Hi all,

Today was another great day of learning and discovery for RSA and RKS.  Our morning started off with some play investigations. Mrs. A had kindly purchased new small lego to add to our lego basket. The lego has certainly been a big hit among the children as they have enjoyed creating and cooperating with others for group projects.

Our blue play dough and coloured pop sticks was also a popular experience with learners using their imaginations and practising their oral language skills as they expressed their ideas.

After Recess the students engaged in their literacy learning. Today’s letter focus was ‘J’. We began by thinking of things starting with the J sound, many showing awareness. They then were  encouraged to practise writing the letter J in their literacy books. It is great to see how enthusiastic and confident they are becoming in their writing abilities, and their pencil grips.

Over the past few weeks we have been supporting the children with their emotional wellbeing through exploring different emotions and expressing our feelings. Today during circle time the students were presented with different visuals to encourage conversations about emotions.We talked about the things that make us feel sad, happy and angry, empowering them to express their thoughts and feelings among their peers.

Our afternoon consisted of indoor/outdoor imaginative play time. This included puppets, blocks with community people, and dress ups.

Next week Mr.S will return and the students are very excited as they have missed him very much. I would just like to say it has been absolute pleasure  working with the students over the past four weeks, I hope to see them again as I continue with TRT work.

See you  tomorrow for fantastic Friday 🙂

Hi everyone and welcome to terrific Tuesday!

Our morning began with ‘Writer’s Workshop’ in which our learners had the opportunity to re-visit and continue creating their  ‘Brown bear’ story, which we started yesterday. This literacy experience enabled the students to practise building their reading skills and connect with print through writing.  We are very proud of our students efforts as they have shown such confidence and enthusiasm in their writing abilities.

We then ventured off to the fish farm in which we freely explored and helped Mr. McCarthy feed the fish as we learn about caring for living things ion our world. We were particularly captured by the big  and small Barramundi. We had learnt that the word Barramundi is an Aboriginal word meaning ‘Large Scales’.

After recess the students engaged in maths investigations, engaging in rotations. We continued to focus on subitiizng and patterns. We began by sharing a book about patterns, the students sharing their thoughts and ideas in relation to the pictures showing  patterns in nature and patterns made by people such as fabrics. Emmett shared with his friends that his school shirt had a stripy pattern, everyone then took the time to explore the patterns they could see on their uniform. The students were then invited to make their own patterns using coloured pop sticks. Some students confidently moved beyond using two colours as they created patterns. We worked with a partner  to roll a dice and say how many. The students were encouraged to compare the amount on their dice and use their mathematical language such as ‘more’  ‘less’.

With such sunny weather, the students were eager to go outside after our mindlessness time. They were encouraged to wear their hats outside as we promote sun safety. We decided to have a indoor/outdoorplay play session which involved imaginative play, kite making  and painting outside.

Overall a great day.

See you tomorrow

Mrs. Iolanda 🙂

Hi everyone,

Today was another great day of learning and discovery.

This morning during ‘come read with me’ many of us would have noticed a small table space with flowers and drawing. This is our little wellbeing area which will enable the students to have time and space they need before they start their busy day. We will also be adding some cards with a variety emotions  to help the students identify and express their emotions.

After our morning organisation time we were ready for our play investigations which gave the learners time to interact with their peers and use their imagination and creativity. Experiences included creating with small lego, finger painting, small world play with dinosaurs and making pictures with geometric shapes.

Today for literacy we re-visited the letter symbols and sounds that we have been focusing on over the past few weeks. Through our literacy rotations the students had an opportunity to explore and and make connections with letter-sound relationships. Spaces included match the letter with the object, guess the mystery letter for objects, and circle the pictures that match the letter sound.

As part of our weather inquiry today we talked about the cold weather we have recently been experiencing as we continue to make observations about our natural world. In today’s task everyone was given a ‘brick person’ and had to decide and draw what to wear for a cold day.  What else might the building brick person need on a cold day?

We ended our day with imaginative play which included puppets, dress ups, and role play props. We invited some of our older friends back to play which everyone throughly enjoyed.

Overall, a wonderful day and we are looking forward to fantastic Friday!

Hi everyone,

Happy 1st day of November!

A new month which will be filled with some fun and exciting learning opportunities. Over the past few weeks the students have expressed wonder whilst engaging in  our weather inquiry. This morning during our class organisation time there had been so much excitement about the sighting of a rainbow on the way to school. It just turned out that Ms Pinneri captured an image of the beautiful rainbow for us to see on our big screen, many intrigued by the different colours they could see. Mrs Iolanda asked the children:” I wonder what makes a rainbow?”   Grace sharing: ” You need rain and sun!”We enjoyed listening and singing along to a favourite children’s classic  ‘ Sing a Rainbow’  while enjoying our brainfood.

