Week 12 in K2

Writing Workshop

We do hope you enjoyed looking and sharing your child's books that he/she made during the last half term. It is wonderful to see the eagerness and enthusiasm during workshop time, as the children make and create their books.

Do remember that as both teachers and parents we need to encourage our children to develop their love of writing. We can work together to achieve this by:

• nudging not pushing
• honouring approximations
• recognising that writing composition is the primary focus at this age

Firstly, resist the urge to push your children with their writing. Ultimately, you will end up with a reluctant writer. Always recognise and acknowledge what your child can do, not what he/she cannot do yet. Nudges work better and your child will be more likely to embrace a suggestion rather than you pointing out what he/she has not done.

Secondly, honour their approximations with both illustrations and writing. They will not get everything correct every time they write – nor should they. Learning to write is a process and like any skill it takes time and mistakes will be made along the way.

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, the primary focus should be on the composition. Whilst writing conventions are important, the stories children have to tell and their powers of imagination are crucial to them becoming good writers. If we spend too much time focusing on conventions, such as punctuation and spelling, we lose the spontaneity of children’s writing at this very early age.

Unit of Study

Our 'Materials' Unit of Study continues to the end of this term, with a special focus on ‘Reduce, Reuse, Recycle’.

The Enduring Understandings are:

• I can sort rubbish in different ways.

• I understand that I can use less and I can reuse things to help the earth.

• I can reuse materials to make something.

The Essential Questions are:

• Where does all the rubbish go?

• What happens to material waste?

• What can we all do to help the earth?

• Why is it important?

Many of the children are already familiar with the idea of recycling; they use ‘rubbish’ for junk modelling or 'Make and Take' at school. Each classroom has a box for recycling scraps of paper and card, and the children are encouraged to use paper that has already been printed on one side for their drawings and craft work. 

We are sure that you have ways of recycling things at home too, and we will be exploring and investigating many different aspects of the three Rs! It is a very interesting and exciting part of the unit for the children, and one in which they will be able to take ‘action’ readily. 

WANTED - PLASTIC BAGS!

We will be doing some art projects using plastic bags. Please could you send in any that you have – the brighter, the better! Also, please do continue to collect and send in any boxes, tubes, bottle tops, egg cartons and other rubbish that can be reused for the children's junk modelling.

K2 Morning of Sport Thursday 6 November

Our Morning of Sport will take place come rain or shine! The tabloid events will take place in the Sports Halls, and we will finish with relays on the Casurina Field. We aim to start at 10:30am and should be finished by 12:00pm. The children will take part in a variety of athletic activities, which demonstrate skills they have been learning in their PE lessons this year.

Obviously PE kit must be worn, together with a hat for the running events outside. Should the weather be inclement on the day, the relays will take place in the sports hall. All parents are warmly invited to come and join us for a morning full of fun and action!

Staff Training Day - Monday 10 November

UWCSEA will be closed for Staff Training on this day. We are welcoming Celena Larkey back from Teachers College, Columbia University, New York who is running further training on Reading Workshop.

K-G2 Parent Presentation: Nurturing Our Young Readers

Celena will also be doing a presentation for K-G2 parents 'Nurturing Our Young Readers'. This will take place on Wednesday 12 November, in the Multi Purpose Hall at 6:30pm. Learn more about the research behind Reading Workshop and how parents can nurture and support young readers at home. If you would like to attend please sign up through the link in the e-Brief.

iLearn Parent Workshop: iPads for Learning 

Tuesday 18 November   6-7pm David Watson Library

It will not have escaped the notice of many parents that iPads are quickly becoming a popular tool for enhancing teaching and learning throughout the Primary School. What is perhaps less obvious is the why, the how, and the 'what do we use them for?'. This workshop will explore the most common apps your children use at school, particularly in the Infant School and Grade 2. iPads will be available for you to use, although you are welcome to bring your own.

Please RSVP here. For more information contact Sean McHugh. We recommended that you visit the Dover DLC blog and read this post prior to the workshop.

UN Day - Friday 21 November

The Infant School will be celebrating UN Day on Friday 21 November. For this event we will need you to accompany your child around a series of activities in school from 9:00am to 10:15am. You are then invited to the Main Hall where the morning will culminate with singing and a parade. Watch for more details in upcoming Blogs and eBriefs.

Primary School Food Festival - Friday 28 November

We will be asking for some parent helpers to take small groups of children around the amazing food stalls so do mark this date in your diaries. Your child's teacher will get in touch with you nearer the time.

Next Week

Maths

Our next unit is Measurement, where we will be looking at the Essential Questions:

Why is it important to know how heavy things are and how long they are?
Which words can we use to describe length?
Which words can we use to describe weight?

The children will be learning how to describe an object using different measurements e.g. length, height, weight, size. Comparisons between two objects will be made: Which is longer/shorter, taller/shorter, heavier/lighter?

Literacy

Our main areas of focus will be:
• Handwriting (numbers, name and ‘one armed robot letters’ r, b, n, h, m, k, p)
• Writing Workshop
• Reading Workshop
• High Frequency Words
• Phonics
• Vowels
• Blending and decoding of CVC words

The K2 Team

Week 11 in K2

We hope you have all had a very pleasant break and we are very much looking forward to welcoming the children back to school on Monday.

