End of Year Teacher Message

Wow, it is extremely hard to believe that 2015 is nearly over. What a fantastic two years it has been teaching all the beautiful students of Room 21. It is hard to believe that the little kids who came to me at the start of Year 2 are now heading into Year 4 as mature, confident young adults.  It has been an incredible journey full of academic growth, personal bests and many fun times along the way.

To see how each and every child has developed their knowledge and understanding has been an absolute pleasure to witness. Room 21 is truly full of the hardest working students I have ever met, and their determination shines through in everything they do. I could not be more proud of their achievements, but even more so, the attitude they have towards their learning. 

In the future I am certain that I will see many of them becoming scientists, teachers, doctors, lawyers, gymnasts and possible even some actors and comedians! 

One of my favourite quotes is “Together may we give children the roots to grow and the wings to fly” and this year I feel exceptionally lucky to have such a great support network around Room 21 to help the children to do this! The key to a successful education is having both the teacher and parents working together to ensure the best outcomes for your child, so thank you for your support and encouragement! I wish all you and your family a happy and safe holiday. 

All the best for the future.

Kind regards,

Mrs Caris Szczepanik

Congratulations

Congratulations to all the talent dancers of Year 3 on their outstanding 'Afro Circus' performance Tuesday night. It was amazing to see each of you give it your all and have fun! Well done.

Donovan Village Choir Visit

On Monday, 14 students from our class, who are in junior choir, went on an excursion to Donovan Village to perform many songs to the residents there. Some songs that were performed include Raining on a Rock, Be True, Silent Night and many other Aussie sign alongs. The residents were so thrilled by our performance. They even cooked us a delicious morning tea for afterwards. We had many conversations with them and found out lots of interesting things like some residents came from England, had 27 grand children and were nearly 80 years old.

Megha and Samo even showed off their incredible skills on the piano. Megha played Silent Night and Samo played Srilankan song which was outstanding. Well done girls and everyone who performed!

Samo wowing the audience!

Megha playing Silent Night!

Class Party

As a way of celebrating student’s dedication and hard work throughout Year 3, our class will be having a celebratory lunch on Wednesday the 16th of December . Please bring in a plate of food to share. Boys are to bring in sweet food and girls are to bring in savoury food.  Please don’t provide anything with nuts. There will be a class list on the door. Please indicate what you will be bringing.

This lunch will run between 12.00pm – 12.40pm so if you are bringing hot food in, just before 12pm would be a great time, as most classes are having their class party on this day so heating up food may be difficult.

The students have been working extremely hard and I feel this is a great reward for them.

Thank you for your ongoing support,

Mrs Caris Szczepanik

Prime Maths

This year we have been using Prime Maths. We absolutely love our coloured course books and, the practice books allow us to show what we have learned numerous times. Over the past year we have worked so hard to get our Prime Maths books finished and we have now completed all chapters! It is very important to go over what we have learned over the year, so for the next 2 weeks we are doing revision on all the concepts we have covered. 

This includes:
- Number work
- Addition and subtraction
- Multiplication and division of numbers into the hundreds
- Problem solving
- Adding and subtracting fractions (which is actually a Year 5 skill, how cool is that!)
- Money: making different amounts as well as adding and subtracting
- Length
- Mass
- Volume and capacity 
- Area
- Time to the nearest minute
- 3D shapes
- Reading maps and graphs
- Symmetry
- Angles: acute, obtuse and right angle
- Perpendicular and parallel lines
- Looking at chance and data 

It sure has been a busy year!

Swimming

Over the last two weeks our class has been participating in Swimming Lessons at Belmont Oasis. We have had so much learning new styles of swimming and even diving into deep water. It has been great and also very tiring! We love being in the water when it is so hot outside. We would like to thank you for getting us to school on time so the bus can leave promptly. 

Book Return

As the end of term is fast approaching all Library and Reading books MUST be returned by the end of next week. Please don't stop reading as it is an important skill that needs continual practice! 

Thank you :) 

ICT in the Classroom

Wednesday afternoons our class is lucky enough to go to the Computer Lab and use the laptops. Today our lesson was to type up our amazing narratives about a Hero. We had to use Microsoft Word, save our work onto a thumb drive, create a cover page by inserting a border and pictures and make sure our work was presented well.

We are then going to print off our stories and make a class book for everyone to read. 

Presentation Night Costume

During Term 4 the students of Room 17 and 21 have been busy practising their class Edu-Dance item ready for the Presentation Night concert. The theme of the dance is Circus. As a part of the item each student needs a costume. Please help your child to organise the costume listed below.

·        - Bright colourful clothes. Colourful suspenders may be worn as well.

·         -Colourful long socks

·         -Coloured hair spray. Please note this must be washed out before school the next day.

·        - Red face paint for rosy cheeks like a clown. This must be applied prior to attending the venue.

Please ensure clothes are easy to dance in and are age appropriate.

Students will need their costumes ready for Presentation Night on Tuesday the 15^th of December.

Thank you for your help!

Chemical Science - Term 4

The focus for Science this term is Chemical Science. We are exploring how solids and liquids are influenced by different temperatures.

