Whats on in Kindergarten
RELIGIOUS EDUCATION
In Religion this term we are investigating Who is Jesus? and what life might have been like for Jesus’ family and friends. We have explored a recreation of Nazareth Village and heard stories from the New Testament that tell about Jesus’ life as a Jew. Later this term we will identify celebrations and rituals that mark special times in the life of the church community and in the church year, and describe ways in which church members pray together during special celebrations and rituals.
ENGLISH
A typical English Block in KIndergarten includes our Initialit Mat Lesson (explicit direct phonics instruction), targeted Reading Groups, a Reading Fluency activity and Writing. Kindergarten particularly love creating special pieces of writing for their learning portfolios. At the moment, we are writing sentences that include a noun, an adjective to describe the noun, and a verb.
MATHEMATICS
You may have noticed that we use mini whiteboards a lot in our Maths lessons (English also). Mini whiteboards are a brilliant resource for implementing on-the-spot feedback to our students. Currently in Kindergarten maths we are building automaticity with ‘the plus 10 rule’, e.g., 54 + 10 = 64, as well as 20 + 7 = 27; 40 + 3 = 43 etc. We use a count-on strategy to determine the missing numeral in number sentences such as 25 + ⬜= 29, where the box represents ‘how many?’ We have also been reading and writing two-digit numbers. We really are very, very clever in Kindergarten!
PLOVER ANTICS!
A pair of plovers decided our school oval was the perfect place to raise a family. They have caused a great disruption to the morning game of Bullrush. Lots of people think Plovers are silly and annoying. Kindergarten decided to learn more about the new inhabitants of our school. This is what we have discovered so far:
- Plovers are also known as Masked Lapwings
- Plovers choose open spaces to lay their eggs so they can see predators coming
- Our Plovers currently have three chicks. Plover chicks are able to leave the nest and feed themselves just a few hours after hatching. Imagine if human babies did this! It is no wonder Plovers seem to be such nervous parents.
- Plovers have spurs on their wings.
- Mrs. Connaughton is really scared of Plovers (especially now that she knows about the spurs!)
As a class, we enjoyed observing the Plovers (we crept as close as we dared!), researching them, writing about them and making them out of recycled cardboard during Visual Arts. We are happy to have the Plovers on our oval now we have learned they aren’t cranky and silly, they are just trying to be very good parents.
“I think the Plovers are good parents because they were stopping their chicks from getting too close to us.” Finley E
“I think Plovers are good parents because they keep their babies safe.” Austin L
SCIENCE
This term we are exploring physics - How Things Move. The students have been learning about different objects and how they move because of a force. This has included identifying forces that make objects move or change direction, and describing how the size of an object affects its movement.
HISTORY
In History this term we have expanded our learning to include Different Families and Celebrations. We have been investigating the different structures of families today, families in the past and families from different places. We have also begun to explore how we commemorate past events that are important to us, as well as share experiences of family, school and community events that are celebrated.
SWIMMING
We are really enjoying our swimming lessons at Moruya Pool. The walk to and from the pool is always an adventure as we look out for the Water Dragons sunning themselves on the riverbank. Having familiar faces teach us to swim is extra special. We are delighted to have Mrs. White, Mrs. Connaughton, Mrs. Grant and Mrs. Durnan in the water with us.
And now we are off to have a BIG rest on the weekend. It has been a HUGE week for our amazing Kindergarten bumblebees!
Mrs Genevieve Schofield
Teacher Kinder Blue