Gowrie Primary School

Yamba Unit
Term One 2007 Overview

Parent / Teacher communication:
As always please continue to use the communication book regularly, relaying any pertinent information about your child. It is a valuable tool as we read the books first thing each morning and can therefore act on any necessary requirements for the day. There will be days where time constraints do not allow for correspondence from school however, you will be informed of any major issues that may have arisen during the course of the day.

Homework:
Yamba unit homework will continue with readers and worksheets relevant to the topics we are working on in class. We read
a new reader each morning with your child as well as discussing the previous night¡¦s reader. Once a week your child will bring home a guided reader which is read over two days at school and is used for the following day¡¦s literacy lesson. Please assist your child in their comprehension of the text by asking them questions using who, when, where, what, how and why. Also allow your child to ask you some questions about the story. Another idea is to discuss the characters, setting and main events of the story.
Homework in folders will be sent home on Wednesdays to be returned by the following Tuesday.

Library/ ICT:
The ILP¡¦s this year will have an ICT component to them. We will be focusing on typing speed and accuracy as well as learning keyboard shortcuts and further developing our power point presentations. There will be a set computer lab time each week and access to the library smartboard on a weekly basis.

Health and Physical Education:
Yamba students will participate in regular PE sessions involving warm-ups, stretching, skills development, brain gym, gross motor exercises and learning minor games. They will join in with mainstream P.E and sport classes and also be involved in any specialised clinics that may occur this term.

Literacy:
This term we will continue to focus on comprehension skills from a variety of texts and the media. The students will be asked to use their prior knowledge to answer questions that may not be literally interpreted and they will have to think more deeply using their Theory of Mind skills.
We will view Behind the News where the children will be asked to retell the main news stories of the week¡¦s program.
The THRASS approach to spelling/ writing will be continued this term. This teaching tool will enable the students to use different strategies to spell unknown words. We will be spending considerable time segmenting words so the children can learn the necessary phonemes in words they require to spell correctly.

THRASS:

Gowrie Primary teachers use a Literacy tool called THRASS (Teaching Handwriting, Reading and Spelling Skills) as part of our ¡§Balanced Literacy Program¡¨. THRASS is a whole-school phonics resource for teaching learners, of any age, about the building blocks of reading and spelling, that is, the 44 phonemes (speech sounds) of spoken English and the graphemes (spelling choices) of written English. THRASS teaches students that when we read we turn graphemes (spelling choices) into phonemes (speech sounds) and when we write we turn phonemes (speech sounds) into graphemes (spelling choices).

THRASS resources are used and prominently displayed in our classrooms. Students are explicitly taught how to use the large class THRASS wall chart and individual desk charts to make informed, independent and accurate spelling attempts when writing and to improve their word attack skills when reading.

Each week the students will consolidate their current knowledge and be extended to understand the relevant uses of grammar.
Writing activities will consist of creative writing, retelling of texts and tasks based on our inquiry based unit of work.
Circle Talk is used for our news time, class meetings, topic discussions, and activities such as ¡¥finish the sentence.¡¦ In this situation the students are required to sit in a circle and are all encouraged to make a response to the topic or issue being discussed.

Numeracy:
The students will be grouped according to their abilities and needs and the focus will be to make maths enjoyable and to increase their understanding of the relationship between number tasks and real life, that is, the relevance maths has to their daily life. Participation will be in a variety of activities that include maths games, using concrete materials, and teacher directed lessons. Term one will be used to continually assess and work individually on concepts not yet fully grasped by students as well as including some new concepts.
Main topics to be covered this term are:
„àRevision and consolidation
„àX Tables
„àArea and perimeter
„àFractions
„àMeasurement, mm, cm, m, km
„àAddition and subtraction

SOSE/ Science:
We will be planning and working with the Lanyon mainstream class for the focus of this term¡¦s inquiry based unit of work.
All the students will participate in some mainstream inclusion activities and at other times in our own unit covering concepts in the program from the Inquiry Based Integrated Curriculum.
The program devised for this term in Lanyon and Yamba is one based on the conservation of water and the topical issue of protecting our natural resources for the future. Yamba studied a unit of work on water last year however we only touched on conservation. Some water concepts will undoubtedly be revisited but the students will be working with their mainstream peers and be involved in many new activities and discussions.

The Arts:
The students will participate in the visual art component of the curriculum in their mainstream classes and in the Yamba unit.
Music will consist of singing, keyboard and listening to a variety of music genre.
We will enjoy regular art/ craft lessons with a focus on drawing skills.
Drama will be used during our social skilling program making regular use of role playing activities.

Social skilling:
The whole school social skilling program, STRINGS involves a Gowrie Gathering in the hall on Thursday one week and an entry into the student¡¦s Growth Diary the following week.
There will also be structured social skilling lessons in Yamba that include topics such as friendships and other relationships, self respect and respect for others, feelings and attitudes and also unpack each of the concepts depicted on the bully buster¡¦s posters. Mr. Warwick will work on the Habits of Mind program for an hour a week in my release time.

STRINGS
S  Safe Play
T  Team work
R  Resilience (Rules, Rights, Responsibilities, Routines, Respect)
I   Improvement
N  Never give up
G  Growth diary
S  Self Belief

Regular times:
School Assemblies                       Tuesday   10.30                              
Library and Computer Lab              Wednesday 12.00                                                 
Gowrie Gathering (fortnightly)         Thursday  1.00        

Dates for Term One:

SRC elections                          Tues    Feb 20
Swimming Carnival                   Fri     Feb 23
Canberra Day                           Mon    Mar 19
Easter weekend                        Fri     April 6 ¡V Mon April 9
Holidays                                Fri     April 13
    
We are looking forward to a great term and year,

Roe Audsley and Neryl Grady