A unique Primary School, offering a British based, child centred education in the Turks and Caicos Islands
Here at Provo Primary, children in the older classes will have a special assembly today to learn about ‘Poppy Day’ and why we wear a poppy. Mrs. Betty has kindly made poppies for the children to wear. At 11am we will stop our lessons to have a two minute silence. Read on to learn about why we wear a poppy. Watch a video that explains, hear the story of Miss Moina Belle Michael who began the tradition of wearing the poppy and hear ‘The Last Post’ played on the bugle.
“We are extremely blessed to see nature so close up, here in our very own school garden. The nest is literally just over a metre off the ground in full sight. Watching this life cycle develop right in front of our eyes is an exciting experience for our children to enjoy and learn from first hand. We hope to see the journey from egg to first flight… look out for our next update.” Miss Sian
Year 5 students have written a recount of their coastal investigation field trip in which they learnt to use a clinometer.
First, Year 5 went to the DEMA building to pick up Mr Roddy Mcleod. We walked across the road with him to the beach by the Bight Park. Mr Roddy showed us how to use a clinometer. He explained to us it is something that measures whether the slopes on the beach have risen or fallen.
“Roddy is a Provo Primary Alumni. How wonderful that he has followed a career path that focuses on looking after our environmental and is now sharing his knowledge and passion, inspiring a new generation of Provo Primary children”. Miss Sian [Read more…]
The Beauty of Mangrove Forests
For National Heritage Month our Year 4 Flamingo class have been learning about habitats, and how they CAN and have to help to conserve these for the future. Their studies have focused particularly on the mangrove habitats…Why are our mangrove systems so important? How do these work in unison with the coral reefs? And what would happen to our island if the mangroves aren’t protected.
Please take two minutes to watch the mangrove video above. Filmed in our neighbouring Bahamas, it give us a powerful insight into why we should actively protecting our mangroves here in the Turks and Caicos.
Amy Avenant from DEMA took the Year 4s on a trip to the mangrove system on Flamingo Lake. With her expertise guidance, they observed and learnt about these amazing habitats close up.
As part of our topic ‘Amazing Me’, the Kindergarten children used mirrors to look carefully at their own faces. They then made a collage that looked just like them. Feel free to come in the Kindergarten class to check out our fantastic self portraits and to find out who is who!
We have some amazing artists in our class.
On 5th November every year, effigies of Guy Fawkes are burned on bonfires across England in recognition of his part in the failed ‘Gunpowder Plot’ of 1605. Here in the Turks and Caicos, Clive Whent at Bay Bistro helps us to join in with this tradition, inviting Provo Primary families to an annual Guy Fawkes Bonfire Night Party.
Come and watch the sunset, enjoy some of Clive’s tasty BBQ burgers, hot dogs, sausages on a stick and drinks (on sale) and admire the Guy (created by Year 4 in their Design and Technology classes) before the bonfire is lit.
All Provo Primary families welcome.
Language development is a very exciting time for toddlers. It accelerates rapidly and toddlers’ ways of communicating expand from simple smiles and gestures to using words and phrases to express their needs.
Our Toddler programme is designed to provide many opportunities to encourage toddlers to communicate with the adults and children around them. We talk to them continuously so that they are exposed to as many new words as possible. Through everyday activities, we help them make connections between actions/things and the words that correspond to them.
The school is buzzing over the new swings that were installed over our mid-term break. The children in Year 1 and Kindergarten had a blast swinging high on their new swings this morning. With 6 swings in all, lots of children were able to take turns during playtime and have lots of time to swing!
When I asked what they liked about the new swings, some children said: “It feels like I am flying!” and “I can’t believe how many swings there are!” The children are pretty impressed! It was also really sweet to see the Year 1 children decide, on their own, to push the Kindergarten children. They were also teaching the Kindergarten children how to push themselves on the swings for next time.
Thank you for the new swings. We love them! Our verdict is a BIG THUMBS UP!
