Week 6 Merit Award Winners!

Congratulations to this weeks merit award winners Savannah, Alex and Saffi! These little champions have been doing some fantastic work in class and I am so proud of them! Keep it up! 

Have a great long weekend everyone!! 

Miss Prowse 

Raz Kids Flight Check

Good evening lovely parents,

I just wanted to let you know that all the children have been assigned a 'flight check'. This is a tool that assesses your child's reading by recording them while they read, which then allows myself to listen to their recordings. This does mean that the device your child reads on must have a microphone - this is more common on iPads.

I would really appreciate if this was something you are able to do by next Friday 5th of June. I am happy for this to be the reading for your child for that particular night as I wouldn't want to over load them. Encourage your child to have a practise run with a few books in the book room, but please know this is meant to be independent.

If this is not possible to do due to technological issues, please email me and I will make other arrangements.

Below is a picture of the home screen and the flight check is the space ship up the top with the astronaut.    

This picture is what your child will see before they begin reading.

It gives them 15 minutes to complete the book so if they are able to find a quiet place to read, it would be helpful.

On another note, the children seem to be loving Study Ladder and some children have been completing a lot of tasks!

Thank you for your support on all of these new technological learning tools.

Miss Prowse

It's Slippery....It's Slimy.....It's a Snail in Science!

During Science over the last couple of weeks, we have been looking closely at snails. We have observed what they look like, how they move and what they eat. Thanks to your contributions (and Zac Morrison from Year 6) the Year Ones got to observe a snail in a collaborative team of 3.

We used magnifying glasses and had an up close look at our slimy friends. Some of the children loved being able to see science in action!

Some science pictures from our snail session

Have a lovely night

Miss Prowse 

Star Citizen for Appreciation

Congratulations to Angus Carty for being nominated as this terms star citizen for Appreciation. You have really showed appreciation towards other students and adults in the school. Well done Angus!

Study ladder - An online math program from home!

Good Evening lovely Year One Parents!

I am very excited to tell you about a new online math program that the children are able to acess from home! Below is some information about this wonderful website!

Dear Parents, 

This is Some courtesy to inform you that your child's class is now using a free version of Studyladder, an online educational program which allows students to learn at their own pace.

About Studyladder

Studyladder is a K-6 web based educational program designed by teachers. The program is curriculum based and covers Mathematics, Literacy and 8 other subjects. Your child has been given a username and password which can be used to access Studyladder.

Using Studyladder

It is not compulsory for your child to use Studyladder at home, however regular access will help your child to reinforce what they have learnt in school. It will also help to build their confidence through practice.

Safe Internet usage

Studyladder is designed to prevent bullying and does not allow student access to social networking. Your child will NOT be able to chat with anyone via Studyladder. However, we encourage you to supervise your child at all times when using the Internet.

Accessing Studyladder from home

Go to 

www.studyladder.com.au 

and login using your child's school username and password.Parents have the option to sign up for a free home account which can be linked to their child's school account. Those who register will have access to their child's certificates and results. Studyladder does not charge for this service and it is optional to upgrade to premium access.

If you have any questions or require assistance, please email support@studyladder.com.au

Below are some pictures of what study ladder looks like and what your child will see on the iPad/computer. 

What your child will see on their home page. Just like Raz Kids, it allows the children to create their own avatar and customise it by earning points and then spending them in the shop. 

The task page has tasks set by me, these relate directly to what we have been learning in class and has the option later on to extend on their knowledge base. 

This picture shows what one of the activities looks like. Some tasks may be multiple choice and some tasks asks you to enter an answer. I have also assigned some videos that relate directly to the Australian curriculum which the children can watch to clarify their understanding. 

I will be handing out the children's passwords tomorrow and putting them in their reading file so feel free to have a play around with the website tomorrow night. 

Please be aware this is NOT compulsory. It is simply another way you can support your child's Nathmatical learning from home. 

Have a restful night. 

Miss Prowse 

Family camp forms

Dear parents,

Due to a busy afternoon aka snail excitement, the family camp forms only reached a few people before they rushed out the door! Please find attached the family camp form if you would like to print it out and bring it in tomorrow or alternatively grab a form first thing in the morning.

Very sorry for the delay! 

Miss Prowse

Week 4 Merit Award winners!

Congratulations to this weeks Merit Award winners - Axton, Sienna and Jack! These Year One super stars have been working their little hearts out in class! Keep up the great work everyone!

