Literacy

Ottoline and the Yellow Cat

While exploring our mystery novel Ottoline and the Yellow Cat, the children have been taking part in a range of drama activities. They have enjoyed acting out key scenes from the story, helping them to develop a deeper understanding of the thoughts, feelings, and perspectives of different characters.

The children have also used hot-seating techniques, where they took on the role of characters and participated in a mock news report, pretending to interview the main character. This activity helped them to think carefully about how the character might respond, further developing their understanding of their role in the story while building confidence in speaking and listening.

Suffixes

The children have been learning how to use the suffix endings -er and -est correctly. They have explored how these endings can be added to adjectives to compare different things. As part of their learning, the children compared animals using a range of descriptive words, carefully applying the rules they had learned when adding -er. They showed great enthusiasm and confidence when sharing their comparisons and explaining their choices.

Using Dictionaries

In Literacy, pupils are learning how to use dictionaries quickly and efficiently.

They are practising:

• Finding words using alphabetical order
• Using first, second, and third letters to help locate words more quickly
• Checking the meaning and spelling of unfamiliar words

These skills help pupils to become more independent readers and writers, building confidence when working with new vocabulary.

Today we learned how recipes use imperative verbs, which are the bossy action words that tell someone what to do, such as mix, stir and pour. We also explored how adding –ing verbs can make instructions more detailed and helpful. For example, in a pancake recipe we might say, “Whisk the eggs, adding the sugar slowly,” or “Flip the pancake, making sure it doesn’t break.” In these sentences, the imperative verb gives the main command, while the –ing verb adds extra information to explain how to complete the action clearly. We had a great time making our own pancakes by following a recipe, and an even better time tasting our delicious creations!

Peer paired reading 

Each half-term the Primary 4 classes enjoy taking part in peer paired reading with children from the Nursery classes. The children love reading their book to their nursery friends, sharing their interests in stories, asking thoughtful questions and developing their listening skills.

In Literacy, we have been exploring play scripts and learning how actors bring characters to life. The children have enjoyed getting into character and acting out different scenes, helping them understand how dialogue and stage directions work. They have also been practising writing their own short scenes, using dialogue inspired by the stories we have been reading. It has been wonderful to see their confidence and creativity grow as they experiment with performing and scriptwriting.