Prep

Reading

Every day our Prep students are immersed in reading through engaging read alouds and shared reading using our big books.

Our reading comprehension focus has been making connections. Students have been learning that good readers make connections when reading by using picture clues, text clues and what they already know. Students have been encouraged to use the sentence stem, "This reminds me of" before explaining the clues that helped them make their connection. Making text connections assists comprehension by linking new story concepts directly to their own lives and known books, transforming abstract text into meaningful, real-world understanding. 

At home, you can support this by stopping during storytime to ask your child, "Does this picture or character remind you of something we have done together, or another book we have read?"

In our phonics program, we have continued exploring digraphs. A digraph is when two letters work together to make one sound. Students have learnt the ch digraph and this week have been exploring the wh digraph through games, reading and writing activities.

What You Can Do at Home

• Play Digraph Eye-Spy: While driving or shopping, challenge your child to spot things that start with our focus sounds, like a chair, chips, a whale, or a wheel.
• The Sound Hunt: Look for words containing 'ch' and 'wh' inside your child's home reading books or on food packaging in the kitchen pantry.
• Stretch and Write: Practice writing small words together. Encourage your child to "stretch out" the sounds they hear (e.g., ch–i–p or wh–e–n) and write them down.

Writing

Prep students have continued learning that there are many different types of writing and that we write for different purposes. Classes have continued participating in interactive writing to create class books based on topics of interest such as food, animals and the purpose of writing. This collaborative approach allows students to contribute ideas while developing their understanding of how authors create texts.

This fortnight we have continued exploring letter writing. During our mini lessons, students participating in creating writing pieces that encouraged them to focus on their developing skills. Students engaged in Free Writing activities that enabled them to have student agency in the writing pieces they created while putting their developing skills to use.

At home, you can encourage this by inviting your child to write an authentic message, such as adding an item to your family shopping list or drafting a short postcard to a relative.

Mathematics

In Mathematics, students continued exploring the concept of sharing equally and began investigating counting patterns, e.g. counting by ones and counting by tens.

Students continued to use hands on materials to practise sharing collections into equal groups and began discussing how many items each person would receive when we shared a specified quantity equally, for example 6 lollies shared two people means they will received three lollies each.

Students practised recognising numbers and investigated counting patterns counting by ones and tens through play based learning, e.g. playing first to 100.

At home, you can practice exploring skip counting patterns when counting bundles, counting with the numbers on letter boxes as you go got a walk and changing the rules to how you count when playing board games.

Inquiry

In Inquiry, students have further explored our new Central Idea: "We communicate our ideas, imagination and experiences through story."

Last week students explored different ways people have told stories throughout history e.g. visual displays, plays/puppets and through written text. They engaged in activities to explore how they can tell their own stories in different ways.

This week students continued to explore the elements of a traditional story. They developed an understanding of settings and characters and the importance they play in story telling.

Reminders

Please ensure your child has a spare change of clothes in their bag in case of accidents, mud or spills.

Our Prep Swimming Program will be taking place in Term 4.

• Group 1: Monday 19th October – Friday 23rd October 2026

  Group 2: Monday 26th October – Friday 30th October 2026

  Each swimming lesson will run for 45 minutes. To help prepare your child for the program, we encourage families to begin practising independence at home. Please support your child to dry themselves and get dressed independently after showering or swimming. Developing these skills now will help students feel more confident and ensure they are ready to return to learning promptly after each swimming session.

   

The Premiers Reading Challenge is open and running until September 4th. Students received logins, passwords and bookmarks this term. 

Thank you for all your support,

The Prep Teaching Team