Striving for more in EY4

A lot can change in a few weeks, and we congratulate the students on their resilience as we said “Goodbye” to Miss Catherine and welcomed Miss Rachel as classroom Teacher on Monday’s and Fridays. We are so grateful to have Miss Nairda as our incredible Teacher’s Aide to provide consistency with the regular routines our students thrive on. We have found that faces may change but predictable routines allow students to adapt better when they know what to expect. Life is unpredictable but having some routines in our day that stay the same makes all the difference to self regulation.

This Friday we recognise our commitment to being safe, respectful learners and celebrate with a pyjama/onesie wearing day. We’ll be snuggly and warm on Friday, but we’ve had some cool starts to the mornings and recommend keeping a jumper or jacket in school bags for protection against light winds on the playground. There continues to be lots of coughs, colds and viruses around so please allow children to rest and recover at home to prevent the spread.

Patterns are our Math focus this semester and we have so much fun racing each other to make repeating patterns on paper and with all sorts of manipulatives. We really enjoy exploring all the different materials and things we can use to make the same pattern in various ways. We will continue to experiment with number and quantity for the rest of the school year. While some of us need more time on one-to-one correspondence, the alignment between number and corresponding quantity that can be represented in different ways such as numerals, tally marks and dots on a dice, others are grouping items together to make simple addition sums or taking away from a set total to explore subtraction, more and less.

Improving literacy outcomes is the whole school focus with every student receiving instruction according to their individual needs. In our class, we are beginning to recognise that 2 letters can make one sound. Each day we review our single letter sounds and investigate a new digraph each week. We have investigated th, sh and ch. There are lots of tricky digraphs to come, but the more we see, hear and say them, the easier they become. Our small class sizes create the perfect environment for students to find their personal best way to learn to decode letters and sounds into simple words with meaning. Reading and writing looks different for everyone. Some of our students use Velcro letters, some traditional writing tools like textas and pencils and others enjoy the feel and sound of magnetic letters.

Exploring night, day and temperature changes in science allows for lots of creative freedom even when using the same materials. We love how we all had the same choice of cut out shapes to make a picture of a sunny day, yet every one is as unique as we are. This time of year is perfect for exploring temperature changes – all in the one day!

Miss Rachel and Miss Nairda are busy planning our decorated door for Bookweek. Being read to is one of our favourite past times and we can usually talk Miss Nairda into reading us a story at least twice each day, so we are very excited to see all our friends dressed up for the Bookweek parade next week. We highly recommend encouraging your child to choose a book for either a parent or older sibling to read to them each day. Children’s audio books are another way to encourage a love of literacy and there are free audio book applications available through Gympie Regional Library.

Take care of you and yours.

Until next time

Miss Jodie, Miss Rachel, Miss Nairda and students of EY4.