Director of Primary
It has certainly been an unusual term, one that has felt incredibly long and challenging.
As we take the time to reflect on the past ten weeks, our Learning@Home experience and the transition back to school, many positives can be identified. The strong partnership between home and school cannot be underestimated nor students’ enhanced resilience, independence and self-advocacy. In fact, teachers have continued to implement features of the Learning@Home platform including Google classrooms during the past few weeks.
A snap shot of the past fortnight highlights the diversity of learning opportunities enjoyed by the students which they will share at Friday’s Kindergarten to Year 6 Assembly. The Kinder children have re-embraced their friendships in recent weeks and have fully participated in the many and varied learning opportunities.
Long Day Care
In Long Day Care we have enjoyed meeting our new friend Emma. She has become a big part of our community. We look forward to getting to know her bubbly sense of humour! Over the past few weeks the children have enjoyed playing in our police station, learning about bugs and looking for them in the garden, building castles and a construction site with cardboard boxes. We are excited for what Term 3 might bring!
Year 1
In Year 1 the students have continued to enhance their Literacy and Numeracy skills. In Religion they have deepened their understanding about Mary, Jesus’ mother. Our History unit has focused on looking at schools through time. We have set our home corner up as an old style classroom. The students are very interested in learning about their parents and grandparents' time in school and comparing it to their own.
Year 3
Over the last two weeks Year 3 have been seeking answers to their guiding question of ‘How are places similar and different?’ Part of this investigation involved researching the 5 climate zones in Australia and the implications of living in those climate zones. An interesting two week homework task involved constructing a house that would show adaptations to the climate zone in which it would be built.
Year 4
The Year 4 students unit of work, May the Force Be With You, concludes this Friday with students constructing and launching rockets. Not only will this be an opportunity to investigate the forces in action but to trial different angles when launching the rockets. During the past ten weeks the students have addressed a number of questions:
- What are the effects of different forces in our lives?
- What are the types of forces we encounter every day?
- How does the size of a force affect the movement of an object?
In addition, the Year 4 students have thoroughly enjoyed creating bird collages, a wonderful way to celebrate the end of our integrated unit - What's Wonderful about Birds?
Year 6 Navy and Year 6 White
Over the past two weeks, Year 6 students have worked together to complete an Integrated Unit on the theme of Sustainability, entitled ‘Build for Your Life!’ Throughout the process, the students have delivered well-researched oral presentations about a significant person who has or is promoting sustainable living. They have also used their knowledge of sustainability, climate science, renewable energy, and recycling/making, as well as a range of creative apps, to design houses and community spaces for an Eco-Village. In between all of that, both Year 6 classes listened to fabulous advice from Caroline Jager on how to market their designs and yesterday pitched their completed designs to an audience of their Year 6 peers and teachers. The pitches allowed the groups to bring together all their sustainability ideas and ‘sell’ their village’s ability to promote “the good life.” We most certainly have some budding architects with an eye for sustainable living in our midst.
I hope that the next two weeks will be an opportunity to rest and re-energise in readiness for the commencement of Term 3 on Monday, July 20. I encourage the students to put away their devices and enjoy spending time with family and friends, enjoying various activities and relaxing.
Caroline WIlson-Haffenden
Director of Primary