Prep
Welcome Back to Term 4!
What a wonderful start to Term 4 we have had in Prep!
We have been so proud of how well our Prep students have settled back into school after the holidays. They have returned ready to learn, reconnect with their friends and jump back into our classroom routines.
It has been wonderful to see students showing growing confidence and independence as they begin their final term of Prep. They have been working hard, following our classroom expectations and showing our PROUD values throughout the school day.
We are looking forward to a fun and busy Term 4 filled with lots of learning, growth and special memories as we celebrate just how far our Prep students have come this year.
Welcome back, Preps!
Reading
Prep students have made an amazing start to Term 4! They have returned to school ready to learn and have shown a strong understanding of the concepts explored throughout the year. It has been wonderful to see them recall familiar skills and put them into practice.
This week, we began to explore the digraph “ng”, as in ring and swing. Students listened for the sound in words and practised reading and spelling words that contain this digraph. We also continued learning about vowels, focusing on identifying vowel sounds and noticing how they feature in different words.
Students have enjoyed a range of literacy activities, including reading decodable texts, playing word-building games and taking part in hands-on tasks. These activities give students opportunities to practise their skills, build confidence and strengthen their reading.
We also learned two new tricky words: come and some. These words can’t be sounded out easily, so students benefit from seeing, reading and writing them regularly. This week, they practised recognising the words and using them in spoken sentences. Continued practice at home can help students become more familiar and confident with these new words.
Maths
This week in Maths, our Preps have become data detectives! We have started our new unit on Statistics & Data, learning how to collect, sort and compare information. We have explored lots of familiar questions with two possible answers and had fun sorting objects into two groups. Students have been practising identifying which group has more and which has less, answering questions about what they can see and talking about what their data tells us.
Our classroom has been filled with plenty of hands-on learning as we collected and represented our own data. Students used counters, Unifix cubes, teddy bears and dominoes to sort and compare, as well as ticks and crosses on simple charts to show their findings. These activities have helped our Preps see that data can be represented in different ways and can help us answer questions, make comparisons and discover interesting things about the world around us. We are looking forward to continuing our data detective work next week!
Writing
This week in Writing, our Prep students have been busy developing their skills as confident writers!
We began by looking closely at a picture prompt and creating a class brainstorm. Students shared words for the people, objects, actions and places they could see in the picture. We discussed how a brainstorm helps us collect our ideas and gives us words we can use when we are ready to write.
Students then practised writing CVC words by stretching out each word, listening carefully for the sounds and recording the matching letters.
We used our brainstorm to help us build and write sentences using who, what doing and where. Students focused on including a capital letter at the beginning, finger spaces between words and a full stop at the end.
It has been wonderful to see our Preps sharing their ideas, using their sounds and becoming more confident and independent writers!
Integrated – My Special Place
This week in Integrated, our Prep students completed their My Special Place assessment. We explored places that are important to us and discussed what makes a place special.
Students thought about a special place in their own lives, such as their home, bedroom, backyard, a park or a family member’s house. They drew their special place, included important features and shared why it is special to them, what they like to do there and how they can care for it.
It was wonderful hearing about the many different places that are meaningful to our students!
Respectful Relationships – Thinking About a Future Me
In Respectful Relationships, we explored our hopes and dreams for the future. Students discussed what they might like to be or do when they grow up and learnt that our dreams and interests are not limited by gender — everyone can follow their dreams.
After listening to When I Grow Up, students imagined their future selves and created a drawing showing a job, activity or dream they would love to achieve.
We finished with a Future Me Gallery Walk, where students enjoyed looking at and celebrating the many different hopes and dreams of their classmates.