Prep Community News
Hello Prep Families!
We have already made it past the halfway mark of Term 3 and the Prep team cannot believe just how much growth all our prep students have made. Prep teachers have been noticing a huge improvement of students’ levels of independence with coming in, unpacking, changing their books on their day and getting organised for the day. At the end of this week, we also celebrated Book Week! Students had so much fun attending the spectacular performance, as well as show casing their amazing costumes with their teachers and peers. Students explored a range of their favourite books and completed different activities about them!
Let’s also have a look at the learning that has been going on in prep:
Reading:
In weeks 5 & 6, students have been learning about the differences between fiction and non-fiction texts. Students have learnt that fiction books are made-up stories that usually have make-believe settings and cartoon illustrations. They have also learnt that non-fiction books are not made up and contain real facts and photos. Students have been exploring a variety of texts and sorting them based on these features. At home, you might like to ask your child the question: Is this book fiction or non-fiction? How do you know?
Writing:
In writing, students have continued with fact writing. They have been focusing on first saying their sentence out loud and then writing each word in their sentence. Students are then always encouraged to go back and check that their sentence says what they want it to say. When we’re so busy writing words it’s easy to forget/add unnecessary words into the sentence.
Students have learnt new sound rules including /ng/ and /nk/. We have also started learning about the ‘magic e’ rule where the e jumps over the consonant to help the vowel say its long vowel sound, for example, make, Pete, late.
Maths:
In week 5 we began learning about subtraction. Students have learnt a range of strategies to take a part away from a collection. Just like with our previous units taught in Maths, students have been encouraged to use a range of hands-on materials such as counters, blocks, number lines etc, to support their understanding of subtraction. To further support your child’s understanding and real-life maths connections, you could discuss subtraction concepts by counting food items before eating, and then re-counting after eating a part. For example, “We had 8 strawberries, we ate 4, how many are left now?”
Reminders/Upcoming events:
- Flying Bookworms Incursion (Monday 16th September). Consent and Payment ($7) is required and due by Sunday the 8th September through compass.
- Swimming (Check compass for dates): Consent and Payment ($65) due on Compass. In Term 4, Prep students will participate in a 5-day school Swimming Program, delivered by Bright Waves Swim School. When attending, students will be required to independently change their clothes. Between now and then, it would be a great idea to support your child to independently practice skills such as undressing, drying their body, dressing, and putting socks/shoes on so that they are ready to swim in the pool!
If you are unable or unsure of how to do this, please see the office staff for support.
Thank you so much for the ongoing support!
PLC Prep