Foundation

Teachers: Nikki Lewis, Bec Mealings, Courtney Williams, Damon Webb, Nic Walsh & Fiona Hedstrom.

Who can believe the term is almost over – just one more week to go! We hope everyone has a lovely final week of term and relaxing holidays.

Dates

Monday 19th June – Assembly

Friday 23rd June – PyjamaFlix Day!

Friday 23rd June – Final Day of Term – early finish at 2.30pm

Friday 23rd June - Reports available on Sentral

Monday 10th July – First Day of Term 3

PyjamaFlix Day

Wear pyjamas to school and bring something to cuddle – like a pillow or soft toy. We are having a special movie day to celebrate the end of term! Students are able to choose which VPS ‘cinema’ they will visit to watch a movie with their peers.

Occupations Dress Up Day

Everyone looked amazing for our Occupations dress up day this week. Thank you to all the grown-ups who worked hard to find, make and put together costumes. Here are some of our photos.

Integrated – Term 3

Next term, we are learning about Toys. We will be learning about the history of toys and how they have changed over time. Also, we will be learning how toys move and get to plan and build our own toys. As part of this, we need lots and lots of boxes! Can you please start collecting boxes at home to bring to school next term? These boxes can be any size – cereal boxes, toothpaste boxes, paper towel rolls, soap boxes, biscuit boxes etc. Please do not send in any egg cartons, medicine boxes or toilet rolls.

Reading

Next term, all students will be moving to nightly readers! Students will change their book every day at school and we encourage you to read the book with your child as well as practicing some comprehension skills afterwards. These comprehension skills and questions can include:

retelling the story
asking students to find certain events in the book
drawing their favourite part of the book
what is the name of the main character?
when did …… happen?
who did …….?
why do you think…?
how do you feel about …..?
questions about how characters may be feeling
what was the problem in the story?
why did the character do that?
did you like the story? Why/why not?

In students’ reader folders, teachers will be also be writing goals for students to practice in their reading at home.

Once students are more confident readers and familiar with more common words, they will be moving away from decodable readers (current take home books). Students may continue to practice their sound blending and move through the coloured decodables for several more weeks in Term 3 or they may start the new readers straight away.

Please do not worry about which book your child is taking home - if we have concerns, we will let you know! All students progress at different times and we are super impressed by their growth and improvement so far this year. Reading at home should not be a challenge for students but instead, helping to develop a love of reading.

Finally, teachers are constantly monitoring your child’s progress and checking their reading in the classroom. We will do two reading assessments with your child next term. They will not change levels until that time.

Please contact your teacher if you have any questions regarding home reading in Term 3.

Buddies

We have loved working with our buddies so far this semester. They are also an extra friend for us in the playground. Here are some photos of our latest activities together.

What’s on in the Classroom?

Maths

We are:

- revising our addition and subtraction strategies

- practicing number formation and counting forwards and backwards

- measuring how long items are using hands, feet and blocks

- practicing telling time to the hour and half hour

Literacy

We have spent the last few weeks writing about our history and our families. We are finishing these books off and then sharing them in the classroom. Students are so excited to take these books home and share them with you next week. We haven't included any photos so that you can be amazed by their writing when it comes home!

Fine Motor and Gross Motor Fun

In Foundation, we have a big focus on building our fine motor and gross motor skills. Fine motor is using our fingers to build their strength and range of movement. This helps us with writing, cutting and decorating. Gross motor skills are those that require whole body movement and use large muscles. Practicing our gross motor skills helps us to do everyday activities such as standing, sitting, running and sitting at a table.

Here are some of the fun things we have been doing in school: