Visitor from NASA

Nagin Cox is a NASA scientist who worked on the Mars Rover expeditions. She addressed the audience of P7 pupils from Bellsbank, Littlemill, Dalmellington and Patna primary schools, and pupils from the Doon Academy’s Astronomy Master Class. The P7 pupils have been attending the academy as part of their transition project which is focused on astronomy and the local Dark Skies Observatory.

Nagin Cox described how she progressed from the US Navy to working on robots with the space agency, NASA. Her photographs of the Mars Rover expeditions captured the excitement of the NASA scientists and engineers as their years of planning culminated in the successful landing on Mars.
 The pictures transmitted by the wheeled robot showed the incredible details of the Mars landscape and evidence of the relatively recent existence of streams of clean water.

 Pupils were able to ask questions of Nagin about her career, space exploration and the prospects of life in distant planets. A show of hands at the end indicated that pupils are interested in following careers in Science and Engineering and one pupil asked about the challenges of working in the multi-national, multi-lingual team at the NASA control centre.

 Mr MacKenzie, head teacher, said the talk had been inspiring. Astronomy and curricular subjects such as the Sciences, Technologies, Maths, Languages and Social Subjects will offer even greater great opportunities for pupils to follow in Nagin Cox’s footsteps in the coming decades.

Primary Transition

The Primary 7 Transition Programme begins for 12 weeks starting this Friday 25th.

The theme this year is Space and was inspired by Dalmellington's 'Village in the Stars' status and new observatory. Literacy and Science will be provided by Doon and Numeracy and HWB by Primary colleagues.

The project has been developed jointly between ourselves and our Primary partners.

Burns by Bonnie Doon

The ‘Burns by Bonnie Doon’/P7 Literacy and Numeracy Day was held on Thursday 27th May and was a tremendous success. P7 pupils from our Learning Partnership primary schools: Bellsbank, Dalmellington, Dalrymple, Patna and Littlemill took part in a round robin of 6 workshops. At the Doon Valley Museum the P7s had a workshop on the life and works of Robert Burns with Mr. Wilson and made willow trees with local artist Geoff Forrest assisted by Ms. Fuller, student teacher Ms. Forrest and S1 pupils. Back at Doon Academy the P7s had workshops in ICT with Mr. Power, French with Mrs. McKenzie, Maths with Ms. McClue and Ms. Laughan and Literacy in the Library with Mrs Bax. Everyone really enjoyed their day. Thank you to Mrs. Lohel and Mrs. Dorans for organising the event and to all the staff and pupils who took part.

New timetable

The new class timetable began on Monday 7th June and all returning S4/5 pupils, who have been on study leave for exams, should now be in school. There is a change of SMT responsibility for year groups. DHT Mr Mackenzie is now year head for S2, S4 and S6. DHT Mrs. McRoberts is now year head for S1, S3 and S5. Head Teacher Mr. O’Rourke has responsibility for school captains and prefects.

P7 links

Primary 7 pupils from the Learning Partnership have started their transition to Doon Academy. The pupils will be attending Doon every Friday morning where they will have Maths, swimming, dance and science classes and also a literacy period.