Room 21

Welcome Back! I hope you and your family enjoyed the break and are ready for an exciting term 3.

To assist families keep up to date with their child’s learning, I have chosen to change from our class blog to the Seesaw app this term. All instructions and information will be sent home with your child tomorrow. Any questions or feedback, please send to my email.

Happy Learning

Maths

We have been very busy in maths lessons. Students designed three different paper planes. They tested all three of their paper plane designs to see which one flew the furthest. They accurately measured and recorded the distance flown by each paper plane, and then used the information to make a decision about which design to enter in the competition.

Over the last few weeks students have been completing 100m or 50m sprints. They recorded their times in a table. We used our data to learn about ordering decimals from smallest to largest. Next, we used our data to create graphs. We analysed our data and explained what the data showed and gave reasons for our times.

Students worked out the perimeter and area of a box. Next, they added windows and doors and subtracted that area from the total area. After, they decorated their “buildings” and joined them together to make a city that we have displayed outside our classroom.

Science

Last week we looked at the properties of gases. Students were presented with two challenges.

Challenge 1

Place a tissue into the cup and then place the cup in the water upside down. Can you keep the tissue dry using only the equipment provided and the knowledge that air takes up space?

Materials you can use:

• tissues
• plastic cup
• bucket of water

Challenge 2

Use the ruler as a balance beam to demonstrate that air has mass.

Materials you can use:

• two balloons
• a metre ruler
• string

Geography

Students developed an inquiry question about their environment. Last week they researched what their impact is on the environment and what we do to make a difference. Next week they will focus on taking action. They will be presenting their ideas and research in multiple ways.

Assembly

Our class is hosting a whole school assembly this Friday at 12.15pm. It would be great to see you there!

Just a friendly reminder that our class is heading to the Tower Arts Centre tomorrow for an excursion between 11.30am and 2.30pm. Can you please make sure your child has a packed lunch (no lunch orders) and a drink bottle. They can bring a small bag instead of their school bag if they would like.

Thank you

Lighting up the Arts is this Thursday!

A note with essential information went home last night. Please see photo below, if you have not seen.

Thursday morning:

• Please ensure your child comes with a drink bottle and packed recess and lunch
• Can bring books or cards to keep themselves occupied tomorrow
• Students will be sent home with their LUTA green t-shirt

 

Thursday Night:

• Arrive by 6:20pm
• Make sure students wear their green LUTA t-shirt
• Students to wear dark pants. If your child is in boys or girls group black is preferable.
• Students meet in the Main Foyer (students will be shown where this space is during rehearsals)
• Parents must collect and sign their child out at the end of the night.

Looking forward to an amazing night!

 

 

Mathematics

We started our unit on measurement. We learned about ‘am’ and ‘pm’ and found it very interesting learning about different time zones. I have asked students to bring in a small box for us to use in our measurement unit next week.

Science and Literacy

Last week, students made slime. We observed the properties of our slime and explained whether we thought it was a solid, liquid or gas. Next, students created a procedural text.

This week, we did a salt density experiment. We observed and compared how objects behave when placed in fresh water and salt water. We learned that not all liquids behave the same. Salt water increases the mass of the water, making the water denser. The salt water was denser than the egg, potato and food colouring so they floated while they sunk in fresh water. Students then created a scientific report to share their findings.

Geography

In Geography, we have been learning about different environments and where they are located in the world.

Students were presented with a number of images of different environments. They wrote words or a statement about what came to their mind when they saw the images.

Nude Food Day

To help our environment we would like for you to try and bring NUDE FOODS every Wednesday. NUDE FOODS are foods without plastic wrapping so that it doesn’t have to go to land fill. As a class we came up with some ideas for what we could do on Wednesdays:

• Put our sandwich straight into our lunchbox without cling wrap
• Put our fruit in small reusable plastic containers
• Buy a larger packet of biscuits or chips and put a small portion straight into our lunch box instead of buying lots of small packets

Lighting up the Arts

Lighting up the arts is fast approaching. In class and music time we have been practising our songs and choreography in preparation for the big night. If you have not signed and returned the consent form, please do so this week.