Handwriting

Formal handwriting practice is being taught in the classrooms on a regular basis and pencil grips are being modified where intervention is needed. If your child has an awkward pencil grip, please do try to correct it at home as well, as engrained habits can be so hard to change. Correct letter formations and orientation need to be practised again and again. As children become more capable and dexterous, letters will automatically be formed correctly, which in turn makes the whole writing
process easier.

Mark Your Diaries! 

Dress Up Day

October 31 is Dress Up day in the Infants. Although it is Halloween and some children will want to come dressed as witches or skeletons, your child can come dressed up in any costume he/she wants to wear e.g. a cowboy, pirate, fairy or princess. Anything goes, as long as it is practical for a normal school day so no masks or restrictive clothing please!

Morning of Sport - Thursday 6 November

On Thursday 6 November, we will have our K2 Athletics Morning of Sport. Tabloid events will take place in the Sports Halls, and we will finish with relays on the Casurina Field.

The day is a chance for every child to participate in activities that he/she has practiced in his/her PE lessons this year.  This is a morning of maximum participation and we do hope to see all the children taking part.

The programme will start at 10:30am and is scheduled to finish by 12.00noon. The children will take part in a variety of athletic activities, showing their agility, balance, speed and hand/eye coordination.

It is important that your child has a good breakfast and is wearing his/her PE kit. Should we face inclement weather on the day, the relays will take place in the sports hall.

We very much hope that you will be able to join us for a morning full of action and fun!

Staff Training Day - Monday 10 November

UWCSEA will be closed for Staff Training on this day. We are welcoming Celena Larkey back from Teachers College, Columbia University, New York who is running further training on Reading Workshop. Celena will also be doing a presentation for K-G2 parents 'Nurturing Our Young Readers'.
This will take place on Wednesday 12 November, in the Multi Purpose Hall at 6:30pm. Learn more about the research behind Reading Workshop and how parents can nurture and support young readers at home. If you would like to attend please sign up through the link in the e-Brief.

Infant UN Day - Friday 21 November

The Infant School will be celebrating UN Day on Friday 21 November. For this event we will need you to accompany your child around a series of activities in school from 9:00am to 10:15am. You are then invited to the Main Hall where the morning will culminate with singing and a parade. Watch for more details in upcoming Blogs and eBriefs.

Primary School Food Festival - Friday 28 November

We will be asking for some parent helpers to take small groups of children around the amazing food stalls so do mark this date in your diaries. Your child's teacher will get in touch with you nearer the time.

The K2 Team

Week 8 in K2

UWC Day

We all had a fantastic day on Wednesday to celebrate UWC Day! Continuing our work on 'Materials', we went to the Botanic Gardens to search and investigate the different materials from which things are made. To assist our children, we were delighted to have some Grade 11 and 12 students with us for the day, who brought a wonderful element of fun and excitement to our activities. 

In small groups, they walked around the gardens identifying what things are made of, talking about the materials and taking photos using their iPads. So that the teachers did not have twenty photos of the same thing from one child's iPad in our photo streams (and this does happen!), the older students helped edit the photos, too. There were snack and drink stops along the way and time to play hide and seek, and tag in the large open spaces.  

In the afternoon, the K2 children were thrilled to have their new buddies come to the classrooms and play with them in Discovery Time.

For a snapshot of the many activities that happened throughout day across the school, please click here.

Writing Workshop

As teachers we are very excited about our Writing Workshops and witnessing the growth and development in the children’s skills. Our main focus for this year is to develop each child’s confidence, so that he/she is able to read and write on his/her own, to the best of his/her ability.

Your child will be bringing home the books that he/she has made so far. These are for you to keep at home. Celebrate all the things your child can do with his/her drawing and writing. Be positive and praise all the effort that has gone into thinking of what the books are going to be about, the drawing and the writing.

Maths 

During our Shape unit, we have been exploring the following key questions:

• Which words or vocabulary do I know to describe shapes?
• Which new words or vocabulary do I need to describe shapes?
• How can I sort these shapes?
• Can I combine shapes to make new shapes?
• Can I recognise and create patterns with shapes?

We have been finding and describing objects in the environment using names of shapes, both 2D and 3D (squares, hexagons, circles, triangles, rectangles, cubes, cones, cylinders, spheres).

Being able to describe a shape can be challenging and we will be introducing mathematical language to help describe both 2D and 3D shapes eg flat/not flat, sides (curved, straight), corners, edges, faces. The children will be matching and sorting the shapes and becoming more familiar with their names.

Swimming

When your child is swimming at school, please may we ask that he/she comes to school in his/her PE kit only. We are having a number of children who have full swimming costumes on underneath their PE clothes. As we do not swim until 11:30am, it makes going to the toilet a lot harder than it needs to be. It also means many of the children are too hot during morning play time. We thank you for your help and support.

Stick Man! - Theatre Trip

On Thursday we will be going to see 'Stick Man!' The theatres can sometimes be cold so please put your child's school cardigan in his/her bag if your child may need it.

Dress Up Day

October 31 will be a Dress Up day in the Infants. Although it is Halloween and some children will want to come dressed as witches or skeletons, your child can come dressed up in any costume he/she is happy to wear e.g. a cowboy, pirate, fairy or princess. Anything goes, as long as it is practical for a normal school day so no masks or restrictive clothing please!

Please note!

Monday 6 October is a Public Holiday so the College is closed. We look forward to seeing all the children again on Tuesday morning.

There will no eBrief on Friday 11 October. The next eBrief and K2 Blog will be on Friday 24 October.

The K2 Team