3/4 Learning Update

Development of the student exhibits has been continuing and the exhibits are starting to look amazing. We have been working on developing the students understanding of information reports as a way to communicate factual information. Through our literacy workshops, draft reports have been created and the published versions are starting to go up onto the exhibits in the neighbourhood. The process of improvement and development of the exhibits is helping students to learn more about the topic that they have chosen as well as helping them explain why they think their topic is important. Students are exploring diagrams, photographs, interviews, films and website design as ways of communicating about their topic.

Bugs Exhibit

Bazaar Exhibit

Art Exhibit

 While only a snapshot of the work that is going into the exhibits. These photos represent some of the research that students have been undertaking and  the emphasis that we are placing on producing an exhibit that is informative, engaging and of very high quality.

The literacy learning focus on information reports is evident here also. Students have been exploring labelled diagrams, paragraph use, titles and subtitles, photographs, formal language and tense use in order to create information texts for the exhibits. The importance of proof reading and spelling words correctly prior to publication has also been a focus.

Bugs Exhibit

Italian Exhibit

Minerals Exhibit

Mythical Creatures Exhibit

Plants Exhibit

Science Exhibit

Premiers Reading challenge 2015

Greetings PRC readers,

Congratulations to those of 

you who have already finished the Premier’s Reading Challenge and have entered their books online. The deadline is fast approaching and you still have time to finish reading and enter your books online.

What you must do now: You have two more weeks to enter your books online. You must print out your book list, have a guardian sign it, and then give it to your home group teacher by Tuesday 8th September.

What we will do: One of your teachers will verify your books online to say you have met the challenge. The certificates will be awarded in Term 4.

If you have trouble logging on please let one of your teachers know as soon as possible.

Thanks!

Simone and Robert

Fathers Day Stall

When: Friday 4th September

Where: Gym

On Friday 4th September the Father's day Stall will be held at the gym. Any donations can be dropped at the gym from 8.00am.

Baked good are always a winner and there will be cake packs available at the office from Friday. Please don't forget to give your child some money and a bag to take home their goodies in. The stall coordinators need volunteers on the day to set up, run the stall and clear up so if you can spare some time, please contact Michelle or Sule on 0400 666 890 & 0404 441 523.

Also, there is lots of information on the 3/4 blog about what is going on in the classroom. If you have not been receiving the Blog notifications, try re-subscribing.

Thanks,

Ciara & Carla

The Great Book Swap: Wednesday 2nd September

When: Wednesday 2nd September

Where: Gym

The Great Book Swap is taking place in the gym on Wednesday 2nd September. It is part of Indigenous Literacy Day. Children are asked to bring in a book/s they wish to swap and a gold coin donation (for each book swapped) and then they can participate in the swap. Please bring good quality books.

Drop off books at the gym before school starts an the swap will take place at  lunch time.

Science Week

This year’s National Science Week focused on ‘The Science of Light’.  To investigate some of the ways we can observe this topic, the Year 3/4 neighbourhoods looked at a ‘Camera Obscura’ (pinhole camera) as well as a solar balloon.  Both experiences opened up interesting discussions and piqued the children’s scientific curiosity.  Below are photos of both experiences, including the inverted image that was created by the pinhole camera.

This is what Louis W. had to say about science week:

“This week was science week and we made a solar balloon that heats up using the suns heat to fly and the other thing we made was a camera obscura that was a dark room with a tiny hole in the wall and on the boards there was the image out side, up side down!  It was so epic, you could see people out side. I had a fun time. It was cool.”

This is what Lexi had to say about science week:

“Three white boards were all adjusted to our eye and then we saw the trees some other kids went outside and we saw them upside down.  This is because our eyes are like a lens then our brain flips it around.  We all have this and it is totally normal to have this. The white board was like a projector screen. We did this experiment in the media room. The whole room was dark pitch black otherwise it would not work. There was a little whole in the media and it was acting like your eye with out a brain.”

Book Swap

THE GREAT BOOK SWAP

As part of Indigenous Literacy Day on Wednesday September 3, we are holding a Great Book Swap to help raise funds for the Indigenous Literacy Foundation to buy books for remote indigenous communities who don’t have access to books. There are schools involved all across Australia and the target is $100,000 to buy 10,000 books.

If every child can please bring a book (or books) to school that they love but no longer want and a gold coin donation on Weds Sept 3, then they can be part of the book swap. By donating a gold coin, they can then swap their book for a new book that someone else has donated. 

1. Books need to be dropped off in the gym before school starts, and the swap will happen at lunch time. 

2. If you're wanting to swap more than one book, it's a gold coin for each book you want to swap. So if you swap five books, it's five coins. 

3. This year if you want take home a junior book, please donate a junior book. If you want take home an older book, please donate an older book. Otherwise we end up with lots of books for little kids, but no books for the older kids. 

4. Please don't donate school readers, library books, board books or really young picture books. Please just donate books you think someone will love!

See you all on Weds September 3 so we can raise money, and all have a terrific new book to take home.

Princes Hill Primary School is participating in National Science Week 2015, 15th – 23^rd August, as a way of further promoting science in our school. Science activities will be scheduled to run in each neighbourhood next week. We want to encourage children to try more science at home and at school.

We also encourage parents who are interested in science or work in a field of science to come along and talk to the children about the work that they do.  Please contact your child’s teachers to book in a time to organise a talk, demonstration or a hands-on activity that the children can participate in.

Thank you for your support.

David Hornsby Parent Information Night

Literacy consultant David Hornsby conducted a parent information night on Tuesday the 28^th of July on how parents can support their children with reading. The focus of the day was on how we can develop thoughtful literacy with our children. 

David spoke about the pivotal role of content knowledge in the making-meaning process that is reading.   Meaning generated by the reader will be influenced by the background knowledge they bring to the text. With this key idea in mind, David emphasised the role parents can play in ‘stirring-up’ their child’s background knowledge around the content of the texts they are reading.  This requires parents talking about the content of the books your children are reading before, during and after reading.  What do you think this text is about?  What do you know about…?  What do you think you will learn about…?  What did you learn about…?  What would you like to learn more about…? Where can we go to find out more about…? 

David also emphasised the importance of teaching phonics, but always within the meaningful context of a whole text. He spoke emphatically about the importance of starting with a whole complete text before dealing with abstract decoding practices such as sounding out words.  ‘Meaning is the way into phonics’. 

David spoke passionately about the centrality of the Literature strand in our national curriculum and the importance of quality literature for building thoughtful, feeling, literate citizens. ‘We hit them in the heart, before we hit them in the head’. 

David’s presentation was appreciated by all the parents and staff who attended for the clarity, poise and humour in which it was delivered.   

 David is away at the moment but is happy for the presentation slides he used on the night to be shared with the community. Once these slides are made available, they will be posted on your child’s neighbourhood blog. 

Tim Aris 

Head of Curriculum

Term 3 Weeks 1 and 2

This video shows some of the learning that has been going on in the 34 neighbourhood over the first two weeks of this term. We have been continuing to develop our museum exhibits as well as writing narrative, reflective and report texts. Multiplication, measurement, area and construction feature in our maths workshops as well as a variety of maths targets which address the individual needs of students, such as the time target that can be seen in this video. Reading scientific report texts to assist in building knowledge within our museum inquiry has been a feature as well as specific guided reading sessions which serve to focus on the strategies that students use when they read. Weekly music sessions with Deb are also featured.