Welcome back to Term 2. I hope you have had a very restful and relaxing holiday and enjoyed some of this stunning weather! After an 11 week term, I'm sure the children will be ready to get back into it!
Welcome back to Xavier Hayhow who will be joining Year 1P this term. We are lucky to have you Xavier!
This term we have a focus on Mini beasts in Science, Aboriginal Culture and places of significance in our local environment in our HASS and Art units. We will also be looking at ANZAC day and how the importance of this day is recognised in our history.
We sent home a news roster last term but please see the picture below if it has gone missing!
Below is some important information about homework and some of the programs and events that we will be running in class.
Think Mentals Mental maths book
The children are very excited to be starting their Think Mentals Math book this week which was purchased at the beginning of the year.
Mental maths such as addition and subtraction, counting on, sequencing of numbers and number recognition are some of the concepts that we have covered in class. These will be reinforced in our Think Mentals book that will help your child gain confidence and apply mathematical concepts in a fun and supportive way.
In supporting our Math program in class, we would like for your child to complete one unit over a fortnightly period (5 columns of Maths question). When completing questions with your child, we would ask that you support them by reading questions if necessary and marking the questions to give your child instant feedback on how they went and writing their score at the bottom of the page.
An example of one unit
We encourage you to use a combination of visual and manipulative tools such as number lines, hundreds charts or counters to help your child complete these tasks.
Please do not spend more than 10 minutes at a time completing these activities and make it a part of your child's reading and sight word routine.
At the end of the fortnight, the books will be collected by myself and checked to make sure your child understands the concepts covered. We ask that your child does not complete more than one unit a fortnight as to ensure we can review these concepts in class if necessary.
Unit One will be due at the end of week 2 (Friday 11th May) as we have completed Day One of Unit One in class.
If you have any questions or concerns, please email me.
Mandalas
On the final day of Term 1, we worked on an inquiry task where we explored and created our own mandala designs. Did you know that the symbol of the mandala represents the universe?We created mandalas using doilies, colouring materials and loose objects that we placed on mats and trays. Many thanks to all of you for organising the children with engaging materials for them to manipulate - we had some interesting items including shells, fresh flowers, bottle tops, twigs, leaves, coloured stones, beads and gumnuts. The children had lots of fun playing with their designs and there was a great sense of calm in the classroom while they shared materials and thought carefully about their arrangements.
Here are some examples of what we created:
UR STRONG Friendology 101 JR
This is the wonderful friendship and social emotional program that we will be starting this term to support the children in helping them make better friends and strengthen and foster healthy relationships. Within the program the children may be starting to use the language of UR Strong: Friendology including: 'Friendship fire', 'Talk it out', 'Quick comebacks' and the 'Friend-o-cycle'. We will be providing some information to parents on the blog as we complete the lessons of the program.
Parent Roster
The Year 1P parent roster is outside our classroom on the bulletin board. Parent roster will start in week 3 and will run from 8.45-11.00am. I ask that you only put one name in each of the spaces and you only put your name down once as there were some parents who missed out last term.
If you have any questions please email me.
Thank you for your ongoing support
Miss Prowse
