Learning and Teaching

Science of Reading

In the last edition of the newsletter, I introduced the difference between phonemes and graphemes.  That is, phonemes being the sounds and graphemes being the letters of the words in the English language. You may recall that there are in fact 44 different phonemes.  

In this edition, we are going to focus on the difference between short and long vowels. For example, one of the 44 phonemes is the short /a/ sound, as in cat. Another of the 44 phonemes is the long /a/ sound as in acorn.

Do you know how many different letter combination spell the long /a/ sound?

a (as in acorn)

a_e (as in cake)

ai (as in rain)

ay (as in play)

ei (as in vein)

eigh (as in weight)

ea (as in steak)

ey (as in they)

Can you think of all the different spelling combinations for the other vowels, such as /e/, /i/, /o/ and /u/?

Idea?

When reading together with your child and you hear a long /a/ sound - discuss together the letter combination. Consider making a word list that you can add to on a regular basis, the back of your homework book may be a logical place to create such a chart.

Mrs Olivia Hodgetts

STEAM Day

On Thursday 16 May, as part of the 2024 Education Week, the students of St Mary's participated in STEAM Day! With over 20 different workshops to choose from, students worked in multi-age groups with staff members to work on various STEAM based challenges!  A massive thankyou to the parent volunteers for helping facilitate the activities and the community for all the donations.

National Simultaneous Storytime

National Simultaneous Storytime is held annually by the Australian Library and Information Association. Every year a picture book, by an Australian author and illustrator, is read simultaneously in libraries, schools and many other places around the country. Now in its 24th successful year, this event aims to promote the value of reading and literacy. On Wednesday 22 May, our students participated in this event by reading the 2024 chosen text, Bowerbird Blues.