YEAR 1

How wonderful to have had the Yr 1 children engaging in face-to-face lessons again over the last fortnight! We've got our little class community back again inside of the bigger school community and the children are so happy to be spending time learning and playing together. In Religion this term we are studying the unit, 'Values'. We've learnt about The Ten Commandments that were passed down from God to the Israelites, through Moses. They were God's special laws that taught the Israelites how God wished for them to live. We're also focusing on the good and bad choices that we make in our lives. We know that we grow closer to God and to others when we listen to our conscience and strive to make good choices. 

In English we are sharing stories that feature Australian flora, fauna, language and culture. We've already covered language activities related to 'Wombat Stew' by Marcia Vaughan and 'Blossom Possum' by Gina Newton. We are currently assessing the children on their sight words and reading so as to re-establish our daily reading groups and rotation of writing/spelling activities as soon as possible. 

In Maths this week we are using hands-on materials to demonstrate how to create 'groups of'. We placed equal groups of blocks on paper plates to show a variety of simple multiplication number sentences. We've also been drawing pictures on our mini whiteboards to help us solve related problems. 

In Visual Arts last week we started some 'Possum' artwork to link in with our reading of 'Blossom Possum'. We look forward to putting the finishing touches on our possums next week! 

 

Last Wednesday was a wonderful day having Year 2 back. The children have really missed their friends and being able to discuss different topics. I would like to take this opportunity to thank all Year 2 parents for the time and effort they have all put into helping their children through this difficult time. I have seen some wonderful work over the last few weeks. CONGRATULATIONS! YOU ARE ALL DOING A FABULOUS JOB. I would like to share some prayers that the students wrote. Our focus over the last few weeks in Religion has been Communities.

In music Mrs Gallagher asked the children to create their own musical instrument. The following photos are a few of the wonderful creations.

In Religion over the past two weeks, Yr 3 has been learning about the various groups that existed in Israel in the time of Jesus. Some of the groups Yr 3 has read about are: Pharisees, Sadducees, Levites, Zealots, Essenes, Men and Women. In Maths, the class has extended work for another week on addition and subtraction. This week Yr 3 has revised the ‘friends of 10’ and looked at the connection between addition and subtraction. Students have also focused on learning the multiplication tables – x2, x5, x10. In English, Yr 3 is reading the novel ‘The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane’ by Kate Di Camillo. After reading some chapters, the students complete activities relating to information they have read. In Science, Yr 3 join with Yr 4 every Friday to learn about ‘energy sources’. Over the last 2 lessons, the students have learnt about ‘heat’ and ‘light’ as sources of energy. Some great group work and discussions have made learning very successful. In Art, Year 3 has looked at various artworks of mythical creatures, particularly by Chinese artists, and have discussed the detail that is evident in each work. The students have also created their own image of a dragon, focusing on detail and colour.

How wonderful it has been coming back to school and seeing each other after such a long separation in isolation!

Year 4 have settled back in well and are really enjoying being back together in the classroom.

In Religion, we have been learning about The Beatitudes and gaining a deeper understanding of the messages they contain for us. It has been interesting to see how we can include those messages in our everyday lives through our actions and words.

In English, we are continuing with our novel, Charlotte’s Web by E. B. White. It is a really special story that shows how friends love and support one another, especially during difficult times. We are also developing our punctuation skills to enable more effective use in our day to day tasks. We have been focusing recently on Persuasive Writing, and we are developing a clear understanding of the structure and the types of vocabulary that add strength to our point of view.

Our focus in Maths has been 3D Objects last week, and Capacity this week. We constructed prisms and pyramids using matchsticks and playdough – it was quite challenging! We also used nets of various prisms and pyramids, as well as cone and cylinders, to make a variety of 3D objects. It was a lot of fun!                        

We used various containers to measure the capacity of smaller and larger vessels and we made our own 1 litre measuring container at home by marking levels of 100ml on the side of a clear plastic bottle. We have become clever at converting millilitres and litres through a variety of tasks.

In History, we are studying Early Exploration and last week we learnt about early explorers of Australia, including Spanish, Portuguese and Dutch explorers. We discovered that many place in our country have names that are of Dutch origin, including Cape Arnhem (Kaap Arnhem), which was the name of the ship exploring the area and the name of a city in Holland (The Netherlands). We also learnt that Torres Strait was named after a Spanish explorer named, Luis Vaz de Torres who made the first recorded navigation of the strait in 1606.

In Science we are learning about States of Matter and we have experimented to observe changing states of matter. We know about the terms: condensation, evaporation, cooling, heating, freezing and melting.

We are working very hard, as you can see, and we are finding out lots of new things every day!