What's Happening in our Classrooms

Year Prep

What’s Happening in Prep: Weeks 7 & 8

What’s been happening in Prep

The last two weeks in Prep have been jam packed with lots of learning and a very special celebration. We had our very first Japanese Day where we celebrated Japanese culture by dressing up, completing fun Japanese themed activities and getting to watch an amazing traditional drumming performance by international band SHIN. We are very impressed with how quickly the Prep students have picked up reading routines at school and at home. We are loving watching their confidence grow and listening to them read each week.

What will be happening over the next two weeks in Prep

Wellbeing

• Continuing to build Zones toolkits and explore strategies that can help regulate our emotions
• Identifying the “size of the problem” and the expected reactions, to everyday problems we may encounter

Phonics

• Revising all learnt phonemes (a, e, i, o, u, s, m, n, t, p)
• Learning consonant phonemes /b/ boy, /c/ cat, /g/ goat and /h/ hat
• Practising “finger spelling” to help sound out simple CVC words
   

Reading

• Independently reading and practising the skills of fluency, phrasing, sounding out, pointing to words as we read and predicting
• Identifying characters and settings in stories 
• Practising ‘Ruby’ memory words (said, is, as, all, went, play, like, school)

Writing

• Using memory words in our writing
• Forming letters from the correct starting point

Maths

• Comparing and ordering numbers to 20 using the language more/less, larger/smaller
• Learning the names and order of the days of the week

Inquiry

Big Question: How might we reuse and recycle products? 

Over the next fortnight, students will be exploring the following lines of inquiry:

• Why do people work as a team?
• What is a product? 
• Why do we reuse and recycle products? 
• How do materials change?

Homework

Continue reading and looking through Word Wizard and Decoding Detective resources in reading pouch.

Reminders

• Due to Labour Day Public Holiday on Monday 11th March, please bring reading pouch on Tuesday the 12th. There will be no library session this week.
• Please continue to bring in recycled materials and family photo if you have not done so already.
• School Photo Day – Tuesday 26th March
• Easter Bonnet Parade – Thursday 28th March at 9:10am

Year One

What’s Happening in Year 1: Weeks 7 & 8 

What’s been happening in Year 1

The Year 1 students have been introduced to the design process, which they’ll be using in the coming weeks for their Inquiry work. The students put on their construction hats to make a shelter that could withstand the breath of The Big Bad Wolf (a.k.a. the blow dryer). They designed their shelter using the design process structure, then constructed their shelter using any materials they liked. The Year 1 classrooms were covered with icy pole sticks, pipe cleaners, string, tape, glue, paper and many other supplies our busy builders were using.       

What will be happening over the next two weeks in Year 1

Wellbeing

• Year 1 is continuing to look at tools and strategies they can add to their personal Wellbeing Toolkit. More specifically, students are focusing on the red and yellow zones and deciding on strategies that will help calm their moods if they find themselves in these zones.  

Reading

• The Year 1 cohort will be reading Handa’s Surprise. In addition to reading this beautiful mentor text, students will be focusing on Word Choice, focusing on the adjectives used in the book. In addition to this, students will be developing their reading skills during Sustained Silent Reading time. 

Writing

• The Ideas Trait will be highlighted in the next few weeks, more specifically, students will be introduced to the KIC-strategy. Year 1’s will learn about the different ways we can find ideas to base our writing off. The KIC strategy is a structured framework students can use to write down ideas about what ‘I Know’, ‘Imagine if’ and ‘I Can Do’. 

Maths

• Shapes are being reintroduced in the Year 1 classrooms for Numeracy in the coming weeks. Students will be building on their prior knowledge of shapes. In addition, we’ll be learning more about the place value of numbers. 

Inquiry

• Year 1 will be visiting Myuna Farm on Wednesday 13th March. In preparation, students have been introduced to the design process and have looked at different construction materials that could help with their future designs. You might like to talk about the different animals students may find at the farm and what design aspects a good animal shelter might have. 

Homework

Continue reading everyday. If students are struggling to read their readers at night, you may like to try reading Take Home Readers in the morning.

Students are still using their sound pack in the classroom; you may like to keep practicing this at home. We have looked at a number of digraphs, /th/ /sh/ and /ch/ in particular. 

Reminders

• Myuna Farm (Wednesday 13th March)

Photo Snippets from Year 1

Year 2

What’s Happening in Year 2: Weeks 7 & 8

What’s been happening in Year 2

The Year 2’s have been enjoying the FMS (Fundamental Motor Skills) program. Throughout the term the students have been working on their team building, throwing and catching and communication skills. Over the past two weeks the Year 2 students have participated in a number of workshops designed to further their knowledge surrounding the big question, “How do changes in the sky and landscape affect living things?”. A highlight has been visiting the other Year 2 teachers for the Inquiry rotations and getting to know these teachers!

What will be happening over the next two weeks in Year 2

Wellbeing

Students will be visiting the Zones of Regulation, building new toolkits and identifying ways in which we are able to help ourselves regulate. For the next two weeks students will be revisiting the Yellow and Red zones and making toolkits that they can access both inside and outside the classroom in times of need.

