Term 3 Week 3

Hello,

We hope you have all had a relaxing weekend.

Thank you for all of your efforts last week as we got home learning up and running again. We are delighted with how well the Preps have settled back in. We will be encouraging them to be as independent as possible this time around. We would hope that they would be managing Seesaw themselves. It would be great if rather than you clicking/tapping that you were prompting them to so that they can reach a point where they don't need you to tell them.

The Google Meets will commence at 11:30am from now on as this ensures that the students onsite do not miss out on the opportunity to connect with their teacher and class.

We will still be celebrating the 100 days of Prep, it will just take on a different format. We are finalising details at present and will communicate with you via Compass once our plans are complete.

As always, please don't hesitate to be in touch if there is anything that we can do to be of assistance.

Codes

As you know we have been using the Write to Read word study programme in literacy. We have been using flashcards daily to expose students to phonic codes. This week we will introduce the codes oy (like boy) and oi (like coin). oi is said as 'oi never' because it is never at the end of an English word. These codes make the same sound but have different letters. In addition to the codes, we have been using the reading and spelling tools process as a strategy to support reading and writing words.

W2R Reading tools – As part of our write to read programme students use the ‘Reading Tools’ strategy to decode words when they are reading. This four step strategy can be applied to whichever level your child is at with their reading.

The four steps include:

Code spot – This is where you look for codes in the word.

Rule check – This is where you check if any of the codes you have spotted have a rule. We haven’t learnt many rules yet, we will continue to work on this later on in the year.

Blender – This is where you blend the codes together.

Final check – This is where you check if the word make sense and you try to put it in a sentence or picture it in your head.

W2R Spelling tools – Spelling tools is a strategy students use when attempting to spell words and learn spelling rules. This is also a four step strategy.

The four steps include:

Sound check/chunk sounds – What sounds can you hear in the word?

Code match – What codes do you know make those sounds?

Rule check – Do any of those codes have a rule e.g. qu are always together.

Final check – This is where we use our reading tools to help us to read the word we have written.

Literacy

Learning to write is challenging and it’s a sophisticated skill. Many students feel reluctant to write because it’s hard and they don’t like making mistakes. Last week we focused on mistakes being OK, in fact it means they are challenging themselves. We encourage students to put a cross or line on their mistakes rather that rubbing out the mistake. Students noticing their mistakes is fantastic, that means they are aware of what sound, punctuation etc. needed to be written. Teachers love to see the mistakes being self-corrected, as this shows us they are developing editing skills, which is part of the writing process. If students rub out their work we can’t see this editing process taking place.

Many parents have asked if we want the writing to be marked and if so how do we mark writing. If you are able to mark the writing that is great, but we understand many of you are very time poor so we understand this might not be possible.

How to mark the writing – We have put together a video on how to mark students writing so you can see in detail how this is done. You will find this video in Seesaw on Monday. You can also message your child’s teacher to discuss this, if needed.

This week for literacy we will also be continuing to focus on syllables, having our Preps practise counting how many syllables are in different words. There will be a continued focus on the codes, as discussed in the codes section this week is oi/oy.

Don’t forget each week there are three writing tasks in the choice board. We encourage students to have a go at these tasks and send a photo of their writing piece to their teacher.

Numeracy

This week we are continuing to build on concepts introduced last week. Children will be creating a tally chart, bar graph and answering questions, this time looking at materials used in different homes around the world. We will also be consolidating knowledge of ordering numbers. This week children will use games to keep practicing their knowledge of the order of numbers, with an emphasis on the order of numbers that are non-sequential. Some children may need to use concrete materials to work out number order and this is an important step in learning the value different numbers have. Many household objects such as pegs, marbles or even pieces of Lego can be used to help children establish concepts.

Unit of Inquiry

The questions that the Preps provided last week were really interesting ones. You will have seen the progression from the beginning of home learning last time when we were working on the difference between a question and a statement, to them asking questions that they often knew the answers to and now where the questions being asked are more open, relevant and come from a genuine curiosity.

This week we will be inquiring into a range of different homes from around the world. This will provide the students with a knowledge base so they can work on the concept of similarities and differences.

If your family has lived in or visited a different kind of home and your child would like to share a photo with the rest of Prep could you please email me the photo with a small explanation at Julie.Daniel@education.vic.gov.au I would love to include some each day.

Well being

This Thursday is International Day of Friendship. Your child is going to have the opportunity to record a message to their class reminding them what it is that they like about their class mates. The focus will be on the class as a whole rather than individual children. We don't want some children getting messages and not others. These will be made into a movie for each class.

On this day your child might like to reach out to any friends they are missing and send them an email or video chat with them.

The Prep team

0A - Kathryn Morrison

kathryn.morrison@education.vic.gov.au

0B - Deb Barden

deborah.barden@education.vic.gov.au

0C - Danielle Palombi

danielle.palombi@education.vic.gov.au

0D - Julie Daniel

julie.daniel@education.vic.gov.au

HU - Krystle Horadam

krystle.horadam@education.vic.gov.au

Prep Fortnightly Snapshot

Issue 11 · 26 Jul 2020

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