Classroom connections
We hope that by showcasing the learning from each year level in this section of our newsletter, we give you, our HEPS community insight into the amazing things that happen in our classrooms on a regular basis. Please enjoy a snapshot of our wonderful learning from the last fortnight.
Foundation
In Numeracy, students have been learning about 2D and 3D shapes. They have been exploring their properties and seeing how many sides and corners shapes have. Students created a ‘shape robot’ and then counted the shapes their robot contained!
In Literacy, students have been busy learning their digraph sounds and recognising them in words they read. We also have been using ‘Lucy Lightbulb’ to help us to determine if we are understanding what we are reading and rereading if it doesn’t make sense. When writing, students have been saying the word or sentence they wish to write and then writing the sounds/digraph that they can hear.
Students love seeing their buddies each week and recently did a guided drawing with them. The Legoland excursion was a lot of fun and students had a great time exploring Legoland, building, playing and completing their season-based Lego workshop!
Level 1
An epic week in 1RK
Over the last week, we have been doing lots of amazing learning! We have loved being able to explore a range of classroom activities. Have a look at our outstanding work!
We have been learning about the /a_e/ sound and writing verbs in the correct tense in a sentence. We have been able to identify these through our amazing brainstorming.
In Numeracy, we have been learning how to tell the time of o’clock, half past, quarter past and quarter to. We have been expanding on our understanding of addition equations through partner work.
In Literacy, we have been reading non-fiction texts. We have been learning about the appearance, diet, habitat and interesting facts of different animals. During our writing lessons, we have been completing information reports about the animals we have read about.
Level 2
Literacy and Inquiry
This term, Grade 2 students have been heavily immersed in all things ‘water’! As we wrap up our unit of inquiry, students have been practising a range of literacy skills to research and write about a water-related animal of interest. Students have been developing their digital technology skills, and synthesising their knowledge of various sea animals’ diet, appearance, and habitat. They have had a tonne of fun recording their facts in an information report and creating a triorama to present their animal. Level 2 are excited and looking forward to sharing these trioramas with parents and carers during our expo in Week 9 (Monday 19th June, from 3 pm).
Numeracy
In the past few weeks, Level 2 students have been consolidating their addition skills and exploring inverse subtraction skills. We have been especially focused on using ‘Number Talks’ to develop speaking and listening skills in Maths. During ‘Number Talks’ students are given an open-ended prompt, and heavily encouraged to explain, reason, and justify their thinking and problem-solving skills. There is a big emphasis on the process rather than the correct answer. Grade 2 students have shown lots of growth in being able to articulate their strategies, and have enjoyed learning that everyone is unique in their thinking!
Creek Excursion
On Tuesday the 13th of June, Level 2 participated in an excursion to Dandenong Creek at HE Parker Reserve. Students had heaps of fun exploring the creek side and applying their understandings of water from our unit of Inquiry. We investigated water bugs in the creek, looked for litter along the bank, and used engineering skills to make nature boats that could float on the water. Thank you very much to all of the education support staff and parent helpers who came along and helped make our excursion such a success!
Level 3
During our reading sessions, 3MW students have been learning how to identify facts and opinions. Facts are statements about something that can be observed, measured and proven true or false. Opinions are a personal view or judgement about something, not always based on fact or knowledge. They are not right or wrong - just different! Students voiced their opinions using ‘I believe…’, ‘I think…’ and ‘I prefer…because…’. We have sorted, identified, coloured, exercised to our choices and written our own facts and opinions. Opinions are like belly buttons – everybody has one!
Our writing genre is adventure narratives – stories written to entertain the reader. We have been using ‘Bold Beginnings’ to hook the reader, ‘Mighty Middles’ to introduce the plot or problem and ‘Excellent Endings’ where the problem is solved and satisfies the reader. Students have been using their ARMS and CUPS to improve editing and revising skills. They have also focused on paragraphing - starting a new paragraph when something changes using TiP-ToP (Time, Place, Topic, Person). At present we are busy typing our edited work ready to publish soon.
Numeracy has continued with subtraction and problem solving. Students have been working hard to use the most efficient subtraction strategies that help solve the equation. Inspired by our class novel about the explorer Ludwig Leichhardt, students were asked to pack their donkey with 30000gms /30kgs of equipment for their own expedition. We had a lot of discussion, planning, reasoning and bargaining!
