Ulysses 

Welcome to The Ulysses Community Newsletter. This is the final newsletter of this delightful but productive term, nonetheless. Looking back, we teachers hope that the students have enjoyed this term as much as we did, and we hope that they have gained a wealth of knowledge throughout this trip. We had a significant number of events this term, including House Spirit Day and Book Week. Once again, we aspire to an excellent term for your children, hoping they gain as much knowledge as possible from this term.

Reading

In Reading this term, our Grade One students are developing essential comprehension strategies that help them become thoughtful and confident readers.

Mentor Texts

We are using a range of engaging mentor texts during our shared reading sessions. These books allow us to model and practise different strategies while building a love for reading stories together.

Our focus this term is on:

• Prediction – Students are encouraged to look at the title, pictures, and first few pages to make guesses about what might happen next in the story.
• Making Connections – We help students connect the story to their own lives, other books, or the world around them, so reading becomes more meaningful.
• Visualisation – Students use “mind pictures” to imagine the story as it unfolds, which makes reading more exciting and helps with understanding.
• Purpose of the Story – We talk about why an author might have written a text and what message or lesson we can take away.

Phoenix Plus

Students are also using the Phoenix Plus program, which supports the development of reading fluency and comprehension. This program is tailored to meet each child at their reading level, giving them opportunities to practise decoding, vocabulary, and understanding stories.

Together, we are building the skills that turn young readers into lifelong learners.

Writing

In writing this term, our Grade One students are exploring narrative writing. Narratives are stories with a beginning, middle, and end, and they often include characters, a setting, a problem, and a solution.

 What We’re Learning

Students are learning to:

• Plan their stories by considering who is in the story, where it takes place, and what problem or adventure unfolds.
• Add details using descriptive words to make their stories more interesting.
• Sequence events so the story makes sense from beginning to end.
• Reread and edit their writing to check for full stops, capital letters, and spaces between words.

Our students have made massive progress in narrative writing this term! They are now confidently planning and writing their own stories with a clear beginning, middle, and end. Students are using their imagination to create interesting characters, exciting settings, and problems with creative solutions. They are also adding descriptive words to make their writing come alive and checking their work carefully for punctuation and spacing

Maths

In Maths this term, our Grade One students are building skills in two exciting areas: Money and Chance & Probability

 Money

Students are learning to:

• Recognise Australian coins and notes.
• Match coins to their values.
• Use coins to make simple amounts in different ways.
• Solve everyday problems, such as “What can I buy with $1?”

We are practising these skills through hands-on activities, such as shop role-play, coin sorting, and money games, to make learning both fun and practical.

 Chance & Probability

Students are also exploring the language of chance. They are learning to describe events as

• Specific (it will happen),
• Likely (it will probably happen),
• Unlikely (it might happen, but not often), or
• Impossible (it cannot happen).

We are using dice, weather charts, and real-life examples to help students understand and talk about the likelihood of events.

A well-anticipated and celebrated aspect of the year is Book Week, where students dress up as characters from their favourite books, and we celebrate the many different characters that come to life from the careful words of our beloved Authors. Yet again, we were pleasantly surprised by the turnout at this event and are genuinely appreciative of the effort put in by the Prep community. Our community’s theme was the commemorative book named ‘Do not open this book’, a creative sequel created by an Aussie Author named Andy Lee. We hope the students have just as much fun as we teachers did. 

Reminders

• Reading Folders – Please bring reading bags every day.
• Library Day – Remember to bring library books on Tuesday..
• Drink Bottles – Bring a labelled water bottle each day.
• Excursion – Don’t forget our Werribee Zoo trip on Thursday!
• Lunch & Snacks – Please pack healthy food.
• Clothing – Label all jumpers and jackets.