Our weather watchers have done a tremendously well in observing and using their oral language skills to report  the  daily weather.  Our aim this month will be to report and record our findings on our  calendar as a means to track the and see if we can identify weather symbols and patterns.

For our morning literacy we continued on with our ‘Brown bear, brown bear’ books in preparation for reading and sharing with a ‘lovely listener’ ( soft toy). Once completing their books they had an opportunity to choose a lovely listener and find a space in the class to read to their special listening friend. It was great to see how many were able to use the picture cues to read and recite the story.

After lunch the students enjoyed some mindfulness (books and colouring pictures inspired by the different seasons) as we calmed our bodies after a busy day, Mrs Sharman offering some lavender to the experience which allowed the children to use their sense of smell for calming.  This led into creative making time in which the learners enjoyed a variety of crafts and imaginative play.

Just a friendly reminder that lollies  are not permitted in class as we have noticed that they are being brought in. We encourage the students to make healthy food choices.

From the team in RKS & RSA 🙂

Hi everyone,

Today our little learning community enjoyed a variety of learning experiences. We continued on with our weather inquiry which has taken shape as the students express wonder.  Today’s letter of the day was ‘f ‘ in which we explored its letter sound and  practised writing it in our handwriting  books to discover its formation.

A highlight of our day was engaging the students in imaginative play. Imaginative play (pretend play) can be described as an act of role play where a child draws upon their imagination based on experiences to explore new ideas, materials and scenarios. During imaginative play children may be a different character, transform materials into new objects or find themselves in a new world creating their own stories. Imaginative play is very vital in early childhood as it promotes social skills, fosters creativity, encourages problem solving, improves language development, just to name a few.

To help build their understanding we viewed a short video called Sesame Street: Imagination.We were able to explore ways in we could be imaginative. We discovered that a stick could be transformed into anything we wanted it to be, from a magic wand, to a rocket ship! We invited some buddies from some of the older classrooms to join us for our play session to support our younger students.

Our play spaces to promote imaginative play included puppet play, felt boards, a home corner with cooking props, dress ups, dolls and tea set. We also transformed our two of our tables into an imaginative play spaces. Sheets and paper plates were added to offer opportunities to be imaginative.

Here are a few  snapshots of our afternoon imaginative play session…

See you tomorrow for fantastic Friday 🙂

Hi everyone!

This week marks the very special Diwali Festival of Lights, a great way to come together in unity and discover different cultural celebrations in our world.  Diwali is the Indian festival of light, prosperity and sharing love with the family.

While in the Diwali Hub the students had an opportunity to explore and engage in some Diwali experiences. Mrs. Finos introduced the students to this very special special celebration with a short Diwali movie to start with. This was then followed up with a craft experience  which involved decorating a Rangoli design with different coloured rice. A Rangoli is a traditional art form that can be made from coloured rice, powder or flowers.

During this process the learners were able to build their confidence in using their fine motor manipulation to squeeze glue pots and sprinkle rice. They also used their creativity as they created colourful patterns. The students thoroughly enjoyed this experience and their Rangoli designs look absolutely amazing.

We then ventured off to the MUDLA in which MR. McCarthy gave  our RKS students  a very special tour of our different fish species. While there we were able to learn the names of different fish with some information about their habitats and diet. We discovered more about the southern purple spotted gudgeon, golden perch and catfish. Some of our learners were also invited to help feed our fish.

Our RSA friends enjoyed some time at the fish farm making new discoveries and learning more about the adaptations of the various species and helped with the feeding.

Also today, our students engaged in learning more about patterns during our maths investigations. Our learning spaces offered different patterning experiences to enable  learners to explore the concept of patterns and how they repeat themselves. In patterning some algebraic concepts are learned such as sequencing and spatial awareness.

We focused on colour patterns in which the students were challenged to create a pattern starting with two colours  while using  pattern bears and cards, coloured counters and unifix blocks. Some of our learners were confident in challenging their own mathematical thinking moving beyond two colours. To help build our understanding we were encouraged to read out our patterns. Some friends worked together to create patterns which enabled them to develop their cooperative skills and engage in problem solving with others.

Overall we had such an amazing day of learning and working together 🙂

Happy Friday everyone!

What  another great day of learning and discovery through today’s curriculum areas science and art.

This entailed exploring and learning about the seasons with focus on Spring. Mrs. A took each class  into the design lab building in which they had the opportunity to engage in open discussion, and represent their thoughts and ideas through their drawings. There was also the aim in introducing the concept of ‘time’ though the seasons with the months of the year.

