Grade 6 Community News
Dear Year 6 Families,
What a busy and exciting fortnight it has been! We had a wonderful time celebrating Book Week, and it was fantastic to see the effort and creativity that went into the students’ costumes. We are continuing to work on our scrapbooks and Antarctic shelter design builds in preparation for Open Day. As we look towards the final weeks of Term 3, we are also beginning to prepare for Graduation and supporting students as they prepare to transition to high school. There is lots to look forward to, and we are excited to see our Year 6 students continue to make the most of their final months of primary school!
English
Our Year 6 students have wrapped up their latest English assessment this week - a huge congratulations to everyone for their focus and effort!
Students are now diving back into their creative scrapbooking projects. This task allows them to create their autobiography and write about an Australian animal they feel a meaningful personal connection to. These activities merge their reflective writing with artistic design.
Next week, we are excited to begin our new class novel, Once by Morris Gleitzman. Set during World War II, this compelling story will offer rich opportunities for class discussion and deep character analysis.
Alongside our novel study, we will continue with our regular Spelling Mastery routines and focus on expanding students’ vocabulary by identifying and analysing unfamiliar words in context.
Maths
Our unit on Measurement has concluded, with students showing a solid understanding of how to convert between metric units of length, mass and capacity.
This week we have started our unit on Location and Transformation. Students have been learning about negative numbers, coordinates and transformations. They have located and plotted points on a Cartesian plane across all four quadrants, using positive and negative coordinates. Students have applied translations, rotations and reflections to transform shapes and investigated how these movements change their coordinates.
Here is an example of one of the skills that students have been working on:
To finish the unit next week, students will use their understanding of transformations to create tessellating patterns, developing their mathematical reasoning and problem-solving skills.
Please continue to encourage your children to access Times Tables Rockstars to practice their skills and compete for points!
Humanities
Students are now in the building stage of our Antarctic shelter project! Working collaboratively, they are bringing their designs to life and using their understanding of Antarctica’s extreme conditions to make decisions about materials, structure and insulation. Students are testing, refining and problem-solving as they work to create shelters that could withstand the harsh Antarctic environment. We are looking forward to seeing the finished shelters on display for families during our Open Day!
Scrapbooking
We are continuing to make great progress with our scrapbooks. Students have completed their ‘Then & Now’ pages and are now finalising their pages about a role model they admire, autobiography and Australian animals.
Respectful relationships
This term, students will explore gender norms and stereotypes and how these can influence the attitudes, behaviours and expectations of people as they grow. Through discussions and activities, students will consider how ideas about gender can be shaped by families, traditions, media, sport, work, toys and stories, and how these expectations can change over time. Students will develop their understanding of diversity, inclusion and respectful communication, while identifying ways they can challenge stereotypes, value differences and contribute to creating a friendly, safe and inclusive school environment where everyone feels respected and included.
As mentioned in the previous newsletter, students are encouraged to bring in photographs (both in and out of school) and any scrapbooking materials they would like to use to personalise their pages. We look forward to seeing their creativity and wonderful memories come to life!