Class 3/4 Steiner

Celebrating Learning

Kii 3/4S families, 

Students have settled well into the new term and have been enjoying their time together after the holidays. Thank you to those families who supported students with their holiday homework by collecting seeds. It was fantastic for students to share the interesting items and to use these to support their writing. They’ve got some amazing stories in the works!

Main Lesson

Our current Main Lesson is Humanity on Earth. We are looking at various dwellings from around the world; such as caves, yurts, thatched homes, Bedouin tents, adobe houses and igloos. We have been discussing the materials these dwellings are made of and how they best suit the environments where they are built. Many of these dwellings use natural materials found locally and the knowledge of their construction has been passed down through generations of indigenous peoples. In the coming weeks students will have the opportunity to research dwellings they are interested in and will be creating their own model of a dwelling. It would be great to have discussions at home about various dwellings and to help your child to think about what they would like to create. 

Maths

In Mathematics we have been exploring efficient mental and written strategies for solving addition and subtraction problems up to 3-digits. We began by looking at the Part-Whole Strategy as we made “Part-Whole Triangles” to investigate the relationship between a whole and its parts e.g. if the ‘parts’ are 9 & 8 the ‘whole’ is 16. We also used the “Bar Model” to make connections between the ‘parts’ and the ‘whole’.

Students then moved onto other familiar and new strategies such as “Jump”, “Split” and “Compensation” to solve 2-digit addition and subtraction problems. We’ve also begun exploring “Vertical Algorithms” as an efficient strategy for solving addition and subtraction with larger numbers, and to build an understanding of partitioning as an efficient strategy. We played “Black Hole” to practise number facts to 20 through repeated addition of 1-digit numbers.

Literacy

In Reading, students continue to practise the four roles for Reciprocal Reading. We started this term by consolidating the role of the ‘Clarifier’; using physical dictionaries to make sense of words we don’t understand. More recently, we have been practising the role of ‘Questioner’, by learning how to ask THICK, open-ended questions that encourage others to think deeply about texts they read and hear. Next, we will focus on the role of the ‘Summariser’. Students will practise identifying and recording the main ideas and key words in a text. This will support their ability to verbally summarise different types of texts. It is important in this ever-changing world that students are exposed to lots of different types of texts and to practise making sense of the information.

Term 2 timetable

Monday: 

MUSIC 9 - 10

4’s Orchestra 10 - 11

Tuesday: 

STEM 9 - 10

CRAFT 10 - 11

Wednesday: 

LOTE 11.40 - 12.40

Thursday: 

PE 10 - 11

Library 12.40 - 1.40