Curriculum News
Our Curriculum Overviews for the Term
In line with MACS’ (Melbourne Archdiocese of Catholic Schools) Vision for Instruction, we use an explicit teaching approach through most aspects of our curriculum. At a Foundation level this involves short periods of interactive whole class instruction, followed by teacher-led or structured independent hands-on experiences to consolidate learning. MACS has developed a partnership with Ochre Education to produce comprehensive curriculum resources for schools. We will be using these resources for Literacy, Mathematics and Humanities this term.
English
Foundation students will start each day with Heggerty, which aims to improve the students’ phonological awareness. This is the ability to rhyme, identify syllables and manipulate sounds in words. We will also be using the Little Learners Love Literacy Program, which has a focus on explicit instruction in Phonics Knowledge. The students will begin by learning two new sounds each week, and using decodable texts to blend learnt sounds to read. Our reading program will consist of whole class and small group work, however the format of this may change, depending on the needs of the class.
Writing is included as part of the Little Learners program, with students learning and practising correct letter formation with each new sound, as well as beginning to spell simple words and write sentences as their reading progresses. Our fine motor activities available each morning will help the students to build the strength needed to support their writing development. Through the use of the Ochre resources, we will also explore text genres and writing through picture story books - in Term 1 our books will be ‘Come Over to My House’ and ‘Stay for Dinner’ for our informative text focus, and ‘Little Red Riding Hood’ and ‘The Three Billy Goats Gruff’ for our imaginative text focus.
Oral Language underpins many parts of Literacy and the students will complete activities that focus on listening and speaking during Literacy activities. During the course of the year students will also be given an opportunity to present in front of their peers, through our Language Experience program - this will include a take home toy and a magic box. More information about this will be shared through the nForma app at a later date. Students are also encouraged to share any special news or events with the class - feel free to send through photos of special people or experiences your child would like to share with their peers.
We will be requiring parent helpers to assist with our Literacy program, however we will ask for expressions of interest once our programs and routines are established and we are ready to start.
Mathematics
This term we have four main units in Mathematics.
Patterns - In this unit students will be learning to recognise, copy, continue and create repeating patterns represented in different ways, including recognising the main element that is repeating within the pattern.
Measurement and Time - We will be learning to sequence the days of the week and times of the day, including morning, lunchtime, afternoon and night time, and connect these to familiar activities.
Counting and Place Value - In this topic we will be exploring counting forwards and backwards and exploring the value of numbers initially up to 10, including numbers before and after. We will also be working on subitising, which is automatically recognising a small collection of items i.e. the dot patterns on a die.
Location - Students will be learning to use location-specific words to describe the position of an object.
In addition to our main focus lesson each day, students will also participate in creating our ‘Number of the Day’ display, counting up to 100 days of school, and learning to represent numbers in multiple ways.
Humanities
Our Term 1 units have a focus on History through exploring our own families. We will explore the similarities and differences between our families, and share stories by exploring objects that hold special memories for their families - I will send out an email in the coming weeks requesting photos to support your child to share these stories with the class. We will also use this focus to explore First Nations families and their connection to Country. We will learn about the different celebrations families share, starting with our own families, and then broadening this to explore the similarities and differences across different families and cultures.
Science
We will start the term by exploring Biological Science through the 5 senses of sight, hearing, smell, taste and touch. Learning how the brain detects information about the surrounding environment, posing questions and developing vocabulary to describe different sensory inputs.
Towards the end of term we will begin to explore the physical science concept of movement, describing how objects move and how factors including their size, shape or material influence their movement. This unit will continue into the first half of next term.
Religion
This term in Religion the students will explore the theme of Church and the Community. We will begin by developing an understanding of how and why we pray, learning the routine of starting each day with prayer, and taking an active role in setting up our classroom prayer space. We will explore the ways people can belong to God’s Family, and what this means for us belonging to a Catholic school community. The students will also learn about the significance of Lent and Easter, exploring the biblical Easter story and reflecting on the importance of these events in our faith.
Wellbeing
Our Wellbeing focus for Term 1 is Emotional Literacy. We will be working on learning to identify emotions in ourselves and others, what triggers these emotions and ways we can regulate them.