S4/5 artists

S4/5 artists have been working on their design projects this week. Mass, Bec and Megan have been dying fabric and working on creating patterns using a batik type technique:

Hannah has been using wire to construct her first working model of an extravagant butterfly inspired hat:

Bec has been measuring up a miniature mannequin and fitting some trial designs for her waistcoat project. This is version 3...

S3 Art

During the course of the week Ailie and Lara completed their design development sheets for their mask projects. The next step is the final piece...

Today we were writing a NAB essay for the design section of the Art and Design Studies unit. After a few weeks of revision and a period of solid writing / typing everyone was glad to be finished!

An interesting week in drama...

This week in S4/5 drama we have been busy with a range of different tasks...

...today we were working on the costumes and props for the Christmas musical. This involved dressing the market stalls with fabric and fruit / veg and measuring some of the primary children who still need costumes to be made for them.

...on Tuesday we were blocking the scripts we had devised in order to make up a prompt copy. This involved clearly writing out all the cues and coded stage directions and then justifying them. After that we had a go recording some of the SFX we needed using Garageband - this was great fun!

...on Monday Deborah was in charge and was directing the others in the scene she had devised for our project on power.

Visiting specialist...

S3 dramatists were very lucky to have visual impairment teacher Lesley Reid come in to speak to them on Thursday.

First of all she let us try out a range of special glasses which simulate a variety of impairments:

After that she told us about Braille and showed us how to decode it visually. We used type one Braille which is the simplest type where each word is spelt out letter for letter. She also showed us some of the more complex type 2 Braille which uses many contractions and shortened forms.

We each had a go decoding some "secret messages" written in braille as well as actually using the braille machine to write our own sentences.

Thanks very much Lesley - it was a very interesting and informative afternoon!

S2 construction continued...

S2 were working on their head sculpture projects on Thursday. Some were using polystyrene, tape, wire and newspaper to create a basic structure for their models whilst others had moved on to the papier mache stage...

S1 clay

S1 were using clay again today - some were finishing off their Terracotta Warriors and others were making tiles with Chinese characters on them. Great fun!

We will paint them next week.

Ni hao!!!!

This week, as part of our Geography topic on China, S2 (and Miss Rukin!) have started learning Mandarin!

All of S2 can tell you why it is important in today's society to study China. They have learnt to say hello, goodbye, sorry, thank you, how are you and I'm very well... however, our efforts are not quite bloggable yet!!

Watch this space for vidoe footage, as soon as we are good enough!
Zaijian! (Goodbye)

Costume mania...

S4/5 drama were fitting all the costumes for the P1 -7 Christmas Nativity today. This is a huge organisational task as it involves at least 2 costumes for almost every child - about 100 in total. All costumes need to be labelled, stored and any alterations correctly noted. They all worked very well and we nearly got finished...!

Trying on for size:

Piles of soldier outfits, ready to be bagged:

S3 Countdown!

S3 artists were working against the clock today in preparation for their Art & Design Studies NAB next Wednesday. They have completed research projects on designers Elsa Schiaparelli and John Galliano and completed notes and draft essays. This is all in preparation for writing their summary NAB essay in 30 mins next week...

Dramatic Wednesdays!

Wednesday afternoons are becoming quite drama! The Broader Currciulum drama group are getting to grips with their play, 'The Thingumybob,' and are just a few weeks away from the performance...

Warm up games...






Script read through!







Working in groups, discussing improvisation:





A hard earned rest, and a quick visit next door for a cuppa...






Back to it: a walk through, last time with scripts!



Quite pleased with ourselves!

Responsible Citizens

S1 are coming to the end of a personal research project, looking at the major world religions. Each pupil has been given one religion to research and make notes on. They then learnt how to select the key facts from their notes, and had to design an A3 poster. Here, the class are putting the finishing touches to their posters.