Stanley's Big Day...

It was the morning of the big race for Stanley.

He had woken early and made sure he had eaten a suitable breakfast of lettuce. He had been thinking about the big race and preparing for it for minutes.

Even though his shell was rumbling, he felt confident.

Today was his day... Stanley was eager to get his warm up training underway

His personal trainer had suggested a few practice laps around the training circuit which he had begun until

a voice came over the intercom announcing that all competing snails had to report immediately to the officials at the starting line.

He was so nervous but knew he was the favourite with the crowd.

Excitement was now mounting amongst the racing crowd as the other snails took their places on the starting line...
READY STEADY START!

They were off!
Stanley, in lane one, quickly took the lead, making an early break for the finishing line, via lanes 1 - 6!
He was soon declared the winner and the race continued with much enthusiastic encouragement by the trainers for their individual snails.

All snail competitors were commended for the excellent sportsmanship shown during the race. (Some still found it difficult though to stay in the allocated lane.) Obviously the sense of occasion had tired many of the younger snails out. They unfortunately remained asleep on the starting line. This did frustrate their enthusiastic trainers. They were more energetic however on their release back into the wild!

Stanley was soon safely back home for a well earned rest. It had been a successful and exciting day for the little snail.
Will he remember his big day ?

NOTE: No snails were harmed during the race. All were returned quickly and successfully to their original habitat.

(Video clips of the race will be added to this blog after errors are sorted out.)

More Swimming Success

Well done lasses!

Nature detectives at work...

green-veined white butterfly



earthworm grass


woodlouse


Lichen spider

moss

For the last few weeks of term we are going back to look at nature in our immediate environment. It was obvious from the excitement of being outside on a bonny day that science is fun!

We are thinking of it as where living things ( including us) are best suited to live

and where shelter, food and others of the same kind are found.

A place where a living thing makes its home is called

A HABITAT.
We started by looking at habitats around the school...

Visit to St Olaf's Church and St Magnus Cathedral

Our visit was part of the ongoing investigation into the legacy of Norse rule in Orkney

From our research we found out that the building of St Magnus cathedral was begun around 1137. When the cathedral was built, we recognised from studying early maps , that the shore would have been near the steps.

Perhaps the grand longships of Norse royalty would have been drawn up just below the steps! (There is evidence of a jetty underneath the Orkney museum gardens.)
The cathedral was built by Earl Rognvald in memory of his uncle ,Earl Magnus , who had been murdered in Egilsay in 1117 during a struggle for power in Orkney between him and his cousin and joint ruler of Orkney, Earl Haakon. He had been killed by an axe blow to the top of the head
Once the building of the cathedral was underway, the remains of Earl Magnus were brought to the new cathedral in a procession , from St Olaf's church. The archway and door of St Olaf's church are all that are left in St Olaf's Wynd. The original church was established in the 11th century if not earlier.

Can you spot the small carved cross just visible on the stone behind where the remains of Earl Magnus rest?

We were fascinated to hear about the history of the cathedral and the retelling of the account of the life of Earl Magnus (St Magnus) from the Orkneyinga Saga and how his bones came to be discovered in a pillar in the cathedral from the custodian Mr Flett. He told us the remains of Earl Rognvald are in the opposite pillar.

The remains of Earl Magnus were found in a wooden box in a pillar during restoration work in 1919 . The carved box (or kist) is on display in the Orkney museum.

Class 4/5 Prepare for The School Fair

Class 4/5 have been busy sewing. They have made cushions and scented hangings as an enterprise using fabric squares that had come out of old wallpaper catalogues. We have begun to prepare our stand.

The items will be sold at our School Fair on Saturday 11th June.

The cushions will be £2.50 and £2.00 each. The scented hangings will be £1.50.

SOLD OUT!

(We reduced our prices near the end of the fair)

Well done everybody!

FANTASTIC JOB NAIL PAINTERS !!

Viking fleet arrives but is running out of puff!

Our young Vikings did not want to get their sails wet so it took a fair bit of puff to get their sleek , clinker built, shallow draught vessels across the Pentland Firth! They managed it though in 2-3 seconds!

If only the actual journey took that long!

(Just a bit of fun.)

Do you know how long the Northlink MV Hamnavoe takes to cross the Pentland Firth ?

Perhaps those Norse sailors a thousand years ago with their wonderfully crafted vessels and a strong wind behind them were not that far behind...

Athletics Success 2011

Well done to James, Joe, Molly, Magnus and Abbie (missing from the picture) who took part in the Orkney Primary School Athletics on Thursday 26th May at the Pickaquoy Centre.

Congratulations to Molly who won a gold medal in the high jump and cricket ball events. She was runner up overall in her 9-10 age group. Great stuff Molly!

STOP PRESS

Details of points have just come through

Overall winner 9-10 age group

1 Grace St Andrews 16 points

2 Molly Glaitness 14 points

3 Claire Glaitness 12 points

Orkney Museum Visit

Today we went on a visit to the Orkney museum to look for evidence of Norse settlement in Orkney. It was very busy with holiday visitors and pupils keen to do research from other schools e.g. Orphir .

We were looking for evidence particularly of family life at home and grave goods.

The museum in Orkney has a selection of smaller and replica items e.g. bone pins and a replica whalebone plaque from the Scar boat burial on Sanday. Large and very important finds e.g. the Skaill Hoard of silver items and the original whalebone plaque are on display in larger museums in cities like Edinburgh where perhaps it is felt that more people will have the chance to view them. They are also on loan to museums around the world.

To record our evidence

• we took photographs
• made notes
• tried to find answers to key questions
• made sketches

Demon Duck of Doom

The Bullockornis or 'Demon Duck of Doom' was a huge flightless bird which lived around 15 million years ago in the part of the world we now call Australia.

It was about 3 metres tall which is higher than our classroom roof at 2.7 metres!

Alanah

In the Style of Egil's Saga...

Molly's Saga

Brave boat

battered by the seas

violent encounters

courageous Olaf

battles against the dragon of the sea

Olaf has not won this battle

the dragon of the sea is triumphant

the crew are tired, hungry and sore

this day they will be with

Odin, Thor and Njord.

Dani's Saga

Bloody slaughter

amongst the wrestling waves

as the cruel sea

smashes the boat

as the jagged sea shore slays the boat

nothing remains

only sand...

Ronan's Saga

The men struggled to stay on board

the bruised boat

wild waves crashed onto the deck

the vessel was split in two

the sea swallowed them up

All class 4/5 saga style writing is on display outside the classroom.

How long is a longship?

We measured the length of 3 types of Viking longship.
The longest of them, Serpent, was 30 metres.

We couldn't believe how long it was!

It would have had a crew of 50 men.

We filled our imaginary boat each side with pupils manning imaginary oars.

We could have asked other classes to join us and make the 50 strong crew! How many each side?
Don't forget to turn right at Cape Wrath Ronan!

Hopefully Odin will give us wind in our sails James!