Mount Pleasant Road Primary School & Kindergarten

Discovery Centre

Curriculum 

Halo semuanya!

 

Congratulations on making it through the first term in Foundation! We are ending with a very busy week and we are really looking forward to celebrating with the school community.

 

Students have been applying their codes knowledge as we continued to listen for the initial sounds in words last week. After listening to The Very Hungry Caterpillar, we labelled the different foods that the caterpillar ate using as many codes as we could. This week, we will also continue listening and responding to texts. Students will identify their favourite book and explain why they like listening to it. We will also have our first introduction to Reading Eggs in the classroom. Students are welcome to complete Reading Eggs lessons at home if you would like to. While it should not replace reading our take-home books, it is an engaging way to get students excited to talk about texts and make words. The Reading Eggs App can be downloaded on any device. Students’ logins have been pasted in the front of their Take Home Reading Journal. The Victorian Premier’s Reading Challenge has also begun! To take part, students can register books they have read in an online portal. Student’s individual logins have been pasted in the front of their Take Home Reading Journal as well. Classroom teachers will be logging books that we share together at school and it is optional for you to log books from home too. 

 

Last week in Mathematics we took our first dive into measurement! Students compared the length of different objects and identified them as ‘longer than’ or ‘shorter than’ each other. We also experimented with measuring how far we could throw a beanbag, and finally ended the week with a paper plane competition - a student request from FH! This week we are looking at patterns. We will discuss how many ‘steps’ in a pattern, and explore making, copying and continuing patterns. Students have also been given a Mathletics login which is pasted into the front cover of their Reading Journal. While we have not begun using Mathletics in the classroom yet, students are welcome to explore the App at home if you would like to. 

 

As part of our First Nations studies, we learnt about Yarning Circles. Yarning Circles are used to tell stories and have meetings. We used our school value of Respect to listen to each other during our first Yarning Circle last week. Students have also been identifying the Character Strengths - such as Teamwork, Creativity and Kindness - as we continue our Respectful Relationships wellbeing program.  

 

This week we will reunite with our Grade 5 buddies! We have discussed questions you could ask someone when you meet them, and thought about things we might like our buddy to know about us. You might like to ask your child if they remember the name of their buddy and how old they are!

Finally, we are looking for some donations of clothing that could be used in our play-based learning areas. These items do not necessarily need to be ‘costumes’, but items like hats, scarves or jackets that could be used in our spaces. The imaginative play settings that we have are a vet clinic, hospital, tool workshop, pizza shop, cafe and an ice-cream shop. Any second hand items that you have can be washed and brought to your classroom teacher, thank you in advance!

 

The final week of Term 1 is bringing us lots of celebrations! Parents are invited to attend the following activities this week:

  • Guided Inquiry Showcase -  Wednesday 6th April 2:45pm on the Basketball Courts
  • Colour Fun Run - Thursday 7th April 2:30 - 3:30pm
  • Family Breakfast - Friday 8th April 7:30 - 8:30am
  • Easter Hat Parade - Friday 8th April 9:00 - 9:45am

Our Guided Inquiry showcase will feature samples of student work from this term that reflect the discussions that we have shared in our topic, ‘Identity’. We look forward to seeing you there!

 

Have a wonderful week,

Jessica Tossell, Brooke Henwood and Ella Gasowski

Student Voice

What will you miss about school over the holidays?

  • Roy S - "Learning about writing because I love writing!
  • Cindy Z - "My teacher and my friends"
  • Min-Yi Y - "Maths because I love maths"
  • Max D - "Playing with my friends"
  • Mallory M - "I will miss my teacher because I don't know what she will be doing"

Reminders

  • Orange folders go home each night and need to be returned each day with the students take-home reader and take-home reading journal.
  • No library borrowing this week - please bring all books back on Wednesday to return before the holidays. 
  • PMP continues on a Friday. Please remember to avoid wearing tights and we suggest bike shorts if students are wearing a dress.

Pupil of the Week

FG: Paige C -

For using perseverance to listen for the first sounds in words. You listened for the first sound in a word and worked with the teacher to match the sound to the letter! Keep up the amazing work, Paige!

 

FH: Maria M -

For working hard to learn and practise all of our alphabet codes! It has been fantastic to see you identify the code you can hear at the start when we are reading and writing. What a fantastic week Maria!

 

FJ: Meg W -

For demonstrating leadership and a love of learning when measuring the length of your paper plane throw. You ensured you and your group measured from the same baseline each time to find an accurate measurement. Well done Meg!