“A joint-funded project by PTA and School, we would very much like to thank our friends at Projectech for helping with the installation of the swings. Also everyone who has supported our PTA fundraising events and our school. It’s wonderful to see the children enjoying the new swings together.” Miss Sian
As part of our first Year 2 topic of 2015, Osprey class has been learning all about ourselves. We have researched where we were born, where we live, what food we should each and how much exercise we should do. It has been really fun learning about us and, as part of our Art lessons with Miss Rachel, we have spent a lot of time and effort creating our own self-portraits.
It sounds easy but it actually takes a lot of skill to make sure all the parts of your face are in the right place. We started by touching our faces and feeling what parts were where…which was actually quite strange! We then used mirrors to keep checking what our faces ‘really’ looked like and not just what we ‘thought’ they looked like.
This term’s PTA yard sale will take place on Saturday 21st November between 9 and 11am. If you would like to reserve a table for $30, please contact Niki at nikiflowers@gmail.com
Volunteers Needed: This first Yard Sale will be hosted by PTA Class Reps and parents from the Toddlers, Preschool and JK Classes. Please let us know if you can help to organise and run this event – look out for details in your inbox.
Last half term, the Year 5 took a closer look at our beautiful coastline here in the Turks and Caicos Islands!
With a combination of class-based and out-in-the-field learning, the children have gained new knowledge about the geographical features of our coastline, the huge varieties of species that live and depend on our coastal habitats, the impact of nature and the importance of ecotourism. They also have a greater awareness of what they can tangibly do in their own lives, and what they can tell others to do, to help protect the beautiful coast that we have.
A big thank you to all of our community teachers and to everyone who helped out with our field trip transportation.
This topic has provided many opportunities for nurturing wonder and respect toward our local environment and the planet through observation, hands-on learning and the sharing of expertise. Phew, it’s been busy half term, but so worthwhile! Just ask one of our Year 5s!
As National Heritage Month comes to an end here in the Turks and Caicos and as we introduce Caribbean Tourism Month, my third and final video choice to share is this wonderful version of ‘Beautiful by Nature’ by Everyman, which has been re-recorded featuring students from the Clement Howell High School Choir. This additional video explains the story behind the song and its recent video production by Island Eye TV. What a beautiful song to celebrate our islands.
Here at Provo Primary School we have launched an exciting new class format called ‘Theatre Arts’ for Years 3 – 6. Taught together by myself, Mrs. Niki, and Ms. Shara, the class incorporates music, singing, dramatic acting and movement through age relevant topics and themes.
This term the children have spent a lot of time working on mime; visualizing scenes, feelings and surroundings, as well as voice projection and word enunciation. The children have learnt through structured, guided games that have resulted in insightful work, as well as lots of laughs.
Year 6 has been learning that all living things (animals and plants) are made of cells which are the building blocks of life.
To help us get to grips with the scientific vocabulary (complex and advanced) and to assist with our understanding, we gathered an array of candies and jelly. The candies were used to create our very own edible animal cell with the best candies illustrating a different aspect of the cell and its purpose.
We discovered that most cells are very small and that they are invisible without using a microscope. Cells are covered by a cell membrane and come in different shapes.
What amazing creative poets we have in our Year 3 class. Click on to read a selection of their poems.
The Year 3s have been fascinated by studying rocks. They have described rocks and compared their properties, doing some exciting activities and experiments along the way.
As part of their studies, they have each focused on learning about a particular type of rock. They created these sensory poems to describe them. Well done Year 3, you have used lot of imagery and descriptive language – very impressive!
The Preschool class participated in an activity called ‘the gathering drum’ this week. This exciting event involved tapping out simple repeated rhythms with finger tips, flat hands and thumbs. They explored loud and quiet sounds and fast and slow rhythms. The activity involved listening carefully and following directions. Before playing their rhythms on the drum they practiced on their knees. They tried two types of rhythms, counting 1, 2; 1, 2 and then 1, 2 ,3; 1, 2, 3. The children listened to I Wan’na Be Like You from the Jungle Book, feeling the ‘swing-type’ rhythm and then playing a faster rhythm.
