Connect: Year 6

Hello Everybody and welcome to another edition of Connect, where (hopefully) you'll get a nice little summary of what's been happening and what's about to happen in and around our classrooms.

I thought that I'd add the "Cool to be at School" at the start to highlight just how important attendance is.  Post Covid attendance rates across the country are down as the whole routine of getting up, getting ready and leaving for school where totally broken down.  Every day at school adds more knowledge and experience to our students and they are hearing that message from us as teachers.  

Literacy

We have a new class novel in 'Runt,' written by Craig Silvey.  (The same author of Jasper Jones- if you haven't read it; do.  One of the great Australian Novels of the past 20 years.)  'Runt' is a beautiful story of a remarkable little dog and an even more remarkable young girl.  

Our Book Club groups are humming along and by the end of the year our students will have the experience of having read- or listened to 8 novels.  Background knowledge is so important when it comes to comprehension and the students are receiving plenty of it.

We have been learning how to write a structured Persuasive piece which has been quite a challenge, but it certainly a skill that they need moving into their secondary school lives.  Once we finish with that, we will be looking to write biographies.  These are easier, but require a lot of research, note taking and paraphrasing.  Again, our students will learn a lot about different people and their experiences and we'll share them so they learn from each other.

Maths

It's been a lot of fun and challenges with our maths of late.  We have done lots of problem solving and have enjoyed learning about angles and how they relate to everyday life.  We are moving towards consolidating our understanding of fractions- which is tough, but we'll get there!

Inquiry

The students are looking into the modern Australian history of the past two hundred and fifty years.  We researched significant events and placed them on a timeline and we are busy collecting information on prominent Australians who have had a role in shaping the nation.  Each student will present their designated Australian to the class so we learn off each other.  After a solid session of research and note taking, one of our class said to me, "I thought that this was going to be so boring, but it was actually kinda fun."

On that note, enjoy the weekend and we hope that your enjoyed reading this issue of Connect!