Level 3 & 4
We have another busy and exciting week of learning ahead in Grades 3 and 4! Our classrooms will be buzzing as students continue to build their skills across all learning areas. As always, we encourage students to approach each new challenge with curiosity,persistence and a positive mindset. We are looking forward to another wonderful week of learning, laughter and growth together!
BULLYING NO WAY WEEK
Last week, our Grade 3 and 4 students participated in a range of meaningful learning experiences as part of ‘Bullying No Way Week,’ building their understanding of how we can all contribute to a safe, respectful and inclusive community. Students began each morning with thought-provoking short clips and discussions, exploring kindness, inclusion, empathy, bystander behaviour and the importance of speaking up when something doesn’t feel right. We also used our mentor text, the Disney Pixar short film Lou, to examine bullying behaviours, character motivation, consequences, empathy, remorse and the power of making positive choices.
A highlight of the week was participating in an interactive online session, which gave students another opportunity to explore help-seeking, respectful relationships and strategies for responding safely to challenging situations. Throughout the week, our conversations reinforced the important message that even small actions—such as including someone, showing kindness, seeking help or speaking up—can have a big impact in helping everyone feel safe and that they belong. This aligns beautifully with the 2026 Bullying No Way Week theme, “Small Acts, Big Impact.”
SCIENCEWORKS EXCURSION
We are very excited for our excursions to Scienceworks, with our Grade 3 students attending on Monday and our Grade 4 students on Tuesday. A highlight of the day will be a specialist coding session, where students will have the opportunity to develop their problem-solving and coding skills through an engaging hands-on experience. There will also be plenty of time to explore the many exciting exhibitions and learning experiences Scienceworks has to offer!
BOOK WEEK
Our annual Book Week Parade will begin at 9:00am On Wednesday 26th August. We can’t wait to see our students bring the wonderful world of books to life, they are encouraged to come dressed as a favourite book character and join in the fun as we celebrate reading, imagination and creativity together. Families are warmly invited to come along, enjoy the parade and help us celebrate what is always a colourful and memorable morning.
A very special highlight of Book Week will be welcoming the fabulous author and illustrator Nicky Johnston, who will share her passion for storytelling and creativity with our students. Nicky is the creator and illustrator of many beautiful picture story books, including Go Away, Mr Worrythoughts!, The Fix-It Man, Grandma Forgets and Saying Goodbye to Barkley. We are looking forward to hearing about her work and gaining a special insight into how stories and illustrations come to life. It promises to be a fantastic celebration of reading, creativity and the joy that books bring.
ANNUAL BOOK FAIR
Our Annual Book Fair is returning!
Families are invited to come along and browse the wonderful range of books available for purchase. A large percentage of all books purchased will go directly towards purchasing new books for our school library.
Students will also have the opportunity to visit the Book Fair with their classes.
Opening times (from Monday 31st Aug-Friday 4th Sept):
- Morning: 8:15am - 8:45am
- Afternoon: 3:15pm - 3:45pm
The success of these events relies on the wonderful support of our school community. We are seeking expressions of interest from families who are able to assist our Grade 6 Library Captains with running the Book Fair during morning and afternoon sessions.
Literacy
Reading
This week, we will continue exploring our mentor text, Disney Pixar’s short film Lou, building on the rich vocabulary and discussions from last week. Students will delve more deeply into the characters, their motivations, perspectives and changing behaviour, using evidence from the film to support their thinking. We will explore important ideas including belonging, empathy, compassion, conflict, consequences and reconciliation, while considering how and why characters can transform throughout a story. Through discussion, comprehension and written responses, students will continue developing their ability to make inferences, justify their ideas and use increasingly precise vocabulary when responding to a text.
WHAT CAN YOU DO AT HOME:
This week, families can support our learning by focusing on character motivation and perspective when reading or watching stories together. Pause occasionally and ask, “Why do you think that character made that choice?”, “How might another character see the situation differently?” or “What evidence makes you think that?” Encouraging children to explain why they think something, rather than simply giving an answer, is a wonderful way to strengthen inference, comprehension and deeper thinking about texts.
Spelling
Students will practise identifying when the rule applies, selecting appropriate suffixes and using their growing understanding of spelling patterns to accurately read, spell and build new words.
WHAT CAN YOU DO AT HOME:
Families can support our work with suffixes and the 1-1-1 rule by playing quick word-building games at home.
Give your child a base word such as hop, run, skip, plan or drop and ask them to add -ing or -ed, explaining what happens to the final consonant. You might challenge them to decide, “Do we double it or not?” and explain which part of the 1-1-1 rule helped them decide.
Looking for words with suffixes during everyday reading is another simple way to help students recognise and apply these spelling patterns independently.
A review of weird words that we have investigated throughout the term include; prepared, area, various, wear, vary, bear, clothes, aunty
Writing
This week, our writing will connect closely with our mentor text, Disney Pixar’s Lou. As the short film contains no spoken dialogue, students will use their inferencing skills to imagine what the characters, particularly J.J. and Lou,might be thinking and saying at key moments.
Students will add their own dialogue to speech bubbles, carefully considering each character’s emotions, motivations, actions and changing perspective to ensure their dialogue fits the events of the story.
This task will also allow us to continue our explicit grammar focus on dialogue and talking marks, exploring how spoken words are correctly punctuated when we move from a speech bubble into written narrative.
WHAT CAN YOU DO AT HOME:
Families can support this week’s writing focus by exploring dialogue in everyday reading or television. Pause during a story and ask your child, “What might this character say right now?” or “What makes you think they would say that?” You could also choose a picture with two characters and take turns creating a short conversation between them.
Encourage your child to think about the characters’ feelings, motivations and perspectives, and, if they write the conversation down, practise using talking marks and correct punctuation to show exactly what each character says.
