Grade 1/2 News

Term 1, Week 2
Welcome back to the Grade 1/2 page!

Welcome

We welcome all families to the 2026 school year! We are looking forward to what we know we will be a fun, busy and exciting year.

We trust you all found the beginning of year interviews a valuable process, just as we did. We look forward to continuing to get to know your child and family better over the next few weeks. If you have any questions or concerns at any stage throughout the year, we encourage you to get in touch with us via email or a phone. If it is something you think can be discussed quickly, you can also pop into the classroom from 8.30am, however if you think it will require more time, please let us know and we can make an appointment.

Our team and emails are as follows:

Madie Floyd: Madison.Floyd@education.vic.gov.au

Tegan Edwards: Tegan.Edwards@education.vic.gov.au

Jane Rodda: Jane.Rodda@education.vic.gov.au

Sami Craig: Samantha.Craig@education.vic.gov.au

Chris McClellan: Christopher.McClellan@education.vic.gov.au

Reminders:

Hats: As we are a proud SunSmart school, between September and April all students must be wearing a hat when playing outside. We ask that students leave their hats in the classroom at the end of each day to ensure they are at school and ready to use. Any students who do not have a hat will be asked to play in the shade in The Hub.

Drink Bottles: We encourage that, where possible, students have a labelled drink bottle filled with water each day.

Belongings: We ask that any belongings which are coming to school or things that can be taken off during the day such as jumpers, please be clearly labelled with your child's name.

Home Reading Expectations: Over the next week, students will begin bringing books home to read. We ask that families do their best to read 4 nights each week and fill in the yellow reading diary on those days. Students may read somewhere between 5 - 20 minutes. Home reading is not designed to be a difficult task and at times the readers may even seem easy which is absolutely fine. Students may bring the same books for a number of days and this is to support them to develop their fluency and expression. Library books can be used for parents to read to their child and discuss asking questions such as: Who was in the book? What happened in the story? Was there a problem that needed solving?

Please ensure that your child's reading satchel is returned to school every day, as we practise reading our readers each morning. We also use the reading satchel as a way to transport notes home, so please keep an eye out for those!

'Me in a bag': Your child should have brought home a brown paper bag to add items/pictures etc. that will give their class an insight into things they like to do. Each student will share their bag with the class next week.

Key Dates:

Monday 9th February: Please bring along your ‘Me in a Bag’ activity
Thursday 19th February: Start Up Performance in the Hub
Monday 10th March: Labour Day
Wednesday 18th March: School Photos

What we have been up to...

This week we have continued to engage in our Start Up program, where students are being reminded of our school values of Respect, Responsibility and Resilience and are working hard during class time to learn expectations and routines. There has also been lots of fun and ‘getting to know you’ activities.

It has been wonderful to see how quickly the students are adapting to their new surroundings, class and routines and we are very proud of their efforts!

Upcoming Learning

Week 3 and 4

Reading, Writing and Spelling:

Our focus texts for the next fortnight are:

Wilfrid Gordon McDonald Partridge – by Mem Fox
Molly and Mae – by Danny Parker

Students will practise using the reading strategies of predicting, comparing and contrasting and also tuning into interesting vocabulary, whilst being read these books.

Phonemes for Term 1 will include:

Week 3 - Revise short vowel sounds in CVC words e.g. dog, peg, big

💗 – back, went, with

Week 4 - Split digraphs e.g. gave

💗 – came, time, made

Week 5 – ai, ay, a_e

💗 – say, play, day

Week 6 – ee, ea, e_e

💗 – seen, tree, week, please

Week 7 – ie, y, igh

💗 – might, light, night

Week 8 – oa, o_e, ow, o

💗 – know, show, snow

Weeks 9 & 10: Revise based on student need

Mathematics: Students will continue to learn the routines that the Grade 1/2 classes follow for Mathematics, including the expectations when playing partner games. They will also continue investigating the strand of Data by exploring different ways to collect, represent and interpret data.

Topic: Our topic for the term is ‘All About Me’. During this unit, students will be developing their sense of self, family and community. Beginning with themselves and their interests, students will then learn about different families and think about who makes up their family. Students will also be able to identify people in the community who help us and places in the community which they are familiar with and visit.