Year One News

Term 1 in Grade 1

Welcome back! We trust that everyone had a restful holiday break and are feeling refreshed and ready for the year ahead. This year we have five grade 1 classes, which are located in the Koala building (portables near the car park for 1JM, 1JS, 1MM, 1LE) and Wallaby Building (1LL). Staff will continue to plan together to ensure that all students receive a guaranteed and viable curriculum in all classrooms. We have a busy and exciting term ahead.

KNOWLEDGE 

This term we will focus on settling in, understanding the classroom and school Agreements, helping students get to know one another, being resilient, building friendships and relationships as we work cooperatively. Using a growth mindset and understanding we are continually learning and may not have achieved something yet is also an area of focus. We will implement the Respectful Relationships program, considering our emotions, being friendly, being kind and identifying our own personal strengths. We will revisit what body autonomy and consent are. The grade 1 students will also focus on using digital technology appropriately and being safe online, as well as understanding what the school’s acceptable users agreement is.  We will also begin to learn about and implement the school values of Belonging, Respect, Resilience and Responsibility.

NUMERACY

Our main focus during term one in numeracy is to develop strategies to establish an understanding of counting and place value. Students will also study 2D shapes, patterns and data throughout the term. Problem solving using a variety of tools and strategies will also be an area of focus. We will revise key concepts learnt through our Daily Review. To assist your child with counting and place value, we suggest practising skip counting by 2s, 5s and 10s, as well as counting forwards and backwards from different numbers. Maths can also be explored at home through cooking and playing games like Monopoly, Uno, chess or Snakes and Ladders to reinforce concepts and strategies.

LITERACY

The main focus of writing will be on sentence fluency and conventions such as grammar and punctuation. The students will explore what nouns, adjectives and verbs are, and be encouraged to use these in their writing to make it engaging. We will write recounts of shared experiences and events. Developing fine motor skills and handwriting formations will also continue to be a focus in grade one. The Little Learners Love Literacy Program will continue and students will be engaged in shared, group and independent reading activities in class, as well as be encouraged to read and share books at home with their family. The students will continue to learn new phonemes (sounds) and graphemes (how we write them). We will focus on effectively using reading strategies for unknown words, understanding what we read (comprehension) and building knowledge of new vocabulary. 

We look forward to working with all students and families this year.

Kind regards,

The Grade One Team