Reading

The students will continue to work on reading rotations, this is a great time for the students to build on their comprehension skills as well as developing their fluency. Students will continue to work on their decoding and understanding of letter blends. 

Writing

Students will be investigating and researching different animals and will be working towards creating their own information report based on their findings. These amazing information reports will be a part of their final Inquiry project.

Maths

Students will begin investigating time, this will include o’clock, half-past, quarter to and quarter past times. The cohort will also be collecting and representing data in a graph and students will interpret the data on these graphs. Students will also be continuing to work on place value. 

Inquiry

Big Question: How do changes in the sky and landscape affect living things?

Over the next fortnight, students will be asked to:

Choose an animal to research throughout class time. The students will take part in note taking surrounding the chosen animal and 5 key areas, these areas are: appearance, diet, habitat, how changes in the sky and landscape affect the animal and fun facts. 

Reminders

• Moonlit Sanctuary Visit - Friday the 8th of March. Please refer to compass communication from last week regarding the excursion.
• Take Home Readers - each student will have the opportunity to change their readers each week and take home 5 levelled readers. It is expected that students read their 5 readers and complete their reading journal. The Year 2 teachers would love to see our students taking responsibility to complete their own reading journal.
• Library - please find below a timetable of when your child will visit the BPS library. Please ensure that you child brings their library book each week on this day. Students should bring their library book to and from school in a library bag (this can be the navy BPS one or another bag of your choice). 

• Hats must be worn during recess, lunch and Physical Education until the 1st May. Please ensure your child has a named hat (to be left at school in their tub or on their hook).
• If you wish to contact your child’s classroom teacher for any reason, please do so using the Beauy Box: Beaumaris.ps@education.vic.gov.au 

Specialist Classes - 

Year Three

What’s Happening in Year 3: Weeks 7 & 8

What’s been happening in Year 3

Year 3 has been a busy time of learning new skills and further building upon concepts learned in Year 2. We have been using our skills of resilience to explore and attempt NAPLAN practice tests, becoming more familiar with the testing platform on the iPads. 

We have loved writing narratives with interesting storylines, practising how to carefully choose adjectives and verbs to bring our texts to life. 

We have spent a fair amount of time exploring expected and unexpected behaviours and how our actions can impact what zone the people around us are in. The teachers did some silly examples of unexpected behaviours and we discussed how it made us feel.

We collected rubbish for Clean Up Australia Day. We walked down Emily Street, around the Concourse, along Reserve Road and back down Victor Street and across to school again. We ended up with a fair amount of rubbish and left the community looking much cleaner!

What will be happening over the next two weeks in Year 3

Wellbeing

• We will continue to link our wellbeing activities with Inquiry, particularly when managing our emotions when facing unfamiliar or uncomfortable situations.
• We will be further exploring a growth mindset.

Reading

• We look forward to our library time on Fridays when lots of book recommendation discussions will occur.
• We will be delving deeper into our comprehension strategies and how to locate information within the texts we read.

Writing

• We will be revisiting how to construct persuasive texts that clearly convey an opinion or idea. 
• We will be exploring persuasive strategies along with the formal structure of a persuasive text. 

Maths

• Continuing a number focus we will explore multiplication and division.
• Measurement including telling the time will become a focus over the next week.

Inquiry - Health

Big Question: How might we promote healthy living choices in our school community?

We will strengthen our understanding of physical, social and emotional health and learn how to best look after ourselves. We will consider what healthy habits do we already have in place and what habits we could adopt.

Homework

We’re still hoping to see every student bringing in their diary everyday to show that they have been regularly reading.

Well done to the many students that have been completing their Mathletics homework tasks. Don’t forget that once these tasks are done, students are free to look around and have a go at other tasks or to take on a Quest!

Reminders

• All students need a working pair of headphones to use at school. This is especially important for NAPLAN. Please check in with your child(ren) to see if they have a working pair. 
• NAPLAN begins in Week 7 and will continue in Week 8. Please see your child’s teacher if you have any questions about this. 

3K and 3S are still desperately looking for an amazing person to be their Parent Rep for the year. Please contact your child’s teacher if you’re willing and able to take on this responsibility.

Year Four

What’s Happening in Year 4: Weeks 7 & 8

What’s been happening in Year 4

Last week we had an engaging incursion which taught students all about government elections and how local council meetings run. They held a mock election to elect a mayor and role played the scenario of adding an off-leash area for dogs in the local park. It was a great way to learn about voting, absolute majorities and council proceedings.

What will be happening over the next two weeks in Year 4

Wellbeing

• Creating Zones of Regulation toolkits
• Building emotional literacy through role plays
• Exploring the size of problems and categorising them as ‘hills’, ‘mountains’ and ‘volcanoes’

Reading

• Continuation of our term novel, The Dragon Defenders
• Conducting reading groups for targeted activities
• Silent reading personal choice book

Writing

• Letter writing using The Day the Crayons Quit as a mentor text
• Persuasive techniques
• Publishing stories based on the text Why I Love Australia
• Personal writing

Maths

• 2D and 3D shape properties
• Composite shapes
• Multiplying and dividing by 10, 100 and 1000
• Numbers on a number line
• Problem solving

Inquiry

Big Question: How can we promote our local community?

