Foundation

Hello Foundation families and welcome to the FINAL TERM of Prep! Can you believe it? We are looking forward to a very busy and exciting term with our Preppies.

Important Dates for Term 4:

Week 3

Monday 21st October - Foundation to Year 2 Assembly

Wednesday 23rd October - Footsteps Incursion #1

Week 4

Wednesday 30th October - Footsteps Incursion #2

Week 5 - 3 Day Week

Monday 4th November - Student Free Day

Tuesday 5th November - Melbourne Cup Day (Public Holiday - no school)

Wednesday 6th November - Footsteps Incursion #3

Week 6

Monday 11th November - Whole School Assembly

Wednesday 13th November - Footsteps Incursion #4

Week 7

Monday 18th November - Foundation to Year 2 Assembly

Tuesday 19th November - Myuna Farm Excursion

Wednesday 20th November - Footsteps Incursion #5

Week 8

Tuesday 26th November - Melbourne Zoo Excursion

Week 11

Friday 20th December - Whole School Assembly

Friday 20th December - Final Day of the 2024 School year (12:30pm finish time)

Hats in Term 4

Term 4 means the return of school hats! Please ensure that your child's hat is packed (or left) in their school bag each morning and that it is named. It is very important that each student knows where their hat is packed so they are able to find it easily as they go out to play at recess and lunchtime. If they do not have their hat, they will need to play in the shelter shed or under the shade sails near the oval. 

Jam Packed Term 4!

Myuna Farm and Melbourne Zoo Excursions

We are really excited to explore living things in our community and are lucky enough to be going on 2 excursions! We will be visiting Myuna Farm on Tuesday 19th November and Melbourne Zoo on Tuesday 26th November. We would love for some parent helpers to come along and help the teachers and students enjoy these amazing days! Please be advised of some of the requirements to attend these excursions:

• Have a valid Working With Children's Check.
• No younger siblings to attend.
• Be available for the whole day (approximately 8:30am to 3:30pm).
• For the Melbourne Zoo excursion, you will be in charge of small group of students and guide them around the zoo. The Myuna Farm excursion will be in class groups.

If you are available to help for either excursions, please email your child's teacher as soon as possible. 

Permissions and payment are now open on Compass. Payment for Myuna Farm is due Tuesday 12th November and Zoo payment is due Tuesday 19th November. 

Footsteps Incursions

This term Foundation, Grade One and Grade Two students will be attending five “Footsteps” dance classes for 45 minutes to an hour on Wednesdays from Week 3 onwards. 

The course is part of the school dance curriculum and is designed to provide students with an insight into traditional forms of dance, whilst also developing their social skills, confidence and physical fitness. The starting point for dance learning is ‘everyday movements’. Students learn about dancing safely and become aware of their bodies’ movement capabilities. They explore movement possibilities using space, time, dynamics and relationships. 

The total program cost is $20 for all five sessions (no part payments available). Please complete payment on Compass by 20th October. 

What’s on in the Classroom?

Maths

Place value – focusing on expanding numbers into their tens and ones

Skip counting by 2s, 5s & 10s and finding patterns

Reading

Continuing our focus on learning phonics rules, spelling new words and writing sentences.

Writing

Information reports about an animal focusing on habitat, diet and appearance.

What’s been happening in the classroom?

Maths

Students explored 3D shapes over the past couple of weeks by building them with different types of blocks. We talked about what kinds of shapes roll and explored the terms ‘curved’ and ‘flat’. The preps were asked to create a mystery structure using ‘2 rolling shapes, 4 boxes and 1 cone’. 

Preps also did an investigation on Sharing, where they were asked to create party bags for 5 guests and see how many of each item they would need to buy for the bags.

We explored fractions such as halves and quarters, and made some posters demonstrating fractions knowledge in cool crafty ways.

Literacy

We've been learning about non-fiction texts and the students have had a go at writing their own information reports about a bug. Students first researched a bug then planned their writing some dot points on a visual organiser. Then they turned those dot points into full sentences to write a short information report.

Inquiry

We have started up our Inquiry Groups for Term Four, where students will visit a different Prep classroom each week to learn about a particular animal. The students were asked what animals they would be interested in learning about, which helped inform our planning for Inquiry Groups. So far the kids have learned about birds, axolotls, giraffes and koalas.

Think U Know

Unsure how to talk to your child/ren about staying safe online? Then come along at 7pm on Tuesday 29th October to the school stadium as VPS will be hosting a ThinkUKnow parent night

ThinkUKnow Australia is an evidence based education program delivered nationally to prevent online child sexual exploitation.

The night will be hosted by Michelle Zhao from Australian Federal Police and Graham Higgerson from Neighbourhood Watch. The presentation is pro-technology and addresses topics including self-generated child abuse material, online grooming, sexual extortion, and importantly encourages help seeking behaviour.

This is a fantastic opportunity for you to learn more about young people and the online environment, and how you can help them to be safe and responsible users of technology.

Please click here to register your interest in attending this presentation.

For more information, you can visit www.thinkuknow.org.au or contact julie.hall2@education.vic.gov.au

Show and Tell Timetable for Term 4:

* Students are welcome to bring in props, photos or examples to assist with their discussions or descriptions.