Mrs. Iolanda took the students for a creative visual art experience. The aim was to connect with our natural world by exploring the sky above. Using pastels and water colours the learners had the opportunity to experiment with elements such as line, colour, shape and form,  particularly fascinated by clouds and their shapes. They also were able to practice manipulating drawing tools such as pastels, as well as experiment with brush techniques.

Hello everyone and welcome to another fabulous day in RSA and RKS.

We began our day with literacy rotations. This included continuing on with our books about filling up our  buckets using positive, green choices.  We also explored  letter symbols and their formations at  our play dough spaces.  The learners were very eager to construct their names using the dough and letter  shapes, showing great confidence and perseverance.The students also enjoyed a shared story time with Mr Winters with one of their favourite

In Drama today children learned about ‘role-play’ where they were given the task to choose a character, become that character and set a scene with a partner.  Children were able to practice their scene and perform it in front of the class as an audience.

Meanwhile, with Ms Iolanda, the children took part in our Science inquiry about the weather.  Children engaged in a brainstorming session to share what they already know about the  meaning of ‘weather’ and what they think of.

Here are some of our learners thoughts:

Matilda: ” It’s like when you see rain outside”

Audrey: ” When the weather gets cold outside it is winter and when it’s hot”

Jayden: ” Raining outside”

We then took some time to reflect on today’s weather outside, peering out our window to prompt our thinking.

Grace sharing: ” It’s sunny outside today.”

Ayva: ” Hot!”

Emmett: ” Oh, it’s warm.”

We then engaged with our senses and unpacked the meaning sharing our ideas and understandings with our peers.

What does the weather look like?

What does it feel like?

What does it sound like?

This will lead us into our science weather inquiry.

After lunch the students were invited for some quiet meditation time as they listened to quiet, soothing music.

Ellie had a very special show and share. She had brought in a very special snake skin and we were all intrigued. Ellie shared that it had come from her snake at home. This had opened up some discussion about how the snake shed its skin. Ellie had kindly let her friends have a little touch and feel of the skin.

Later in the afternoon they were ready for some fresh air and play outside. We headed to the log park for some nature play and gross motor movement.

Overall a great day 🙂

Hi everyone!

Today was another wonderful day of learning and discovery.

Firstly, I thought I would take the opportunity to introduce myself. My name is Iolanda (the students call me Mrs Iolanda) and I am really excited to be working with the class over the next few weeks to cover Mr  S. I am really looking forward to getting to know more about the students and supporting them with whilst on their learning adventure. Please come say hi as I look forward to meeting you all.

Yesterday we introduced the story ‘ Have you filled a bucket today’ written by Carol Mccloud. Through the story the children were able to explore  positive behaviour choices and kindness to make ourselves and others feel better. This very much alignes with our green choices we make daily in our interactions with others.

As an extension the students  were encouraged and empowered to think about ways in which they could be bucket fillers during our literacy writers workshop. Through book making our learners expressed their thoughts and ideas.

Some ideas captured in the children’s books were as follows:

Matilda: ” I talk nice to my friends”

Eshrup: ” I use kind words”

Mupie: ” I help everyone”

Jayden: ” I help my friends inside with the fridge”

Beau: “I fill a bucket cause I help clean up”

Emmet: ” I help my friends when they hurt themselves”

We will continue to support the students emotional and social wellbeing through our bucket filling.

Whilst enjoying some explorative time in the MUDLA the students spent time freely exploring and discovering the various species. Mrs Iolanda enjoyed a personal tour run by the learners as they talked about the different kinds of fish in the aquariums, and the turtles.. We were very excited to personally meet and greet Phoenix the bearded dragon. Mr McCarthy kindly let us have a little touch and feel of its scaly skin.

After recess the learners engaged in numeracy investigations through rotations. Our spaces included dice roll and count. This enabled the students to practise counting on the dice and then counting the corresponding quantity.

Creating pattern rods appeared to be an interesting space. Our learners were challenged to create patterns using two colours with unifix blocks. Many grasped the concept as they were able to read out the pattern and add to it.

They also used ten frames flipping  tiles. Through this the students flipped their tiles and sorted them onto their ten frames. They had also been encouraged to use mathematical language to explain how many red tiles there were and how many yellow.

After lunch the classes were  invited for some calming time  through mindfulness. Through quiet  reading time  and using our imaginations to draw, we  had the opportunity to wind down and regulate after such a busy day.

Just a reminder, this Sunday the 23rd we will be holding our Spring Carnival. If you have any special donations please bring these to the office.

See you all tomorrow,

Mrs Iolanda