 

Literacy: In our guided reading sessions last week, we studied the text structure and language features of procedural texts.

Maths: Last week, most overcame their fear of division, learning about the relationship between multiplication and division. Knowing our multiplication facts helps us with division as they do the reverse of each other. We learned mental and written strategies to solve division problems.

Geography: We started our geography inquiry. After fitness, we walked into our classroom to find it covered in rubbish. Students were asked the question: “How did you feel when your learning environment was trashed?”

After, in pairs we brainstormed our current ideas about what the environment provides us with. Looking forward to this week!

Science: We attended Frank’s Lab on Legs on Tuesday morning. Students worked in pairs to complete a number of experiments about gases. Groups shared their data from an experiment, creating a graph as a class. We used these results to produce a scientific report about pumping gases. Our results clearly showed that a balloon pump, pumps more air than a bike pump.

ROOM 21 TERM 2 CURRICULUM OVERVIEW

English

We will focus on the structure and language features of information reports and procedural texts, after consolidating narratives and persuasive texts.

In spelling, we will continue to focus on phonemes and graphemes identified in the THRASS program. We will use the Jolly Grammar program as a guide to assisting students to improve their grammar, sentence structure and punctuation.

Our small guided reading group rotations will continue this term which consist of partner reading using Literacy Pro, Studyladder reading activities, comprehension activities and reading activities with the teacher.

Mathematics

In mathematics, we will continue to develop understanding and reasoning using number and strategies for number fluency, especially using multiplication, division and problem solving. We will also cover financial literacy and measurement.

Science

We will be focusing on chemical science this term beginning with Frank’s Lab on Legs in week 4. Literacy in science will include procedural and scientific report writing.

Humanities and Social Sciences (HASS)

The focus in HASS this term is in the area of geography. We are combining the year 4 focus of the importance of environments and sustainability with the year 5 focus of how people impact environments, (both natural and built environments.) We will be working with Simone Percy, our teacher librarian, support our inquiry.

Art
Students focus this term in Art is on caricatures and cartooning. They will be differentiating between cartoon style drawing and life drawing. They will focus on interpreting artworks – see, think, wonder.

Japanese

In Japanese, students will be learning about Japanese tradition, speech test and verbs.

Music

Term 2 is set aside for the performing arts area of Dance. With the commitment of Lighting Up the Arts in Week 8 this term, the focus will be on Choreography.

They will learn how choreography enhances a choral performance and will explore choreographic techniques   and learn a range of movement routines. They will work collaboratively to rehearse these and then perform for an audience demonstrating their technical and expressive skills.

Later in the term, they will explore the elements of dance and have opportunities to create their own movement sequences.

PE

In PE this term students will be focusing on the fundamental movements needed to perfect their skills in athletics disciplines of long jump, discus, shot put, high jump and sprints. Students born in 2008, 2007, 2006, 2005 and 2004 will then participate in the athletics trials later in the term. Successful students will attend the SAPSASA District Athletics day early in term 3. All students will continue to focus of developing fair play strategies through invasion games.

A message from Governing Counciland School Improvement Team

As requested by our Governing Council and School Improvement Team, we are currently reviewing our Year Book and are seeking community feedback so that we can evaluate its continuance and future options.

Our school invests substantial time and resources each year to the design and production of the Year Book. Historically around 200 copies have been sold. As you can appreciate it is a huge commitment, so if you buy it, tell us why, and if you don’t purchase a copy we need your thinking too! It would be appreciated if you could please take a few minutes to complete the survey.

https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/CH76V6D

Welcome back! It sounds like students had a great break.

There will be no maths sheet for homework this week.

Homework includes:

– Spelling activities (students were given new words today)

– Prepare for oral language task

– Maths questions on study ladder

On the last day of term I handed out our next oral language task to all students (attached for your reference). I also did an example for students to model from. Part of the oral includes making a short powerpoint. Students that don’t have access to a computer at home will be provided with a short amount of time to do this powerpoint in class time. If you have any further questions, please send me an email.

Oral Language 3-2kkldsw

Enjoy the holidays!