Middle Learning News
Hi everyone!
It’s beautiful to see the dedication towards learning in our space. Students have been encouraged to be self-directed learners. This is to influence students to guide themselves through their learning to identify if a learning task is the right amount of challenge for them. As we have a wide variety of ages in our space, activities are differentiated depending on individual abilities. We have been establishing a culture that recognises that sometimes we need extra time with a concept before we can move on to the next part. Students are doing a fabulous job of calling out their abilities and independently moving to tasks more targeted for their learning. I am super proud of these efforts!
Literacy
Everyone continues to focus on their reading development by practising daily phonics, decodable sentences and spelling activities. We are improving partner practise tasks which involve reading books to each other. The listener is encouraged to ensure they are also following along and they are to ask the reader some questions at the end. This way the students can have a discussion about the book they read. Phonics we have focused on this fortnight have involved ‘are’ like in care and 'ow' like in grow. Students had previously learned 'oa' so have connected that 'ow' is commonly used at the end of the word. We continue to work on our understanding of suffixes s, ing and ed.
Mathematics
Students continued to use various tools to support their ability to add and subtract numbers in their minds. For the duration of this unit, students worked on the following (if you would like to continue to practise at home).
Ten/twenty facts (2 numbers making ten or twenty)
Doubles and near doubles (6+7)
Counting on/back (6 or less only)
Adding/subtracting ten, twenty, thirty, etc. from numbers.
Single-digit addition (5+3=8. 8-3=5)
This fortnight, students also learned strategies to add and subtract two-digit numbers mentally through the use of partitioning and the part-part-whole method.
National Reconciliation Week
Now More Than Ever
This week we read Sorry Day, Come Together and Welcome to Country to acknowledge National Reconciliation Week. Students also created and designed their own poster which was in line with this year’s theme, ‘Now More Than Ever.' We also used a Taungurung dictionary to learn some new words and displayed them in our classroom.
We ended the week with a chance for students to wonder, explore and create with National Reconciliation Week in their minds.
Focus Student
Scout was lucky to be the second focus student picked out. She decided to spend some time completing a guided drawing and making slime. Turn taking was the skill highlighted through this process as students were divided into groups to make slime together.
Everyone had a joyous time stretching and playing with their slime.
Connor was our Focus Student this week.
Connor’s chosen tasks influenced students to focus on their self umpiring skills. We started the day with some card games and puzzles. It was wonderful to see some groups establishing misconceptions of the game prior to starting, to avoid any conflict. Our detective Jane took photos of people being a great umpire. We also played a game outside involving team work and strategy.
----Student Highlights ----
We celebrated Maison's birthday with some lollies and a game of his choice last week.
We acknowledge the magnificent efforts of Hunter, competing in division running last week!
Jane has spent the last few weeks trying the monkey bars for the first time. With help from peers, she’s built on her skills daily. This week, she has learnt to do a backflip!
As you can see another fun and eventful time in our Year 2/3 space this fortnight.
Have a beautiful weekend. See you all Monday!
Miss Gab