip to our local library, where they had the opportunity to look at and share lots of new books.

Room 15 were exploring stories using Attention Autism.  They enjoyed finding out about The Tiger Who Came To Tea, Super Tato and The Very Hungry Caterpillar and they also had a wee competition to see how high a tower they could build with books.

Some of our pupils have even been sharing stories at home too!

We hope everyone has had a fun week and enjoyed sharing a story as part of World Book Day!

Story Time in Room 3

  By , , ,

The pupils in Room 3 love story time!  Our stories are always brought to life with props, smells and sound effects which help bring the words and ideas to life.  You never know what might happen during story time in Room 3… monsters might come to chase us, Katie Morag could take us on a journey to deliver the mail, a pirate ship to jump aboard for an adventure or even up into the night sky in a rocket to visit the moon with Baby Bear.  Items go flying, the room descends into darkness and there can be very loud or quiet noises – our senses are well and truly awoken and the engagement is fantastic.

During stories we have the chance to practise some of what we learn through our targets or other curricular areas – a really good chance to generalise our skills.  We always leave gaps so that the pupils can join in with signs and vocalisations.  It is really helpful to repeat the same stories so that we become familiar with them and can begin to anticipate what is coming next.  Sometimes we find that things which can be tricky in other contexts i.e. particular textures we aren’t sure of or having to pass on something to a friend which we would rather keep ourselves is much easier to cope with or work on during all the fun of story time.

 

The children’s active participation in story time has developed so much, we are really proud of them.  They are joining in not only during their own turns but also paying so much more attention to their peers, lots of careful watching and listening.

 

We are looking forward to sharing some favourite stories from home with each other and getting to know some new ones while working through our context of ‘All About Me’ and answering the question ‘Who am I and who am I within my class?’.

Howes Hoose and Howes Road P.M. Nursery try the Fruit/Vegetable of the Fortnight

  By , , , , , , ,

Our fruit/vegetable of the  past fortnight was apple and for the next two weeks is CARROT. All our classes are encouraged to serve this vegetable at least five times during snack to expose our children to fruit/vegetables and encourage them to have a taste. Our Howes Hoose group certainly enjoyed their apple and carrot and at the other end of the school our little ones in nursery are being exposed to and encouraged to taste the fruits/vegetables.

Fruit/Vegetable of the Fortnight

  By , , , , , , ,

One of our new initiatives for Healthy Eating in 2020 is ‘Fruit/Vegetable of the Fortnight’. A fruit or vegetable will be introduced at snack time and served regularly over a two week period. In this way we aim to expose the children to fresh fruit and vegetables and encourage them to try new fruit and vegetables, develop a taste for healthy foods as well as  offering children the experience of preparing and tasting a selection of fresh fruit and vegetables. We will also be sharing our Healthy Eating successes … WATCH THIS SPACE!!

Our ‘Fruit of the Fortnight’ is APPLE.

Room 3 – What is Christmas?

  By , , , , , ,

Three weeks ago, Room 3 started exploring the question ‘What is Christmas?’ as part of our Winter Festivals theme and as you will see from the photographs…we have certainly tried our hardest to answer it!  We have been building on our prior learning and have used means of learning which are motivating to help us discover more about Christmas.

We have participated in many music sessions where we have used Christmas props and have been practising our Makaton signing – we look forward to performing some of the Christmas songs to an audience at the show tomorrow.

Exploration of a wide range of objects has happened through Sensology sessions as well as focussed turn taking games as we continue to develop our awareness of each other – Christmas pass the parcel was a lot of fun and we did so well at sharing what we found inside with our friends.  We have explored exchanging money as part of a Christmas counting song where we bought mince pies at the bakers shop.

During free play we have explored a wide range of Christmas items and found some of them very interesting.  One boy found it great fun to knock bells off his standing frame, meanwhile another young lady was delighted to find a chocolate coin hiding in the Christmas exploration bowl as you will see from her selfie!  There have been many Christmas activities set up including festive playdough which we made together and our favourite exploration tubes which we have been motivated to request through vocalising or move towards by crawling or in our equipment.

There are so many lovely Christmas stories and poems and we particularly enjoyed learning about the ‘Old Lady Who Swallowed A Bell’ – there was much hilarity as she swallowed bows, parcels, a sack and even a sleigh which we made fly across the classroom!  We learnt about the Christmas story and joined up with friends in Rm 2 and 8 for this – we took on different roles, dressed up and acted the story out.

We have loved exploring Ian Bean’s online Advent Calendar with a daily activity we could do using the switch or eye gaze machines.  The Christmas tree lights have been a real motivator to press the switch for too.

A real highlight was the sensory 12 days of Christmas…unfortunately there was so much fun and hilarity that it was tricky to get still photos but the classroom was very animated as we anticipated each item coming back – one boy was beyond excited about the 5 gold rings which he shook with gusto each time!  There were lights flying, crackers cracking, tooters tooting, Christmas puddings and a beautiful dancing snowflake which sparkled on the tree.

We have been busy doing lots of crafts including using the salad spinners to make pictures for each season – this is definitely one of our favourite art techniques!  We posed to take a picture for our Christmas cards and have done lots of crafts in art with Diane too.  The room smelt amazing when we made jam to take home as a little Christmas gift.

We all looked fantastic today for our Christmas party before going to visit Santa and having a wee sing song with him.

Is it any wonder everyone is tired?!  Yet another busy term in Room 3 with so much hard work.  Enjoy your well deserved holiday and we look forward to what 2020 has to bring.

 

Room 6 Explore The Local Community

  By , , , , ,

Room 6 have been enjoying exploring the community this term.

We walk to the ducks daily and have seen the number of ducks increase from in the teens to 34.

We have a weekly visit to the library where we enjoy investigating the DVD’s, sensory box and looking at books.

We enjoy playing on the toys at the park in Sheddocksley and have enjoyed exploring the ice when walking to the horses.

 

Festive Fun

  By , , , , ,

It has certainly been a busy week at Orchard Brae and we have enjoyed participating in a range of festive fun and yesterday was the busiest day of all!

In the morning, the Primary department had a dress rehearsal for their Christmas Show, which we will performing next Friday.

A big thank you to Lynn and the catering team who put on a splendid Christmas lunch for us yesterday.

We all enjoyed tucking into our turkey and all the trimmings and festive shortbread and ice cream for dessert while listening to some Christmas tunes.

In the afternoon, we were joined by the St Margaret’s School choir who performed some Christmas tunes for us.  We would like to say a HUGE thank you to the pupils and staff from St Margaret’s who joined us.  This has become an annual event and it is one which we always look forward to.  The hall was packed and everyone enjoyed their performance immensely.  Thanks also to Room 9 staff and pupils who hosted a short snack and get together with them afterwards.

After such a hectic week, we look forward to seeing what excitement next week will bring!!