Inquiry Centre

Curriculum

It was a jam-packed week in the Inquiry Centre, although slightly shorter than usual! Students have been continuing to use their perseverance and love of learning in everything they do.

What makes for a great reader? How do we build on our understanding of texts? Why do we learn these reading strategies? All of these are fantastic questions that we are always considering in the classroom but especially this week as we have been learning about the skill of questioning. Students learnt about thin questions (where the answer is directly in the text) and thick questions (where we need to think and search) and have practised applying this strategy in our Reading Rotations. Over the coming weeks, you’ll see a Seesaw task where your child has demonstrated their questioning skills!

In Writing, students have been working on using “Show not Tell.” This is when we use our five senses to describe a character, setting or event in our work to help engage the reader. It’s a great opportunity to develop our wow words and phrases, with some students having a go at using new adjectives while others challenged themselves to use some similes. This was particularly evident in our Big Write about the MPRPS Circus… you may have even seen the video prompt on Seesaw of Mrs Streitberger dancing with a giraffe! A highlight was students collaborating with their peers to edit and uplevel their writing using checklists. It was fantastic to hear their rich learning conversations and seeing their teamwork! We will continue to share writing Home Talk approximately every 3 weeks on Seesaw and encourage families to leave a voice or written comment after briefly discussing the prompt. Please contact your classroom teacher if you have any problems accessing your child’s Seesaw.

Throughout Maths this week, our focus has been on measuring time by investigating days, weeks and months. A highlight was trying to put together a calendar jigsaw where the months had been all scrambled up and the names of each month had also disappeared. Students used their problem solving and teamwork skills to put the calendar back together and name each month. There was fantastic discussion about the order of months, the number of days in each month and how the days of the week connect in with this. It was trickier than it sounds! We also explored the First Nations calendar and the different seasons and weather conditions that are included.

We are always noticing different character strengths in ourselves and others, as well as learning about how we can use our strengths more often. In Wellbeing this week, we considered the character strength of kindness and discussed what this means, what it can look like and what it means to be a good friend. This is a great topic of conversation at home to discuss the different acts of kindness we can show with our family!

Finally, in Guided Inquiry, students have continued working on their end of term project about their identity as they consider what it means to grow older and wiser. We are looking forward to sharing the finished product at our Family Showcase on Wednesday 6th of April 2.45pm for those who can make it. More details to come next week! Students have been reflecting on things that they could do as a baby compared to what they can do now as part of our understanding of how we change over time. It was pretty funny for students to imagine their teachers being babies! This week, keep your eye out for a Seesaw post asking families to share where they are from as we are going to discuss our culture and background for the next stage of the project.

We hope you had a wonderful long weekend!

Miss Glen, Mrs Martin, Miss Molloy, Mrs Seadon, Mr Shaw, Mrs Sutherland and Mrs Tang

Student Voice

Abby N - "I liked doing our Wellbeing lesson because I made a card for my friend."
Linus T - "The calendar puzzle was tricky to solve with my partner!"
Zoe D - "I loved Literacy because it was fun using the iPads."
Jarrod L - "I enjoyed doing all of our specialist subjects."

Reminders

Seesaw Family Access Codes have been sent home and we always welcome comments on student work celebrating your child’s successes!
Students should bring and keep labelled headphones to use while at school
Please bring a labelled drink bottle every day
Easter Hat Parade on Friday 8th March - Students can decorate an Easter Hat. The award categories will be announced in coming weeks

Pupil of the Week

1/2ET: Isaac D -

Well done for demonstrating perseverance when writing our ‘MPRPS Circus’ Big Write. You challenged yourself to include adjectives and descriptive language to entice the reader. Keep up the awesome work Isaac!

1/2G: Pil Y -

For using your editing skills to review and uplevel your Big Write about the MPRPS Circus. It was great to see you using your love of learning and honesty to build your writing skills. Keep up the great work!

1/2K: Harrison C -

For demonstrating a love of learning when you were creating your Big Write. You used adjectives and similes to add detail to your work. Impressive Harry!

1/2M: Vespa P -

For demonstrating kindness and creativity when discussing ideas during Circle Time. You really thought about how people feel when they don’t have someone to play with at lunch and came up with a fantastic strategy to share with the class. Wonderful sharing, Vespa.

1/2SS: Jane W -

For always showing a love of learning and kindness in our class. You display a positive attitude towards learning tasks and help others when needed. Well done on all your hard work Jane!