Learning Updates -
School of Wonder
Skills transferred from PE to the athletics track
The Physical Education program has focused on athletics this term and children have had the opportunity to build their running, throwing and jumping skills in preparation for the St Anne's College Athletics Carnival. The skills were on display yesterday, along with sportsmanship, determination, perseverance and willingness to try new experiences. The children are to be congratulated for the manner in which they encouraged each other and participated. Thank you to Ellie Phillips for preparing the children in PE lessons and for the many hours spent planning and organising the School of Wonder activities.
Explicit teaching around Resilience, Rights and Respectful Relationships (RRRR) is regularly programmed, and at the moment the Years 1 and 2 children are focusing on helping others and describing actions that make them feel proud. One of the learning experiences has involved playing a game called The Life Raft, and children reflected on what was done to help during the game, what happened if no one offered to help, and where helping skills can be used in life situations. The texts Koala Lou by Mem Fox and Olympig by Victoria Jamieson promoted discussion around persistence, positive self-talk and growth mindset and the relationship they have to being a self-manager. The RRRR program links well with our School-Wide Positive Behaviour Support framework, Religious Education and school expectations.
I was able to hear some of our Foundation children read this week and it is was terrific to see the progress and the transfer of explicit teaching by Foundation Learning Mentors Ros Heathman and Jasmin Buha. The children were able to quickly recall high-frequency words, use punctuation to stop at the end of a sentence, point to words accurately having one to one matching and recognise the initial letter of a word to assist in problem solving. It is expected that children read their take-home reader each school day. This can look different for each child. Some children can read the story independently, some benefit from an adult reading the story first and others benefit from hearing the book read to them while the adult points to the words. Emphasis is on making learning to read enjoyable and providing support when needed. Learning conversations are in week 8 and this is an opportunity for your child to share their learning and to set goals to work towards. When learning conversation bookings open on PAM, please ensure you make an appointment as this is part of our reporting process.
- Laurel Baxter-Butts, School of Wonder Leader
Olympic feats, food and film the focus in Italian
Recently children have been focusing on le Olimpiadi - the Olympics, and cultural concepts from the film Luca such as il cibo - food, and different types of pasta e formaggio - pasta and cheese.
The children have completed a variety of tasks related to food, such as drawing their favourite food, recording themselves saying mi piace - I likeand non mi piace - I don't like,about different Italian foods and completing matching activities about different types of formaggi and pasta. Foundation children have also learnt the song 'man, man, mangia' - eat, and have used craft resources to make their own props - gelato, pasta and pizza to use when singing the song.
Le Olimpiadi created quite a buzz too, and children looked at and compared the medal tallies for Italy and Australia and counted the medals in Italian. They also created their own torches and designed their own Olympic kits and medals.
The highlight of the past couple of weeks was students creating their own traditional Italian or Australian triathlon using the film Luca as a starting point. In the film they compete for the Portorosso Cup which involves swimming, eating pasta and bike riding. The children needed to include two physical activities, a traditional Italian or Australian food to eat and create their own name for the cup. Their responses were very creative with some very unique activities such as eating fairy bread, doing cartwheels, eating Vegemite straight from a jar, a dance-off etc. It was very difficult to choose the most creative and unique responses and the children who came up with those were awarded a trophy and chocolate coin.
The children's efforts during distance learning and adapting to being back at school continue to amaze me, as well as their constant enthusiasm for learning another language. Also grazie mille to all the parents and carers for your amazing help with their Italian activities while at home. Smooth transitions wouldn't happen without your support.
On another note . . . if you haven't seen the movie Luca yet, it's worth watching.
Silenzio Bruno!
- Linda Alampi, School of Wonder Languages Learning Mentor
Interests explored during Wonder Play
The Foundation children have been collaborating, researching, communicating and thinking during Wonder Play! We have been interested in measurement and height and are wondering who is the tallest at St Anne’s.
- Jasmin Buha, School of Wonder Learning Mentor
Green-screen fun planned for Book Week
The Book Week dress-up day on Friday, August 27, has been adapted due to COVID restrictions, but it will still be a lot of fun for our students! We won't be able to have our traditional Book Week parade, however students can dress up as their favourite book character, movie character, hero, sports star or something related to the Old Worlds, New Worlds, Other Worlds theme and have their photo taken in front of our green screen at the college. Our ICT Administrator Jamie Hatch will help bring the children's dress-up characters to life and the photos will be made into a video to share with the community. Learning Mentors will be dressing up too! Students who dress up will go into a draw for the chance to win a prize!
There are some great costume ideas at: https://www.simplifycreateinspire.com/book-week-costume-ideas/ and https://www.bountyparents.com.au/expert-advice/20-easy-book-week-costumes/
- Julie Villani, Library Technician
