Term 1 Curriculum Newsletters
Prep
Our Prep cohort has made impressive strides in Term 1 as they began their schooling journey. They have adopted life as a KEFAR learner with great enthusiasm and are committed to helping each other “Be Like KEFAR”. It has been a pleasure to witness students forming and strengthening trusting bonds with their peers, teachers and buddies to help them feel safe and settled at school.
Literacy (Reading, Writing and Speaking and Listening)
Our Literacy learning this term will support students in building, writing and reading simple words with two and three sounds. They will do this by breaking the words into individual sounds and then blending the sounds back together to read and write the word. Students will be learning how to hold a pencil with a tripod grip to help them form the letters correctly. Handwriting will be practised daily.
Each day, students will be listening to a wide variety of rich picture books and taking part in class discussions. Students will practise how to communicate orally by speaking in full sentences. They will learn to take turns when speaking and listening in small groups and whole class discussions. They will also learn how to communicate how they are feeling to their peers and teachers.
Numeracy
This term in Numeracy, we are learning to count by 1s to 20 and beyond. Students will be naming and representing numbers to 20 using counters and objects. We will practise counting strategies to ensure we can trust our count. Students will also practise handwriting numbers daily. Accurate formation of numbers 0 to 9 will be our main focus this term. As part of our daily routine, we track and count how many days we have been at school and link the Days of the Week to familiar recurring events.
Marvellous Me and The Resilience Project
This term, our Inquiry unit of study is “Marvellous Me”. We will focus on what makes us unique, our likes and dislikes, our talents and strengths. We will also learn about the Zones of Regulation and how to recognise and regulate our emotions. We will also be learning about our KEFAR values and what it means to “Be like KEFAR”. The Resilience Project further immerses us in strategies for recognising and managing our emotions.
Independence
We have already seen fantastic growth in students building their independence. Some ways you can further assist with this is to encourage them to pack their own school bags and check that they have tools necessary for the school day, such as a drink bottle, a fully charged iPad, headphones, their hat and their library book (on relevant days). Our goal is for students to walk into the classroom independently and confidently by bringing in their own bag and waving goodbye to you at the door.
Thank you for your support,
The Prep Team
Grade 1
In Literacy, students will practise the skills of segmenting, blending and phoneme manipulation, as well as further reinforcing conceptual knowledge that a sound may be spelled by 1, 2, 3 or 4 letters. Students will continue to revise the different units of the Initial Code and will be working on developing their knowledge of the Extended Code. As writers, students will be practising writing sentences, identifying and using nouns, verbs and adjectives. Students will be writing recounts and will use words that link the events in their writing.
In Numeracy, the students will develop their understanding of counting patterns and place value. Students will explore and classify two-dimensional shapes and three-dimensional objects.
Our Inquiry unit is ‘I Belong, You Belong.’ Students will explore friendships and the qualities of a good friend. They will describe ways to include others and to make them feel that they belong.
Grade 2/3
The 2/3 students were jumping for joy when we launched our Inquiry unit of work last Friday, based on Health and Wellbeing. Throughout Term 1 we will work on identifying, expressing and managing our emotions, as well as being persistent and developing strategies to deal with challenging situations. Our Inquiry unit ties in beautifully with the Resilience Project and our KEFAR values; we will learn to be good friends, and to be like KEFAR!
In Reading and Writing sessions our students will focus on persuasive texts – understanding their purpose, identifying and forming opinions, and developing strong reasons to back up their views on a range of topics. We will also read entertaining scripts in order to develop fluency and expression when reading aloud. Students will aim to make their own writing descriptive and interesting through the use of adjectives, nouns, adverbs and verbs. We will conduct Handwriting sessions focussing on correct formation of letters, to aid in fluency and legibility when writing.
Maths classes will develop and strengthen student understanding of place value, as a basis for work on addition and subtraction problems. We will make models of and order numbers into the thousands and beyond, and practise counting forwards and backwards from various starting points. Telling the time on an analogue clock is another skill we will work on this term; moving on from o’clock and half past times, we will focus on quarter past and quarter to times. If you have an analogue clock at home, this is something you could practise with your child.
This term the 2/3s will work with Trish in our wonderful garden; we are very fortunate to have this program at our school. If parents or grandparents would like to help out with the 2/3 Garden sessions - you will need a Working with Children Check - please check the schedule that was posted on Compass and let your child’s teacher know.
The 2/3 staff and students can look forward to an exciting term of learning ahead, filled with lots of DIS moments!
Grade 4/5
What is health? What does it mean to be healthy? How can I be safe? These are some of the questions that the 4/5 students will be investigating in our Inquiry unit this term. Students will be exploring what the different food groups are, the main systems in our body that allow us to move, the media’s health messaging and safety around medications in the home.
This term we are studying a novel in reading, analysing how characters act and justifying our position with evidence from the text. We are exploring new vocabulary and discussing why the author has made certain choices. As writers we are exploring how to create highly descriptive and cohesive narratives, focusing on our description of characters and setting. We are looking at upleveling our vocabulary choices to engage our reader and are experimenting with different sentence types to help our writing flow.
In Maths we are exploring place value and exploring different ways to represent numbers. We will also be investigating effective strategies to solve addition and subtraction problems. Telling the time and applying their knowledge of time to timetables and scheduling will also be a focus throughout this term.
Grade 6
This term in Reading, the cohort will be undertaking a novel study on the text, ‘Once’ by Morris Gleitzman. Throughout the unit, the students will have the opportunity to discuss a wide range of topics and themes with their classmates. We will analyse the way the author chooses to portray World War 2, through the eyes of a 10-year-old.
In Writing, the students are working on narrative writing, and will continue to develop their writing skills by focusing closely on sentence development, syntax, and punctuation.
In Maths, the students will be developing their understanding of number and place value. We will cover topics ranging from place value, the four operations, and a variety of problem-solving strategies. Additionally, the students will be learning about perimeter, area and converting units of measurement. This will culminate with a project in which the students plan, measure, and create their very own apartment design according to specified dimensions.
This term our Inquiry unit will be focused on Health and Wellbeing. An external organisation, Elephant Ed, will be running four health lessons between weeks 5 and 9. In class, the students will also be learning about how to identify and manage emotions, how to identify and manage stressors, and learning about gender and identity.