What we have been up to:

As we approach the end of the first semester we wind up our unit on “bugs” and reflect on our learning. It is evident from the students' information reports and accompanying labelled diagrams that they have a stronger understanding of features, needs, behaviours and habitats of the living things in their gardens and yards. Well done 1/2s.

Over the past week the 1/2 students have enjoyed participating in the Learning to Swim Program at Ivanhoe Aquatic Centre. Students worked with their appointed instructor to build skills and become stronger and better swimmers. On the last day they had organised fun things to do as a group where they could put all the different skills they had learnt to the test.

This week we also welcomed our wonderful parent volunteers into our classrooms to support our reading program. Students were thrilled to be able to read, play a literacy game and show off their phonics skills. Thank you so much to our wonderful helpers.

If you are at all interested in helping out with reading in the classrooms in the mornings (Monday- Friday) volunteering, it’s not too late! Please get in touch with your classroom teacher, we will be having a second workshop next term. Kiaya (speech pathologist from La Trobe University) will be coming back to speak to us about the reading support you can give the children when you come into the classrooms.

Maths:

In our numeracy lessons, we have continued to explore addition and subtraction. We have been introducing students to more efficient mental strategies to join and separate numbers, such as commutativity (flipping around and adding on from the bigger number), tens facts, breaking apart (28+8= 20+8+8), and building to 10 (28+6=28+2+4).

If you would like to practise basic addition or subtraction facts with your child at home, you could generate the facts by using a pack of playing cards with the royals taken out. Flip two cards and add them together. If you want to make this Addition Snap, the fastest person to add the two numbers together wins the cards. Person with all the cards at the end of the game WINS!

Literacy:

We have continued our focus on procedural (How to) text types, and you may want to support this learning at home over the holidays, by following recipes or how to make different arts and crafts.

As part of our phonics program, classes have begun Little Learners Love Literacy Stage 7.2 sounds. These sounds include: ar as in farm, or as in born, and aw as in yawn. This stage will continue into the rest of the term, moving on to other sounds such as ir as in first, er as in fern ur as in Thursday, and air (are, ere) as in fair.

On Friday’s, our 1/2s have been focussing on oral retelling and have spent this term moving their retelling into story maps. We are looking forward to taking these skills into our Narrative writing next term.

What’s to come in the next two weeks:

The school holidays will finally be here! While we are not at school together, here are some ways families can maintain growth and support learning a home:

Continue our home reading program. Record any books that you read from the library or your own collection. If your child is choosing a text that is ‘too easy’, work on other skills like fluency and comprehension strategies (such as retell and vocabulary).
Visit your local library. It's a fun, free activity for the whole family.
Play lots of card games.
Use the photos in our newsletters to stimulate conversation about school and learning!

1/2 TEAM

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