Kia ora e te whānau,
It is incredible to think that we are into the second half of our first term together... and what a fantastic term it is! The tamariki are well-settled into school life, including our routines, timetables, and expectations. It's a joy to listen to them referring to our school values at both mat time, and during their learning and play. Their ability to articulate their thinking and their reasoning is second to none, and we're very proud of the way that they are already 'living our school values' (in particular, 'We Care' and 'We Get There Together' which are our focus values for Term 1)!
Kotahitanga (Getting On Together):
Throughout this first term, we have been focusing on the importance of making connections, forming, maintaining, and sustaining relationships.
Over the term, our work has (and will be) related to:
- personal identity and self worth (feeling good about ourselves)
- belonging
- talking about ourselves, including about our feelings and expressing our opinions
- enhancing relationships (working cooperatively)
- communication
- friendship (defining friendship, establishing friendships, maintaining and sustaining our friendships)
- social environments and, in particular, our class (aroha; what it looks like, feels like, sounds like; and making good choices in our happy hub!)
Maths in the Koru team:
Our Maths programme in the Koru team is made up of several different components:
- Warm ups
- A sequence of lessons focusing on a particular strand, or strands, of Maths (e.g., Maths and Statistics, Geometry, Algebra, etc.)
- Problem solving
- Maths games
Warm ups:
These take place at the start of each Maths lesson, and can take the form of an activity we call Notice, Think, Wonder, another activity we call Move and Prove, or a focus on number knowledge.
'Notice, Think, Wonder' will begin with a photograph which is designed to stimulate thinking and questions. Some examples might be:
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| What do you notice? What do you think? What do you wonder?
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The letters 'a', 'b', and 'c' (and also 'd' as the children become familiar with the activity) are positioned on corners of the mat. The tamariki are given thinking time and then might be asked to 'turn and talk', to discuss their thinking with a learning buddy. They are then asked to move to the letter which represents the option that they have chosen. The 'prove' part of Move and Prove asks children to justify their thinking - why did they choose the answer which they chose?
- All About Us (a 3-week topic, focusing on Number, Geometry, and Algebra)
- Pattern Makers (Algebra)
- Counting One to One (with a focus on Number Structure and Operations)
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| An example of a possible Maths problem |
- We love visiting the library each Friday:
- Here we are practising our interoception activities:
- Practising the letter sounds and forming the related grapheme:
- Playing schools:
- Playing hospitals:
- Practising writing the heart words:
- Practising our Skip and Bounce pen grip:
- More fun at Learning Through Play time:
