Foundation students are buzzing in school life and are eagerly awaiting to enter the learning space each morning. The children are continuing to build upon their their social skills by navigating their ability to interact and communicate with others effectively both inside and outside the classrooms. The children are becoming more independent and are continuing to develop their sense of responsibility by taking care of their own belongings.

Students in Foundation avidly keen to participate in investigative play four mornings a week. This allows them to interact with their peers and build friendships whilst learning through exploration and discovery.

Every day the children's confidence is continuing to grow. It is pleasing to see them seek new challenges and learn by making mistakes. It's hard to believe our Foundation students have only been at school for just over half a term!

Reading

The children are now settled into their reading groups and are navigating their way through various reading activities. This term, the students are engaging in storybooks written by Pamela Allen. The selected texts are explored for one week at a time, with a different focus each day exploring the meaning, visual and structure features of the text. Engaging in the texts this way allows the children to build and develop their literacy skills as well as nurture their enjoyment for reading.

The children have been engaging in guided reading sessions along with activities that are allowing them to explore meaning, letter sounds, letter formation and sentence structures. These activities are differentiated and are purposely designed for each student, focussing on their needs in different areas when reading.

Religion

This week, Foundation children attended their very first whole school mass in acknowledgement of Ash Wednesday.

Ash Wednesday earmarks a very special date in Catholic Liturgical calendar, marking the beginning of the Lenten Season.

Lent is the 40 day period leading up to Easter that Christians use as a reflective time, and is a beautiful way to remember Jesus’ sacrifice for us. During Lent, we prepare our hearts and minds for Easter through three different pillars including fasting, prayer and almsgiving. Recently, students in Foundation explored these pillars and reflected on a personal commitment they can make to commemorate Jesus' offerings. The students traced their hands and wrote down their own personal Lenten promise, showing their commitment to recognising the spirit of Jesus in their everyday lives.

Maths

In Maths, students have been exploring location and positional language. This includes the students demonstrating an understanding of concepts including left, right, top, bottom, middle, behind, front inside, outside, near and in between. The children also worked on following and giving a series of directions to get from a start to a finish point.

The children enjoyed working with 'Bee-Bots' to program movements to get from one location to another.

Positional language is used in every day life and can be practised at home in many different scenarios. Practising these concepts, particularly left and right, at home will help children make stronger connections and applications in their daily lives.

Specialists

The children enjoyed their first week of specialists classes this week as they have been introduced to Art, Science and PE. The students were excited to share their learnings from these classes when they returned and are already asking when it is time to go back!

A gentle reminder that PE is scheduled on Thursday and all children will need to wear their sports uniform and runners on this day.

Homework

Just a reminder, it is an expectation that reading diaries are brought to school every Thursday and Homework Word Books are brought to school every Friday for teachers to review.

We also encourage your child to complete Maths tasks that have been assigned as part of Essential Maths, and reading tasks that can be accessed in Reading Eggs. Login details for both sites are located on the inside back cover of your child's reading diary.

Finally, library books may be borrowed from the library each Friday, if your child has their library bag.

Parent Helpers in the Classroom

Starting from Monday 15th March, we will be welcoming Parent Helpers into the classroom. This is an exciting opportunity for parents to be able to come into the learning space, lend a helping hand & watch the students learn and grow.

Parents who have completed the Parent Helper Workshop last year will be able to sign up to assist immediately. A note will be sent out via Skoolbag in the coming days and a hard copy will be given to your child by the end of this week.

Parents who have not yet completed the 'Parent Helper' Induction workshop will need to do so prior to helping in our learning space. Parent Helper Induction sessions will take place over the next few weeks. Please refer to the 'principals' page of the newsletter for the days and times that the induction will be conducted.

Meet the Teacher Information Sessions

We are very pleased to announce, a Zoom Information Session has been scheduled this Wednesday at 3:45 pm-4:15 for FL & FM parents. Parents will meet online as a group with their child's homeroom teacher. This will be an opportunity to meet the teacher and find out information related to what is happening in Foundation. Please note, this is not a parent teacher interview and student performance and individual students will not be discussed.

Zoom links will be sent out via Skoolbag. We look forward to seeing you all on Wednesday!

Important Dates

Monday 14/03 - Labour Day Holiday (School Closure)

Monday 14/03 - Friday 18/03 - Catholic Education Week

Tuesday 15/3 - Monday 21/3 - Harmony Week

Thursday 17/03 - St Patrick’s Day

Thursday 17/03 & Friday 18/03 - Teeth on Wheels

Week 7 & 8 Learning Intentions

Click on the attachment to find out what students will be learning in the next fortnight.

Timetable-Week 7 & 8

Click on each attachment to find out what students will be doing in the next fortnight.

Contact Details

Lorraine Uzunovski (FL) uzul@srprestonwest.catholic.edu.au

Michelle Slattery (FM) mslattery@srprestonwest.catholic.edu.au

Please note, we will respond to emails Monday to Friday, between the hours of 8am- 5pm

Student Birthdays