Week 5 in K2

Learning Journals

Yesterday, you should have received an email with a private link to your son/daughter's Learning Journal. This is a Google+ album. Through this journal we hope that you will get a glimpse of some of the learning your child is involved in at school. Some of the selections may be annotated to describe a specific aspect of your child’s learning, while the majority will be of your child ‘in action’.

We will continue to add photos into your child's Learning Journal throughout the year. You will be advised of updates to this journal through the K2 Blog and an email from your child’s teacher. This journal will stay online until the end of this academic year, at which point it will be removed. Please make sure you download any or all of the Learning Journal by then.

Please note that we have encouraged the children to capture as much of their work as possible.

Here are a few suggestions that will allow you to use this link more effectively:

1. You do not need a Google account to view or download this album or individual photos or videos.
2. Bookmark the link to your child’s Learning Journal, for easy access for the rest of the year.

We hope you enjoy looking through your child’s album with him/her.

Reading at home

From Monday your child will be bringing home his/her first levelled reading books. The excitement and enthusiasm for reading these 'just right' books in class has been terrific!  Every day, three books will come home in the blue folder, all chosen by your child during Book Shopping. Enjoy these books for that day and then return them to school the following day for your child to make a new selection. If the books have not been read, please return them to school anyway, as your child will need them for Reading Workshops.

If your child is at the very beginning of their reading journey and reading Red Elephants, Orange Elephants or Orange Monkeys, he/she will need your support with each book.

Here’s how to make first-time reading fun and easy:

Read the title of the book and look at the front cover together. Ask your child what they think the story is going to be about.

Look through the pictures together so that your child can see what happens in the story before reading the words. Introduce and discuss any new vocabulary.

Read one or two pages to your child, placing your finger under each word as you read. “Touch and Say”

Let your child touch the words and read the rest of the story. Give him/her time to figure out each new word.

If your child gets stuck on a word, you might say, “Let’s look at the picture. Is there a clue? What would make sense?”

If your child is still stuck, supply them with the right word. This allows him/her to continue to read and enjoy the story. You might say, “Could this word be ‘ball’?”

Always praise your child. Praise what he/she reads correctly, and praise good tries too. Talk around the book and if possible, make a connection with something from real-life, e.g.“Can you remember the time when…. ?“

Give your child lots of chances to read the story again. The more your child reads, the more confident he or she will become. Have fun!

Writing Workshop

Children are encouraged to see themselves as writers through drawing, labelling and writing sentences and have been making books, showing the stories and information they want to share. They are developing routines for self-managing their writing tools and equipment and have learned that ‘When I am done, I have just begun!’ which means that they can always go back and add more details to their pictures and writing of unfinished books.

After School Activities

Due to the large number of Infant children involved in after school activities and the inevitable confusion and congestion arising, we ask that these routines be followed:

If you are accompanying your child to his/her activity, please meet him/her at the designated assembly area, not at your child's classroom.

Each day indicate in the Message Book if your child will be attending an activity that will affect his/her regular pick up arrangements.  For example, if your child would normally take the bus home from school each day but is now involved in swimming one day and gymnastics on another day, we need notes for each of those days. A blanket note, such as “My child is doing swimming every Tuesday so please do not put him/her on the bus” is not sufficient.

We recognise this is an extra for you on these days, but after much trial and error we have found it is the best way of keeping track of the transportation logistics for 22 children.

Thank you for your cooperation.

Next Week:

Maths 

Our main focus will be:

• Where do we see numbers?
• Why do we need numbers?
• Counting objects in a set
• Counting groups of objects
• Recognising numbers and matching to number names

Literacy

Our main areas of focus will be:

• Handwriting - numbers, name and ‘long ladder letters: l, i, t, u, j, y
• Writing Workshop
• Reading Workshop
• Phonics and decoding CVC (consonant/vowel/consonant) words

The K2 Team