New Unit of Inquiry: Stories

The Stories unit of inquiry will be an ongoing unit. We will begin exploring the lines of inquiry now, and continue to deepen our knowledge and understanding through a variety of activities for the rest of the school year, often connecting to other units of inquiry. In this time, the students will have many opportunities to listen to, retell, and act out stories, as well as to create and share personal stories with others.

We will reflect on how stories make us feel, and why different people connect to different stories. We will investigate the reasons stories are told, and look into a variety of different stories. We will learn about the form of stories, recognizing the elements common to all stories (characters, setting, beginning, middle and end, a problem to solve), and inquire into the different ways stories are created and shared, for example through books, films, music, dance, and drama.

We invite parents and family members to come and tell/read a story to the class. We hope to have as many guest storytellers as possible! I will be sending a separate email discussing how to sign up for a time to come into the class.

We hope that the students come to understand that we are all storytellers and that through stories we connect with others to communicate ideas, feelings and beliefs.

Language Arts

Oral Language skills: The Stories unit is a great time to practice listening and speaking skills, as students will be asked to listen to, discuss and analyse a variety of stories. They will have opportunities to retell stories, answer questions, and tell their own stories.

Reading and Writing: We have introduced all of the letters of the alphabet, and students are applying their knowledge in writing and reading. In reading, we are practicing blending sounds, especially reading CVC (consonant-vowel-consonant) words correctly. Each student makes progress and his/her individual level.

In writing, students are encouraged to sound out words carefully, writing down as many letters as they can, and using a little line __ when they are not sure what letter to write. We continue to practice forming letters correctly, using the lower case. We are also introducing high-frequency and sight words to help the students in writing and reading. These include words that students are not yet able to sound out phonetically, and that should be recognized instead (e.g., I, the, like, play, my). These words will be added to our 'word wall' so that children can refer to them when writing.

Students continue to take home reading books each week. Please help your child read the books and return them to school promptly.

Mathematics                                                                    

In Maths we have been focused on developing understanding of numbers to 20, while learning and practicing strategies to add numbers. Understanding place value, i.e. that the 1 in 13 represents 10, is a big step for many Prep students, so we engage in a variety of hands-on, concrete tasks to build understanding.