Students will be investigating a community service/club they are interested in and developing advertisements and letters for them.

Homework

Students will receive homework on a Monday and it is due on the Friday of the following week (signed diaries due every Friday). Homework consists of 20 minutes reading a night, 3-4 Mathletics tasks to reinforce the concepts being taught at school, and one additional task, as instructed by the classroom teacher. Homework for weeks 7 and 8 is due on Friday 22nd March.

Reminders

• Please fill out and send back contact information for class contact list.
• Homework for Weeks 5 and 6 is due on Friday 8th March.
• Year 4 Camp will take place in Week 1, Term 2 from Wednesday 17th April to Friday 19th April. Please remember to send signed forms back ASAP.

Year 5

What’s Happening in Year 5: Weeks 7 & 8 

What’s been happening in Year 5

Over the past couple of weeks in Year 5 we have been busy preparing for NAPLAN which is occurring in Weeks 7 and 8. Please see below for the NAPLAN schedule for Year 5 students. We also enjoyed the commencement of Interschool Sport where we both travelled and hosted other schools. We were lucky enough to be visited by some St Kilda Football players last week, where we were able to see an insight into what it is like to be an AFL professional athlete by asking them lots of questions. We also participated in Clean Up Australia day on Friday where we walked to Banksia Reserve and did a tremendous job of cleaning up our local community. This week we were introduced to our Summative Task for our Inquiry unit with our big question being: How has the Gold Rush had a lasting impact on Australia today? 

What will be happening over the next two weeks in Year 5

Wellbeing

• Identifying personal strengths in others, such as courage, sense of humour and determination and explaining how these could contribute to achieving success
• Describing what being successful at school looks and feels like and what personal strengths would assist

Reading

• Use comprehension strategies to analyse information, integrating and linking ideas from a variety of print and digital sources
  
  Book Club Groups:
  - Students read set chapters 
  - Complete Talk Sheet 
  - Participate in Literature Discussion Groups

Writing

• Explore persuasive texts by revising persuasive techniques, analyzing the structure of persuasive texts and comparing various persuasive texts including news articles, visual literacy, debates and opinion pieces
• Reread and edit own and others’ work using agreed criteria for text structures and language features

Maths

• Identify and describe factors and multiples of whole numbers and use them to solve problems 
• Exploring factors and multiples using number sequences
• Using simple divisibility tests
• Describe, continue and create patterns with fractions, decimals and whole numbers resulting from addition and subtraction 
• Use the number line or diagrams to create patterns involving fractions or decimals

Inquiry

• Select our theme, partner and presentation model for our Inquiry project
• Begin researching for our selected Inquiry Topic

Homework

• Students are to be reading every night and they can access Mathletics tasks.

Reminders

• Monday 11th of March - Labour Day Public Holiday (no school)
• Friday 15th of March - Interschool Sport
• Friday 22nd of March - Interschool Sport
• Friday 22nd of March - Open Afternoon

Year 5 NAPLAN dates below:

Year Six

What’s Happening in Year 6: Weeks 7 and 8 

What’s been happening in Year 6 

The students have been enjoying getting back into a normal classroom routine after camp in Week 3. Between the Teddy Bear Picnic with their buddies, Clean Up Australia Day and interschool sport, our students are finding time to immerse themselves into the Mathematics, Literacy and History learning outcomes below. 

What will be happening over the next two weeks in Year 6 

The first Southern FM radio broadcast is due on Thursday 14th and 28th of March. Please tune in to 88.3FM. We look forward to hearing our students live on the radio! 

Wellbeing 

Students identify people they are grateful for help from.  

Students will recognise who they can give help to in certain situations.  

Students will rehearse situations where they can offer help to peers.  

Literacy 

Students are practising reading fluency (accuracy, rate, prosody) through repeated oral reading strategies through inquiry linked texts.  

Continuing to read the class novel ‘Glass House of Stars’ and looking at how the author uses magical realism to make the text relatable and engaging.  

Students will be constructing historical narratives about significant Australians from the 20th century, Edith Cowan, Gough Whitlam and Cathy Freeman. 

Spelling - morphology - understanding prefixes and their role in modifying the meaning of words. 

Maths 

Students are exploring strategies to work with negative integers and recognising uses in everyday life. 

Students are working with the four operations with whole numbers, fractions and decimals. 

Inquiry 

Our Lines of Inquiry are:

How has the women’s rights movement impacted on the way women live their lives?  

How have Indigenous Australians been impacted by societal change in Australia and who have been the key drivers of reconciliation with Indigenous Australians?  

Homework 

Students are expected to be reading every night and completing Mathletics activities where possible. Diaries with reading recorded will be checked weekly.  

Reminders 

• Students need hats, water bottles and runners for sport for the next two Fridays. Week 8 is a double header. Students to arrive at 8:30am on Friday. Training takes place at school each Wednesday. 
• All students require a new digital agreement signed in preparation for using devices at school. 
• Labour Day Holiday – Monday 11th March.