Maths
Grade 3 – 3D Shapes
Students will begin exploring the exciting world of three-dimensional objects. They will make, compare and classify 3D objects, including prisms, pyramids, cylinders and spheres. They will investigate and describe important features such as faces and surfaces, edges and vertices, and use these properties to explain how objects are similar or different. Through hands-on building, sorting and investigating, students will develop their spatial reasoning and mathematical vocabulary while discovering why particular 3D objects are suited to different purposes.
WHAT CAN YOU DO AT HOME:
You can support this learning by becoming 3D object detectives around the home! Look at everyday objects such as cereal boxes, tins, balls, dice and packaging and discuss which 3D objects they resemble. Ask your child to describe their faces/surfaces, edges and vertices and compare two objects: “What is the same? What is different?” You could even challenge your child to collect household objects and sort them into groups, explaining the mathematical rule they used for their classification.
Grade 4 – Fractions
Students will continue to strengthen and extend their understanding of fractions as numbers. Students will investigate equivalent fractions, explore families of related fractions and make connections between fraction and decimal notation.
They will also count by familiar fractions such as halves, thirds and quarters, including beyond one whole into mixed numerals, and locate and represent fractions accurately on number lines.
WHAT CAN YOU DO AT HOME:
Fractions are everywhere in everyday life! Families can support this learning through practical experiences such as sharing food equally, following recipes, measuring ingredients or dividing collections into equal groups. Ask questions such as, “If we cut this into eight equal pieces and eat four, what fraction have we eaten?” and “Can you think of another fraction that represents the same amount?”
Encourage your child to explain or draw their thinking—for example, showing why 2/4 and 1/2 are equivalent.These everyday conversations help students see fractions as meaningful numbers.
Continue to encourage your child to practice their times tables regularly by saying them out loud, writing them down, or through quizzing.
Multiverse on Mathletics and Hit the Button (website) can be a fun interactive way to practice and strengthen number fact knowledge and work towards automaticity
CBL (Challenge Based Learning)
Our Challenge Based Learning (CBL) Big Idea is Power.
This week, students are diving into our mini challenge, ‘Use Your Power to Make a Positive Impact.’ Working collaboratively, students are identifying issues and opportunities within the Wonga Park community that matter to them and investigating ways they could use their voice, ideas and actions to create meaningful change. In groups, students will share ideas, make decisions, create support resources and as they plan for how they can make a positive impact within our local community.
During Weeks 7–10, our CBL learning will shift to exploring power through coding. Students will investigate how coding can be used to create, problem-solve and bring ideas to life through a range of engaging challenges. To support this learning, we kindly ask families to check that their child has the Swift Playgrounds app installed on their device. If it is not currently installed, we would appreciate families downloading it in preparation for our CBL sessions across the final four weeks of term.
Wellbeing
SWBPS
Through our SWPBS program and token system, we continue to recognise and celebrate students who demonstrate positive work habits, respectful relationships and safe behaviours, helping to create a supportive learning environment where everyone can thrive.
This week in Respectful Relationships, our focus will continue to look at help-seeking and effective communication. Students will explore a range of realistic scenarios and discuss how they can communicate their needs, recognise when they may need support and identify trusted people they can turn to for help. Through discussion and role-play, students will practise using clear and respectful language, consider different ways to respond to challenging situations, and build confidence in seeking help for themselves or others when needed.
Kitchen Garden
We continue to rely on the support of our wonderful parent helpers to ensure this program is safe and successful. We also warmly welcome help from extended family such as grandparents, aunts, and uncles. If you or a family member can spare some time to support the program, the sign-up link is:
We post our recipes on Showbie for students who would like to recreate the amazing dishes they make in our cooking classes.
Please use the Showbie code below if your child would like to access these recipes:
9JYVE
INFORMATION & REMINDERS
MUDDY PLAY
With the recent wet weather, we are noticing that some students are becoming very muddy during playtimes! While we love seeing students enjoying the outdoors, our supply of spare clothing in the sickbay has now been exhausted.
We ask families to please ensure that children who enjoy exploring the muddier areas of the yard have a complete change of clothes in their school bag, including underwear and socks. Having spare clothes available will mean students can quickly change and return to class clean, dry and comfortable, ready for their learning.
Thank you for helping us keep the muddy adventures outside!
SQUISHY & FIDGET TOYS
We ask that students do not bring squishy toys, fidget toys or similar items to school unless their use has been specifically recommended by an Occupational Therapist or relevant professional and communicated with the school as a strategy to support the child’s focus and learning.
While these items can be valuable tools when used for a specific purpose, when brought to school as toys they can become distracting for both the student and those around them. Thank you for helping us keep our classrooms focused and ensuring that learning tools are used purposefully and appropriately.
HOLIDAYS
If your family is planning a holiday during the school term, we kindly ask that parents communicate this directly with their child’s teacher, rather than relying on students to pass the information on. A quick email letting us know the dates your child will be away is all that is needed and helps us plan for their absence and return to learning.
Thank you for helping us stay informed and ensuring clear communication between home and school.
Term Three Dates
August
Monday 24th August – Scienceworks Grade 3 excursion
Tuesday 25th August – Scienceworks Grade 4 excursion
Wednesday 26th August – Book Week Celebrations –
Parade 9am & Author Visit Nicky Johnston
September
Tuesday 1st September - Friday 4th September: Annual Book Fair
Thursday 3rd September – District Athletics, selected students
Friday 4th September - Father’s Day / Special Persons morning “Donuts with Dad”
Tuesday 8th September – Grade 3/4 Hooptime
VSSS Choir have several dates on the calendar
-please help support your child to make sure their iPad is charged and ready to use each day
-please download the app Swift Playgrounds onto your child's device to support our CBL coding