Junior School News
With a running start to a shorter term, we could not have asked for a better or more enthusiastic beginning from the Junior School! The students were as ready as ever, walking back into school after their jam-packed holidays, and it has been great fun hearing all about their adventures and fond memories.
Students across all classes have continued to blow us away with their dedication to learning, their positive attitudes, and their commitment to being the most supportive classmates and friends they can be. Their ability to self-reflect and eagerness to improve each day is truly inspiring.
Celebrating 100 Days of Prep
Last week, our Prep students marked 100 Days of Learning with a celebration bursting with creativity, laughter, and pride. Dressed as 100-year-olds with walking sticks, curlers, suspenders, spectacles, and the occasional wrinkle or two, our little learners stepped into character with charm and confidence.
It was heartwarming to see the excitement on their faces as they embraced the fun of being “100 days brighter.” As one of the most coveted calendar dates in Prep, you could feel the sense of achievement and excitement in the air, recognising the joyful milestone was magical! Throughout the day, students engaged in playful and purposeful activities all themed around the number 100 from counting games, crafts, movement challenges, and more. Their curiosity, teamwork, and imagination shone brightly as they celebrated just how far they have come.
To top it all off, the students were treated to a special pizza party, sharing delicious food and joyful conversation with their classmates. This event is a much-loved highlight of the Junior School calendar and a beautiful reminder of how much growth, resilience, and joy can unfold in just 100 days.
Of course, none of this would be possible without the incredible Prep teaching team. Our dedicated educators and support staff pour their passion, energy, and care into every moment of the Prep journey. Their thoughtful planning, encouragement, and unwavering support help create a warm and inspiring environment where every child can thrive. We are immensely proud of our Preps and deeply grateful to the amazing teachers and staff who make magic happen in the classroom every single day!
Year One
We are immensely proud of the Year Ones and how well they have settled back into school this term. Each day is filled with incredible growth, new understandings, and opportunities for students to develop in all aspects of school life.
From learning a new rule each week including, this term, the bridge rule, where the spelling ‘dge’ is used to represent the ‘j’ sound after a short vowel, and the two spellings of ‘oi’ and ‘oy’ in words like destroy and recoil, to becoming engrossed in the world of measurement using informal units to explore length, the students never waver in their dedication and effort to build their knowledge and extend their thinking.
They have also been committed to strengthening their sentence skills by identifying and incorporating pronouns into their writing, ensuring common and proper nouns are not repeated but replaced with the correct pronoun.
Seeing those moments of connection in their learning, where they link a wide range of skills together, is truly inspiring and a powerful reminder of what these students can achieve when they are working at their best.
Check out these beyblade champions!
Year Two
The Year Twos have not wasted a second, jumping straight into rich learning across all lessons. They have been using their knowledge of syllable patterns to apply the Camel Rule, where you divide the first syllable of a word after a consonant if there is a vowel followed by another consonant, creating a closed syllable such as tim in timid, rob in robin, and lem in lemon.
This was followed by revisiting the two ways to represent the same sound ‘au’ and ‘aw.’ Students learned that ‘au’ is typically used at the beginning or in the middle of a word, while ‘aw’ is used at the end, unless the sound is followed by a single l, n, or k, in which case ‘aw’ is still used, for example, crawl, dawn, hawk.
In writing, the learning pace continued as students explored how to identify and use subject and object pronouns within a sentence. For example, the sentence “Miss Flynn loves 2F” becomes “She loves them.” The Year Twos also worked on identifying and using possessive adjectives within sentences. Possessive adjectives describe who something belongs to and are always followed by a noun. An example of this is, “We went to her party on Saturday night,” with her being the possessive adjective.
In Maths, students have begun exploring more complex ideas of multiplication and division through a variety of concepts. These include doubling and writing the matching addition equation, halving numbers and writing the subtraction equation, making arrays and skip counting to find the total, as well as practising sharing and grouping. They have also used visual strategies such as bar models to represent “groups of” in different contexts.
Year Two's Shining Bright
The Year Twos have shown amazing leadership skills and growing responsibility in the Junior School while their wonderful teacher, Miss Flynn, spent some much-needed time with her family in Ireland. They have continued to thrive in their learning and demonstrate how united and hardworking they are as a cohort. Their success has been supported under the watchful eyes of the incredible Miss Moloney, who continues to shine with her adaptability and deep knowledge of students across the school. The students have been in the safest, most enthusiastic, and knowledgeable hands, for which we are very grateful.
Quanto è bello imparare!
Each week, it is a joy to see and hear the dedication of Maestra, who has injected a love of Italian into our Sacred Heart community. Her enthusiasm and genuine passion for teaching Italian have made the weekly specialist lessons a highlight of many students’ weeks. Below, you will find an amazing resource shared by Maestra to help bring the passion for Italian into your home. This resource is filled with engaging, interactive tasks and printable worksheets that introduce, reinforce, and recycle vocabulary.
The activities are self-paced, self-correcting, and help students practise listening, speaking, reading, and writing, all for free, with no logins or registration required! It also includes online vocabulary flashcards and songs.
It is always a joy when the Junior School finds time to bring all year levels together to support cross-level relationships and foster stronger connections and identity within our community. Last Friday’s class sport was a perfect example of this, with the hall filled with cheer, laughter, and a zest for dance as all students in the Junior School ‘Just Danced’ their hearts out alongside their teachers, who were eager to join in the fun.
Glitz
Last week saw the first session of ‘Glitz’ underway in the Junior School, a program focused on developing and strengthening gross and fine motor skills through gymnastics-based activities.
These included tumble turns, forward rolls, bar work, and jumping and landing with control, just to name a few, along with fun games like statue tag and crab crawling. It was wonderful to see students of all abilities take on the challenge and achieve new tricks and skills.
We will certainly need to keep an eye on these new moves and ambitions in the school yard! We cannot wait to see their strength and confidence grow over the next four sessions.
Our Junior School students had a fantastic time during a special karate session this week! They learned some basic moves, practiced focus and discipline and discovered just how fun a good kiai! can be.
Sophie Prosser
Junior Leader
hwood@shsandringham.catholic.edu.au
bmaloney@shsandringham.catholic.edu.au
sprosser@shsandringham.catholic.edu.au
comeara@shs.catholic.edu.au kflynn@shsandringham.catholic.edu.au