The Small One

Year 1 watched a movie called The Small One. It was about a little donkey who was weak and his owners wanted to sell him. But there was one person who didn't want to say goodbye to his donkey because he loved him, it was the little boy. The little boy's dad made him take the donkey to the town to sell but no one wanted him, they were rough with him. Someone appeared in front of the little boy and The Small One and said "Tell me, is this donkey gentle? I need him to carry my wife to Bethlehem. Is he for sale?". The little boy said yes and also that his donkey was kind and strong. The man took the donkey and gave the little boy a silver coin.

Year 1 was very clever because they could recognise that the man was Joseph and his wife was Mary and The Small One had the important job of carrying Mary and unborn baby Jesus to Bethlehem. We learnt that ordinary people can be extraordinary people when God has a plan for them.

If you would like to watch this special religious movie that shows the Spirit of Christmas click on the link below

The Small One movie

Animals animals everywhere

Year 1,
We love how excited and engaged you are in your learning about Life and in particular animal life. We are so proud of the passionate and collaborative learner qualities you are showing.
Below is the link to the website we explored in class. We decided to put it on our blog for you because we know how much you loved it at school
National Geographic

Shopping Trip

Help fill the basket with 3 items from the food groups. Listen to the message that comes out of the speaker so you know what you're shopping for!

Click on the link below and happy shopping!!!

Supermarket Game

"Learning at home" idea for this week...

 Words I Know

Put a timer on 10 minutes and write all the words you know...see if you can beat your score each day! Or maybe you can have a competition against mum or dad!

If you don't have a timer you can use this link and set a timer. 

Timer

Saint Mary of the Cross MacKillop

What do you know about Mary MacKillop?

Mary MacKillop Video

Play Dough Recipe

Click on the link below to make your own play dough...its fun and easy and no cooking is needed!

No cook play dough 

I wonder what colour you'll make?

My Weekly Timetable

JLS have been excited to create a grade calender to help us keep track of all the important events that happen at school for us. 

We thought it would be a good idea to have a go at making your own weekly calendar at home to help you see what important things you need to do like swimming lessons, reading your home reader, checking the blog, going to football practise, dancing, setting the table for dinner, cleaning my room, polishing my school shoes, bedtime etc.

A Poem in my Pocket

This week is National Literacy and Numeracy Week and the theme for this year is A Poem in my Pocket. Year 1 read the story Quick as a Cricket by Audrey Wood and illustrated by Don Wood.

Quick as a Cricket story

They were inspired to write a poem using similes and opposites just as the boy did in the story. They planned their writing, wrote a draft which was edited and then published their amazing poems. Year 1 kept their poems in their pockets and shared them with other children and teachers at school.They are very excited to bring their poems home and share them with you!

What's the Time Mr Wolf?

Year 1 have been learning about time and clocks. We have learnt that a clock can be divided into halves and quarters and this can help us tell the time. We noticed that there are 60 minutes on a clock and these are in groups of 5. We have been practising our half past times...we can say it two ways - half past 6 or six thirty (6:30).

Below are some blank clock faces. If you want to print them off at home and put some half past times on them you can then play Crocodile, Crocodile with them...or make your own watches with times on them!

Some Learning at Home activity suggestions

 

A reading activity idea  -  after you read your home reader this week, why don’t you try and be a word detective and find describing words (adjectives) on 3 pages of your home reader.

If you like you could also practice some sight words by playing the following game... 

Click here to play a sight word game

One Is a Snail, Ten Is a Crab

This week we read the book 'One is a Snail, Ten is a Crab' by April Pulley and Jeff Sayre.

This book challenged us to think about the different ways that we can put numbers together to represent a new number.

In the book, each animal represented a number. 

 We followed a success criteria to show the different ways that we could make the number 10.

 We wonder which numbers you could try to make at home using the success criteria?

Some numbers you might like to try are 12, 20 and 16.

Math activities to play

Below is a link to a website that reinforces some of the concepts we cover at school in Mathematics.
Since we have a hands on approach to problem solving in Mathematics, this site is more directed as question and answer type problems, so we strongly suggest you sit with your child to complete the activities so that you can discuss together what the task is asking them to do. Alternatively you can use some materials you may have at home for your child to use to help them solve the problems and model their thinking.

This is not a compulsory task, but upon reflection from our 3 way conferences and feedback from yourselves we thought we'd offer you and your child some extra activities and resources you can access from home.

Mathematics Link

Bug Club

In the holidays Year One will practise their reading using Bug Club.
To be successful readers and learners using Bug Club, Year One have come up with a success criteria.

Success Criteria

• Ask an adult for permission to use the internet
• Get  your Bug Club license
• Click on the Bug Club link to log in Bug Club Log In Page
• Type in your username
• Type in your password
• Pick a story to read
• LISTEN to the whole story first
• READ the whole story yourself
• ANSWER the reading bug's questions
• Log out until your next visit
• Put your license back in a safe spot

Happy Reading! :)

Another App Update!

This is an App we have been exploring with children who are still developing their handwriting and letter formation. It uses the NSW Foundation Handwriting Font, which meets the Board of Studies outcome for Handwriting Skills. If you have a stylus it is recommended you get your child to practise their letter formation using this tool, as it acts like a pencil and works best to develop your child's fine motor skills and pencil grip.

For further information about the App, feel free to look at the link below

http://ourinspiredclassroom.wordpress.com/2012/05/22/red-writing-australian-made-handwriting-app-and-so-much-more/

Happy App-ing!

What can we find out about shapes?

We have been exploring shapes in Year 1. We had a challenge to make 3D shapes using paddle-pop sticks, match sticks, play-dough and Magnetics. Here are some of the shapes we made...

Stage One Excursion to the Powerhouse Museum!

Last Thursday, we went on a trip to the city to explore the Powerhouse Museum.
We had a fantastic day and saw many interesting and creative things. There was so much to see! We saw everything from fashion, to transport, space, furniture, steam, and even robots!
Some of the items we saw were almost 100 years old!

Here is a snapshot of our day at the museum...

Our ideal Learning Studios...

At the end of term 1, year one chose a section of their idea learning studio to design and make. 

Before we could begin to make our models, we had to complete a bird's eye view or perspective drawing of the area of the learning studio that we chose.

Take a look at some of the final products!

We have continued to explore ways that we can count more efficiently. We have learnt that sorting our collection into groups helps our counting, especially when we play Roll and Collect. 
Last week, the teachers gave us a challenge. Our success criteria was to sort our collections using pairs and groups of ten.  We worked with a partner to test different ways that we might achieve this.

We worked out that if we sort our collection into pairs and in rows of 10, our counting is much more  efficient! It took us 20 seconds to count our collection by 2's... It only took us 6 seconds to count our collections by 10's! We were amazed!