National Best Friends Day – 8th June
We celebrated National Friends Day with an afternoon of arty activities. Our directed drawing of 2 friends turned out differently for each student, reinforcing that friends do come in all shapes and sizes! Next was our friendship flower. Each petal included a phrase that finished the sentence starter “A good friend is …” and offered ways to be a good friend. Examples include being kind, helpful, respectful, honest, fair, sharing, caring and inclusive. We even used our mini pictures from the first week of school this year to embellish the display!
Finally, I was lucky enough to score a sneak peak of the students on their ukuleles during Performing Arts this week. The sound was sensational, considering they have only had a few lessons.
Level 4
Recently in 4TO, we have been learning new concepts, as well as reviewing some of our previous learning. There have been several hands-on and active activities to keep us engaged. We have had a busy term with camp, multi-age days and other events. It has been great to see the students developing their relationships as the year goes on.
Reading
Recently in Reading, we have been revisiting text connections, where we made links with texts by thinking about our own lives, other texts we have read before and the world. We also focused on visualising characters, settings and details in a text. We did this by listening to and reading stories, whilst making a mental image. This helped us to further develop our understanding.
Writing
In Writing, we have begun researching our chosen topic for information reports. Students had the agency to choose a person, place or thing to research. This has helped students develop their researching and digital technology skills. We have also been working on recognising which websites and resources are reliable ones to gather information from. We are beginning to draft our reports, before finishing off the term publishing them.
Numeracy
In Numeracy, we have been learning about symmetry and transformations. We spent a few lessons designing and making our own coaster to explore these concepts. We even got to take them home! As of this week, we are starting to revisit addition and subtraction, focusing on mastering the vertical addition and subtraction strategy.
Level 5
Inquiry
HISTORY FUN is continuing in 5YS!
After creating wonderful dioramas and capturing time from Australian history in this project as part of our Inquiry topic, ‘Museums in Motion’, our students will make a presentation about influential people in Australian History.
All students chose a person who significantly impacted our history, researched and created a presentation. They can dress up as that person for their presentation next week.
Writing
Our writing focus is poetry; we explored the various poems and their main parts. Students are excited to create their own amazing masterpieces as they discover more about poetry.
Reading
Students analysed the text structures and language features used in various non-fiction texts. They identified the different types of non-fiction texts as part of analysing them. Students gathered the information and created their own anchor chart.
They also learned to analyse and think critically about the author’s purpose and perspective in non-fiction texts.
Maths
Students spent two weeks on the ‘Measurement and Geometry’ unit, practising how to calculate area and perimeter and convert measurement units; they used many skills, such as identifying the correct unit, multiplication and division as part of this unit. Students explored real-life Maths problems to develop their knowledge.
Level 6
6JL
Interschool Sport Gala Day
We had so much fun representing HEPS at the Winter Interschool Sport Gala Day. We were able to play a range of different sports on the day- AFL, Softball, Netball, Touch Footy, Soccer and Lawn Bowls. During the day we played different schools, and we will have our final round in week 1 of Term 3! Our school showed fantastic teamwork and sportsmanship skills. Our sports leader Lily Young said “I enjoyed playing against other schools with my besties!” about her Netball day!
Numeracy
6JL have been enjoying learning about a new topic in Numeracy over the last few weeks- Cartesian Planes! We have enjoyed plotting coordinates on a Cartesian Plane. Some students even looked at creating a Cartesian Plane using a Z axis! We drew pictures and lead our peers to copy these pictures with instructions using coordinates! The mathematical genius Harper Rogers said “I thought it was hard at first, but once I got the hang of it was really fun and easy!”
Inquiry
In Level 6 this term we have been looking at people and events that have helped shape Australia. We have researched events like The First Fleet, Eureka Stockade, Blue Mountain Crossing and Batman’s Treaty. We have been researching what life would have been like for us across different decades. Our Inquiry project this Term is to create a “Museum in Motion.” We have made groups of 2 or worked independently to create a diorama depicting an important event. We have also added a voice memo to go with our dioramas and posters of key people that have influenced this event! The wonderful Twisha said “It was interesting to learn about what life was like years ago and it was so fun to work together.”
We will be showcasing our wonderful work for our parents and special friends Tuesday the 20th of June from 2:15pm-3:15pm. We look forward to seeing you then.