Dear Parents and Caregivers,
A warm welcome to new children and their families who have joined our Junior School since last term. We hope that you and your child are well settled into school life and are looking forward to another term of exciting learning experiences.
Highlights this term include the Pou ceremony, Celebration of Learning afternoon, Junior School Cross Country, visits to the Planetarium, parent information evenings about reading, writing and mathematics, reports and parent/teacher conferences.
Physical Activity
Every Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday we begin the day at 8.40 a.m. with Jumpjam in the hall. This exercise to music programme benefits all the children as it warms up their bodies ready for learning. It is really important that the time that the children are not distracted so that they can concentrate on the movements. Adults are very welcome to join in with their child to do the routines but please do not chat at the back of the hall as it echoes. On Thursdays and Fridays, the children will be involved in running activities in preparation for our Junior School Cross Country so it is important that your child wears shoes suitable for this.
Mathematics
The focus this term will be extending the children's knowledge in Number and strategies involving addition and subtraction in particular. They will also be involved in the Geometry and Measurement strand with a focus on Time and Rotation.
Writing
The students continue to practise story writing each day and will be focusing on recounts and writing about personal experiences. The year 2 children will also be writing character descriptions and reports related to our Inquiry. All children will be focusing upon using wow words which are adjectives and adverbs to enhance their writing along with ensuring fullstops and capital letters are in the correct places. They will continue with the editing, proofreading and publishing of their work.
Handwriting
It is very important that all letters and numbers are correctly formed by the end of the first two years at school. We place emphasis on the correct letter formation, size of letters and placement of them on, above or below the line. Handwriting practice in each classroom will continue throughout this term.
Inquiry
This term our Inquiry is entitled " Our Star the sun: Life and Time in a Solar System" This will involve the children learning about the solar system, planets and incorporates a visit to the Planetarium later in the term.
Sport
The emphasis this term will be on running, large ball skills and skipping. The children will all take part in our Junior School Cross Country to be held at Bishop Park on Wednesday June 5th. The large ball skills will emphasize using their hands for catching and throwing so that they can learn to play some ball games practising these skills. The Year 2 children will also be widening their repertoire of skills in skipping with a rope.
Visual Arts
Painting is the focus for the term.The children will be mixing primary colours to create both secondary and tertiary colours and using different brush techniques to produce a wide array of paintings. They will learn about the colour wheel and how to make tints and shades,
Te Reo
Greetings, farewells, numbers and the weather along with learning about the legend of Maui will be the work we will be covering in Te Reo throughout this term. The children will also continue to learn our National Anthem, School song and other waiata that involve actions. The Pou ceremony was a great highlight and an occasion that the children will remember for the rest of their lives.
ICT
The children will continue to use either Ipads or laptops each week to enhance their learning in literacy, numeracy and inquiry.
Events
On Wednesday May 15th parents and caregivers are invited to our 'Celebration of Learning' afternoon from 1.40 p.m. This afternoon involves the children sharing their work and explaining their current and next learning steps to their parents.
A show entitled 'And the winner is' will be on in the hall for all the children in the school. It will be held on Thursday June 6th and the cost of this will come out of the Activity fee.
As part of our Inquiry all children will be going by bus into Wellington to visit the Planetarium. The Year 0 and 1 children will be going on Tuesday May 28th and the Year 2 children will be going on Thursday May 29th.
Reporting to Parents
All children in Year 1 and 2 will be receiving a written report at the end of the term. The report will outline your child's curriculum areas of strength and weakness and their next learning steps in Literacy and Numeracy. It will also show how they are progressing towards meeting the National Standards. The reports will be given out at the parent and teacher conferences that will be held on Wednesday July 10th and Thursday July 11th at school between 3 and 7 p.m.
Hotdogs
These are available on Wednesdays throughout this term. This is a fundraiser for the Home and School committee. The cost of $3 involves a hotdog in a bread roll with or without sauce. Please send your child's order in a named envelope enclosing the correct money to your child's teacher before school on Wednesdays.
Slippers
This term and next the children wear slippers inside the classrooms. Please send along a pair that can be kept at school each day. Please also ensure that slippers, gumboots, sweatshirts and raincoats are well named. The children often have the same size in footwear and clothing and items can get mixed up.
'Hooked on Books' Programme
Thank you so much to those adults who have volunteered to run this very important programme. If anyone else would like to help out could they please contact me.
'Parent Information' evenings
I am holding a series of evenings over the next three weeks to share how we teach your child and how you can help support their learning at home in reading, writing and mathematics during their first two years at school. The first of these is reading and will be at 7.30 p.m. in room 3 on Thursday May 16th. Please come along and have your questions answered. 'Writing' will be on Thursday May 23rd and 'Mathematics' will be on Thursday May 30th. They will all be in room 3 starting at 7.30 p.m. and should run for approximately an hour.
Bottles and Bottle tops
Mrs Ryan in room 1 desperately needs clean one and a half litre lemonade or coke bottles and also clean plastic lids from milk bottles. It does not matter what colour they are. If you can help please send them along to her in room 1.
Six Year Old Literacy Testing
As near as possible to your child's sixth birthday they take part in some literacy tasks. If your child has turned six and you have not seen their results can you please contact Mrs Buckley.
Blogs
To gauge a snapshot of what your child is learning at school please visit the classroom blogs. Please also leave a message or comment about the work that you see happening there. The children look forward to reading these and counting how many people have visited their classroom blog.
If you have any questions or wish to know about your child's progress or classroom programme please do not hesitate to contact your child's teacher.
Yours in partnership,
The Junior School Team
Maureen Buckley - Deputy Principal buckley@muritai.school.nz
Barbara Ryan ryan@muritai.school.nz
Margs Mills mills@muritai.school.nz
Liz Sullivan sullivan@muritai.school.nz
Mikaela Cody cody@muritai.school.nz
Rebecca Saker saker@muritai.school.nz
Morag Roberts roberts@muritai.school.nz
Jo Salisbury salisburyjo@gmail.com
Sandra Blair blair@muritai.school.nz
Carolyn Murphy, Romy Anderson and Angela Armstrong
No comments:
Post a Comment