Miss Prowse

Your recyclables are needed!

Hello lovely parents,

Next week the Year Ones will be constructing a mini beast from recycled materials. We would love if you were able to bring in any recyclable materials that we could use to make our creative creatures.

 This could include:
- water bottles
- toothpaste or small boxes of similar size
- egg cartons
- bubble wrap
- coffee filters (maybe new for this one)
- plastic forks or spoons
- plastic sauce bottles
- tissue paper

Any sort of recyclable material that is smaller than a 600ml water bottle would be fantastic. We want to display them in our room so it is really important we don't have anything to big or bulky.

Thank you in advance, your support is always appreciated!

Miss Prowse

Tick tick goes the Year One Clock!

This week the Year Ones having been learning about time! First up, we did a diagnostic assessment to figure out what each person knew about time. I was astounded at how much the children already knew!

We took this information and then applied it to the big clock we put together outside....using a round parachute. The children were so clever already because they knew that the 12 went at the top of the clock and the 6 went at the bottom. Someone in the class even said that they look like they are waving to each other so we came up with the idea that 12 and 6 were friends and they stood directly opposite each other. The same went for 3 and 9 and when we had these 4 numbers, it was easy to fill in the rest! 

When we used the parachute we spoke about big hands and little hands, the children knew that the big hand was for the minutes and the little hand was for the hours. So what better way to represent this on a HUGE clock? Use tall people as minute hands and shorter people as the hour hand. 

We had a ball learning about time! 

Here is a game we have played in class which will help your kids with o'clock times. 

On Time game

(The first level is O'clock times and level 2 is a mixture of o'clock and half past times) 

Have a great night. 

Miss Prowse 

Toys or items from the past

Within our History unit, the Year One's have been learning about events and items from the past and how particular things have changed over time. In class, we watched this great BTN video about schools in the past. Have a look at how the children acted in school back in the olden days! The Year One' s were absolutely horrified at the idea of the cane!

Here is the link to the video we watched:

BTN Past Schools Video

This relates to the History Outcome of:

Differences and similarities between students' daily lives and life during their parents’ and grandparents’ childhoods, including family traditions, leisure time and communications. (ACHHK030)

We would really appreciate if you were able to bring any items that either yourself or your parents/grandparents used when they were young. This could include:

- Clothing
- Toys
- Games
- Books
- Ornaments

We would love to be able to keep these items in our classroom over the next couple of weeks but of course if the item is sentimental or of great value to you, please don't feel pressured to bring it in.

Thank you

Miss Prowse

Author's Chair Week 4

This week our star writers were Ella and Toby for our recount writing ( aka Weekend Writing). Both of these students had different writing goals and did a fantastic job of re-reading their work before reading it to the class.

Please watch the blog in the next couple of days for information about Studyladder - an Australian Curriculum Math and Literacy website which has activities children can compete from home. 

Miss Prowse 

Year One is going bug crazy!

We have had a very bug-tastic week this week in Year One! We have been learning about mini beasts in Science and on Wednesday we went on a Insect Safari! We worked in teams of 3 and in each team we had a Communications Officer (the person who communicates with the teacher), a Safari Sargent (the person who directs the team) and a Bug patrol and digger (the person who gets their hands dirty and looks in the bushes nd dirt for bugs!). We had to carefully look for insects around our school and look at the environments in which they live. Each team had  an iPad which they used to take pictures of the insects this then allowed us to come back to class and share our findings. Here are some pictures of our Safari!

As well as looking at mini beasts in Science, we have also been exploring non-fiction texts within our Literacy session. We have learnt about different text features within a non fiction text which include contents pages, titles, headings and labelled diagrams. We have read a lot of information books about mini beasts and this week we had the opportunity to create our own mini beast!

We had to use our prior knowledge of what we knew about mini beasts and create a hybrid insect that reflects our understanding of what we have read. I must say we have some very creative children in our class...I don't think I would know how to draw a mixture of a spider, a dragonfly and a beetle together! The children had to draw a labelled diagram of their mini beast which will lead into writing an information report next week. Here are some of the wild creations so far!

We will be exploring worms, snails and ants in the coming weeks so please, if you find any snails by the end of next week, I would really appreciate if you could (carefully) catch them and put them into a container just for viewing and I will make sure they get safely back into their natural environment. 

Thank you in advance!

Miss Prowse