Homework

Totara’s Term 4 Newsletter

Term 4 promises to be a very exciting term with lots of fun and new ways of learning for all of us!!! The children are becoming much more independent in their work habits and this will continue to improve in the next ten weeks.

v  We will be trialling Mathletics in Weeks 1 and 2. (A note will come home informing how it will be of great benefit to the children.)
You can access this through Totara’s blog.
Each child has their own password.

v  Science: We will be looking at
‘Our Living World’.
They will choose an animal or
a plant as their own individual inquiry.
Their inquiry needs to show they can recognise that all living things have
certain requirements so they can stay
alive. They will do some of this at school but this will also be part of their  homework the first part of the term.

v  Science: Mrs Plieger and the children will also be working on ‘Kitchen Chemistry’. The children will love this as it will be ‘hands on’ activities.

v  Athletics Day will be later in the term. In Weeks 2 -7 the children will need to wear PE gear on Tuesday/Wednesday/Thursday as we will be having Athletic Rotations with Pohutukawa and Kahikatea on these days.

v   Homework: As well as working on their individual   inquiry there will be a big focus on BASIC FACTS (Mathletics will be excellent for this). Spelling,
some New Zealand general knowledge questions,
common sayings and reading will also be sent home.
The children will have two weeks to complete the set homework (individual inquiry may take longer.)
This will all be done in their Homework exercise books.
If your child has not returned their book please do so asap. The worksheets will be glued into their books.

v  Later in the term (towards the end of November) we will be having a ‘Cultural Day’. This will involve the whole school. Totara will be looking at a variety of cultures leading up to the ‘Cultural Day’. This is part of our Social Sciences Curriculum.

You can see we have a very busy term ahead. Any problems or questions you have please pop in and we can have a chat about them. I like to see happy faces J in the morning then I know we are off to a good start to the day J

Ann Dooley/Totara Class Teacher
stjosephtotara.blogspot.co.nz

Totara Term 3 Newsletter

Our school focus in 2014 is “Living The Way, The Truth and The Life”. In Term 1 we looked at how we live our lives as part of God’s Family at St. Joseph’s School.

In Term 2 the children chose a country they would like to find out more about. These individual inquiries were amazing!!!

In Term 3 we will be focusing on ‘The Commonwealth Games’.  I have ordered NIE (Newspapers in Education) which we will focus on during our reading/inquiry time. The children will be looking at the different sports at the games and the countries taking part. The children can  choose to follow a certain country or look at a particular sport they are interested in as their inquiry. They will be doing some of this at school as well as part of their homework. They can use newspapers and magazines at home for more information.

Resources they can use

Ø School Library

Ø Atlases

Ø Internet

Ø Class library books

Ø School Journals.

Ø NIE

Ø Totara Class Blog

Ø Newspapers/Magazines

Homework

Reading:

In class we are focusing on the different ways we read, silently to ourselves, reading with a partner and listening to someone read. The children are also reading Chapter Books in class at silent reading time. They should also be doing this at home. Please make sure the children fill in their reading diaries so I can see what they are reading at home. (Newspaper items on Commonwealth Games can be added).

Numeracy

His term we are working on multiplication and division. It is most important that the children complete the times tables activities sent home. There are some links on the blogsite that will help make times tables fun to learn. The children are very familiar with the ‘Teacher Tools’ website. We use this website in the classroom and it would be a very good one for you to look at and see what stage your child is at in numeracy.

Spelling

Every two weeks the children will be given 10 words to put into sentences (These words are also on Spelling City). There will also be some other words associated with the Commonwealth Games.

A BIG focus this term is for the children in Totara to take more responsibility for their own learning. I have spent a great part of the holidays planning and preparing our classroom to reflect this. We can discuss this at our interviews next week.

I am looking forward to a great term full of fun, learning and lots of happy faces J J J J J   

Ann Dooley/Totara Class Teacher J