What's happening in our learning spaces? 

Students of the Week

Foundation Year

We would like to welcome back the Foundation AM and Foundation LW students after what has been a very challenging week. We are so proud of the way they enthusiastically engaged in remote learning for the first time, after only nine half days at school, before returning back to on-site learning for their first two FULL days at school! A big thank you to all the parents and carers for their support, and for taking the time to engage in parent teacher conversations with us to help us find out more about your child. 

As inquirers, we are finding out how to be good collaborators and self-managers as we play and learn with others. We engaged in short literacy and numeracy rotations with a partner while other students engaged in a small group with the teacher. We discovered that these are called independent learning opportunities and focus groups. As self-managers, we demonstrated responsibility as we engaged in our independent learning tasks. We listened to and followed instructions, stayed focused on our learning and maintained a respectful noise level. As collaborators, we shared materials with our partners, took turns and listened to their ideas. 

As readers, we are continuing to read different big books and picture story books. As thinkers, we are listening for and identifying rhyming words, and pointing to each word as we read. We are also continuing to identify the sight words  ‘can, ‘see’, ‘the’, ‘me’, ‘went’ and ‘I’ in different texts, and initial sounds such as /s/. This week we will also focus on the /b/ sound. When engaging in reading with your child at home, ask them to look for these words in the text and listen for these sounds. 

As curious learners, we are taking the time to pick information texts that we are interested in, to find out more about some of our interests, including dinosaurs, planets and the human body. We will now take home a fiction and a non-fiction text each week to read as part of our home learning. 

As mathematicians, we have been collaborating with our peers to order and compare numbers from 0 to 10, and match numerals with words and pictures. Some of us were confident and courageous as we took on the challenge of ordering the numbers 10 to 20. This week, as thinkers, we will be focusing on identifying before and after numbers and will begin to tune in to patterns by looking for them in the environment around us. 

We look forward to another week full of amazing learning opportunities!

Alycia Marsico & Leanne Wenckowski

Foundation Team

Year 1/2

This week, our learning started off a little different! We began our week in a lockdown meaning that we had to do our learning from home. We were resilient and persistent and attended our Google Meets with enthusiasm and positivity. As communicators, we spoke to our teachers and our friends about our thinking and our feelings. We self-managed our learning by making sure we did our best to do some each day! On Thursday, we were permitted to return back to school. We were very excited to see our friends again and get back into our learning spaces!

In Literacy this week, we have been investigating verbs and adjectives as well as noticing and incorporating them in our writing. We have been making sure to use lots of new and interesting words in our writing!

During Numeracy, we have been learning how to use data from a table to put into graphs. We have also been practicing our counting, doubles and expanding numbers. 

In Inquiry, we have been learning about the difference between human made and natural things in our world. As curious investigators, we went outside to provoke some ideas as to what may be human made and what may be natural. We posed very thoughtful questions and had valuable learning conversations with our friends and teachers.

In Religion, we have been unpacking the significance of Lent and of Ash Wednesday. We always make sure to confidently communicate our ideas and reflect on our new knowledge. We look forward to continuing our learning of Lent during the week. 

We love learning here in 1/2 and can't wait for the week ahead!

Year 1/2 Team

Stefanie Carriera, Maria Delaney & Belinda Fillipone

Year 3/4

This week at school was a short one due to the lockdown. The Year 3 /4 teachers would like to take this opportunity to thank all of the students for their positivity during their short stay at home for remote learning. We would also like to thank the parents who continue to support their children during these challenging times. 

Back at school, the students continued to work on the concepts of place value and number sense in Mathematics. 

In Literacy, we continue to explore the concept of inference when reading and listening to text. The students have been encouraged to think about and consistently ask themselves how and why things happen in text. The students had the opportunity to share their Animal Town stories which they began writing at home. Some of these stories were shared and the students will have the opportunity to edit them and then publish them.

In Religious Education, the students continue to develop their knowledge and understanding of Lent. We have given out Project Compassion boxes and encourage the students to give to others if they can. The students will read and discuss scripture in the coming weeks that displays how Jesus gave and prayed with others. 

We continued to explore our country Australia in Inquiry. We have focussed on the states, territories and capital cities. We will further think about why people live where they live in Australia. What was it that encouraged early settlers to build cities where they did and why do we continue to live where we do.

The specialist classes are in full swing with STEM, Visual Arts, PE and Italian now running weekly. The students have enthusiastically participated in these classes with many sharing their learning with their classroom teachers. The feedback from the specialist teachers regarding the Year 3/4 students’ efforts and participation has been very positive.

Finally a big thank you to all the parents and carers who were able to join the parent/teacher conversations on Wednesday. These conversations are important in sharing information so we as teachers can support your children as best we can.

Have a great week.

Mark MacGregor, Graham Troy and Katarina Davidson.

Year 5/6

What an eventful week it has been for the 5/6 students!  We are very proud of our students for the way they conducted themselves throughout remote learning, showing their excellent self management skills. The students and teachers were very excited on Thursday to be back in the classroom and learning together again! 

In Literacy, the students have continued their efforts in developing the skills of visualising and inferring when reading texts and viewing images. The students are also in the process of developing interesting and engaging narratives that are based on the theme “Lost”. The students have been exploring different ways they can describe characters and settings in their writing. 

In Numeracy, the students are learning to record and describe large numbers and decimals. In Location, they are learning to use scales on maps to calculate distance and have also begun exploring the compass and the compass rose.

In Religion, students have been preparing for the season of Lent and investigating the meaning of Ash Wednesday. 

In Inquiry, the students have been researching the countries that produce the most and least waste in the world. They are learning about where waste comes from and where it ends up when we are finished with it! It is fantastic to see the students working collaboratively in small groups to conduct their investigations. 

The Year 5/6 students are also eagerly preparing for their first round of interschool sports this coming week. They have been practising hard and are demonstrating excellent teamwork through their encouragement of one another. 

Congratulations to the students in 5/6VC for leading our whole school assembly last week. They did a terrific job! The 5/6 teachers would also like to thank all the parents and carers for their time and support during our parent-teacher conversations last week. 

Have a wonderful week!

Michelle Casamento, Tania Fragopoulos, Viviana Clarke & Olivia Sargent

Year 5/6 teachers.