Learning News
Preschool
We welcomed a brand-new group of preschoolers at Para Vista Preschool on Monday Week 1. Children enjoyed exploring the preschool and experiencing all the activities on offer.
Inside, some children enjoyed cooking up delicious treats in the home corner; others loved using the playdough to create characters; some built huge farms in the block corner; some constructed elaborate marble mazes; others loved playing with kinetic sand and painting pictures.
Outside the sandpit, swings and obstacle course were the favourites. Children loved using the water in the sandpit and created dams and dug out pathways for the water to travel through. Others navigated the obstacle courses and experimented with ways to climb and jump over the equipment.
We played some ‘getting to know you’ games during group time and enjoyed eating our snack outside on the lawn. We can’t wait to see what else we will achieve and discover over the coming year.
Specialist Lessons
This year, all R-6 students will participate in learning with 3 teachers in specialist learning areas. Belinda Mentha will work with all classes for 2 lessons each week in the area of The Arts. Ben Noske will also spend 2 lessons teaching the Health and PE curriculum and Paul Bairstow will spend 1 lesson teaching Language. Below is more information about the content of their lessons.
The Arts
I am excited to be teaching The Arts at Para Vista Primary again this year. Festival of Music Choir for students in year 5 & 6 is held in lesson 3 on Wednesday and Junior Choir for students in year 2-4 is held at lunchtime on Wednesday.
Percussion group for year 5 & 6 is held at lunchtime on Thursday.
Term 1 R-2
This term in Music students will feel, show and move to a strong beat. They will explore the 4 voices, speaking, singing, whispering and shouting, and sing songs with the class. Students will investigate how different sounds are made using percussion instruments.
In Drama, students will use facial expressions and movement to become characters and show their reactions to different situations. They will also explore character through varying the volume of their voice.
Term 1 Years 3/4
In Music, students will be focusing on beat and rhythm. They will be working on reading, writing and identifying the following rhythms – to, titi, za. There will also be a focus on tempo and dynamics.
The students will be exploring tableau and mime, facial expression, body language, gesture during Drama.
Term 1 Years 5/6
The students will be exploring dynamics and expression, using aural skills to identify and perform rhythm and pitch patterns in Music.
In Drama, students will work on developing skills and techniques of voice and movement to create character, mood and atmosphere and focus dramatic action.
Physical Education & Health Term 1
Year R-2
This term in Physical Education, students will participate in a range of play-based movements to develop their fundamental movement skills. This will involve games where students are working in small groups and pairs, as well as individual activities, such as dance, skipping, hopping, jump rope and team games such as Rob the Nest. These activities will support students to develop simple game sense, taking turns and working together. In Health, there will be a focus on identification of common emotions, as well as understanding their own strengths and interests. Students will also be involved in understanding their own self and body – exploring self-regulation to manage emotional responses.
Year 3-6
This term in Physical Education, students will participate in a range of invasion games where there will be focus on tactical play, fundamental movement skills as well as movement selection. These games will also support students in developing their collaborative skills and determining how movement strategies can be adapted to create scoring opportunities. In Health, students will develop ideas around the influence of media on people, how we as individuals are influenced as we grow and develop our personalities and appearance (positive and negative). In addition, we will also discuss ideas around wellbeing, how we can keep ourselves healthy and identify how community is involved in wellbeing.
Language
In Language lessons, we will target language features and how to make these implicit features more explicit for students. As students progress their understanding of how language works, they develop the use of metalanguage (technical terms for language features) and they learn to make more conscious decisions about how to craft texts using these language features for specific purposes. For example, when creating Narratives students will choose to use descriptive language with features such as noun groups or circumstances. When writing Expositions they will learn to make use of more formal technical language such as nominalisations, passive voice and complex sentences using appropriate conjunctions. The content will be adjusted to be relevant for all year levels and how language works as defined in the Australian Curriculum.
Students will work towards being able to:
- Collaborate, building oral language skills to develop understanding of targeted language features. This includes listening, sharing, building on ideas and making justifications about thinking.
- Craft text using various language features to provide rich descriptions. They generate and manipulate a range of language features in oral and written text to convey specific information to a readers.
I look forward to working with all students across the school this year. If parents or caregivers have any questions, please feel free to make an appointment with me via your child’s class teacher so that I can contact you.