We begin our week here at Provo Primary with one of those not so common rainy Mondays. What a joy it is to hear the frogs merrily croaking in the water tank and to see the children arriving in wellies and raincoats, huddled under umbrellas. We don’t often get to hear such sounds or to don such apparel so there is almost a sense of excitement as children arrive for their day at school.
The climate in Turks and Caicos is described best as desert tropical. This means that the weather is arid, warm, and lacking significant annual rainfall. Although when it rains, our heart turn to the tourists and a hope for our sunny skies to return, residents also feel a sense of joy that their water tanks will be filling up and that the parched plants will be enjoying a well needed drink.
The islands average 350 sunny days per year. With a few unsettled days forecast for the week ahead, please enjoy this amazing video from cayahicomedia.com as a reminder of what will soon return and how fortunate we are to live in such a beautiful land with predominately gorgeous climes.
Thursday, 15th October was GLOBAL HANDWASHING DAY. The Preschool class had a fun-packed morning with a variety of activities emphasising the importance of ‘hand washing’.
We began our morning making bubbles outdoors using whisks and blowing through straws to make bubbles on our hand prints. We listened to the story ‘Germs Are Not for Sharing’ and did a ‘germs away’ experiment. For this experiment, we sprinkled black pepper in a bowl of water (the pepper represented germs). The pepper floated on top. In the centre of the bowl we added a few drops of dish washing soap and watched the soap ‘scare the germs away’
Please take a look at our photographs of the children enjoying different aspects of literacy, writing and physical development. These early activities are fun ways of strengthening the child’s hands, fingers and arms in preparation for writing. Our classroom encourages independent reading, drawing and writing. As a group we often read a story and then create our own expression of the story inventing strange, entertaining and exciting scenarios that make us laugh. Please feel welcome to come in and enjoy hearing one of our tales!
Saturday 31st October at Provo Primary School.
Between 6 and 8pm. Entry ticket $5 per adult/child.
Great for families with young children (0-tweens) looking for a fun evening with an organised trick or treating route, lots of games and dancing.
Come dressed in your most creative Halloween costume.
Food and drinks available.
Tickets on sale at the school at pick up and drop off. Also call 441 5638.
This year, Years 1 and 2 have been getting together for a weekly assembly. Our assemblies this term have focused on highlighting all the lovely National Holidays and other special days such as World Kindness Day, that occur during our school year. We have enjoyed getting together to share our learning with each other. Please read on to see their hard work creating posters for National Heritage Day!
‘Global Handwashing Day’ (Oct 15) is an annual global advocacy day dedicated to increasing awareness and understanding about the importance of hand washing with soap as an easy, effective, and affordable way to prevent diseases.
Teaching children about hand washing early in life is important. Most children develop the ability to wash their hands independently by about three years of age. But even when they know how to do it, they’ll almost certainly need to be given lots of encouragement and reminders.
At Provo Primary, teaching about hand washing and reinforcing its practice is an everyday part of school learning. On ‘Global Handwashing Day’ we will be highlighting and reinforcing this even more, with our younger children participating in a variety of focused activities.
Thank you to everyone for the amazing support of our 12 hour Perform-a-thon this weekend. Congratulations to all of the children – they sang, danced, acted and stretched their hearts out for the entire 12 hours. It was hot and sweaty, but well worth it – the children enjoyed being on stage and showing everyone what they’ve been working on for the past 4 weeks.
A special thank you to the parents and guardians who inspired and enabled the children to take part – it wouldn’t be possible without you. A big thank you also to all of our community supporters who made donations.
The Provo Primary School Council would like to pass on a huge thank you to everyone who donated children’s books for the local Library, downtown!
We will be sorting through the many books this week.
Look out for our next post telling you all about our trip to the library, what we learnt and discovered about this local facility and how we plan to support and promote it.
My second National Heritage Month video choice comes from our friends at Brilliant by Tropical Imaging. A collection of amazing photography that captures the spectacular nature, rich history and cultural splendor, our smiling people and wonderful places and experiences that can be enjoyed here in the Turks and Caicos.
Island Life in Turks and Caicos from Brilliant by Tropical Imaging on Vimeo.