We have been conducting many experiments in class with a variety of different materials such as honey, rubbing alcohol, water and chocolate. 

Some of our finding so far have been:

• Chocolate is a solid but when heat is applied it turns to a liquid
• Water is a liquid but when placed in the freezer it turns into a solid. At really high temperatures water turns into a gas like the steam out of the kettle
• Rubbing alcohol stays as a liquid no matter what temperature it is placed in
• Honey can freeze but only at extremely cold temperatures, otherwise when placed in the freezer it just crystallises

We had to investigate what materials at home melted and why. Thank you for assisting us to complete our homework.

Stay tuned to find out more about Chemical Sciences, as we have more interesting facts and experiments to come!

Swimming

Last week a letter about swimming went home to all families. Our swimming time is 8.45am - 10.10am. Please ensure that during Week 7 and 8 your child arrives at school on time because we will be lining up for the bus at 8.40am and the bus will leave at 8.45am sharp.

Students must to come to school in their bathers as we won't have time to change before hand. To make it easier for your child, they are able to wear thongs to the pool. Please ensure their school uniform and correct footwear is packed in their school bags so they are able to change upon our return. They will be required to have their school shirt over their bathers. In a plastic bag clearly labelled with their name please pack:

• Towel
• Goggles

EDU Dance

We have been very busy getting our groove on in Room 21 and practising our EDU Dance for Presentation Night! The song we are doing for our dance is...... Afro Circus from Madagascar. We have learnt many funky dance moves and we are loving our dance! 

This link below will take you to the song so we can revise the dance at home:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=slMub4NtrSk

Writing Development

At the end of Year 2, Mrs S got us to write about the same topic as this week: Should animals be kept in cages? 

She kept the writing we did at the end of last year so we can compare it to the end of Year 3. Although there are still a few weeks to go and lots more learning to come, we thought we would bring home our current writing and our past writing to show you how much we have improved!

Please make sure all writing books and old writing samples are returned by Tuesday the 3^rd of November. 

It has been truly impressive for everyone, and Mrs S, to see how far we have come in a year. From spelling, sentence structure, ideas and vocabulary every single person has improved. We are very proud of ourselves and Mrs S is one happy teacher!

Uniform Award

Congratulations to Room 21 for winning the Uniform Award again! It is a great accomplishment which we are very proud of. 

Well done everyone!

Sports Equipment

With the profit we made from our Rocky Road Stall at the Student Fete last term, our class voted to purchase some really fun sports equipment that the school doesn't have! This term, we are pleased to announce that our sports equipment has arrived and we are absolutely loving seeing the rewards of our hard work.

Some of the sports equipment that we got includes:
- Totem tennis
- Ball catchers
- Grip ball
- Hand balls
- High bounce balls
- Frisbee
- Bowling set
- Elastics
- Guess who
- Twister

We are currently working on our Totem Tennis skills so watch this space for future tennis stars!

Sustainability - No Throw Thursday

What is Sustainability you might ask? 

Sustainability could be defined as an ability or capacity of something to be maintained or to sustain itself. It’s about taking what we need to live now, and thinking about what we will need in the future and conserving that.

This term, our class are becoming Environmental Protectors and investigating ways in which we can create a sustainable future. Simple things such as reducing the amount of waste you throw out, walking instead of driving your car, turning off lights when you aren't needing them and turning the tap off whilst brushing your teeth can make our planet a more sustainable one.

We have been learning all about the 3 Rs - Reduce, Reuse and Recycle. One way in which we can support our environment is by bringing lunches to school that are wrapper free, therefore reducing our waste. Each Thursday at our school in No T

hrow Thursday. Every student is required to bring a wrapper free lunch and each person who does this gets one point towards their classes total. At the end of the term, the class with the most amount of points wins a special prize. Please assist us to bring wrapper free lunches each Thursday and create a more sustainable environment!

Sustainability will lead to a happy future for all of us. 

Student Diaries

Each Monday morning, our class fills out our Student Diary for the week. In our diaries we record special events, reminder notes such as remembering our library books, homework and any upcoming tests. This helps us be organised and prepared for the week ahead and lets our parents know special events that are coming up!

To help us be prepared for the week, go through our diaries with us each Monday afternoon so you too, are aware of any special events that might be taking place in our school. 

 Organisation is the key to success Mrs S always says!

Centenary Fete

This Sunday the 1st of October, from 11am - 4pm, is Wattle Grove's Centenary Fete. It is going to be an amazing day filled with rides, loads of stalls and displays that show Wattle Grove's interesting history. To make our Centenary Fete even more special, students and families are encouraged to dress up in their olden day outfits from 100 years ago! 

I would like to thank all the wonderful families in Room 21 who volunteered their time to ensure our fete runs smoothly. Your help and support is greatly appreciated! 

Our class is responsible for the plant stall. If you haven't already, and are able to, donate any plants you may have that would be a massive help in ensuring that our stall is successful.

It is going to be a fun filled day and I can't wait to see you all there in your olden day outfits. 

 

Literacy Pro

Our goal for this term is to complete (and pass!) as many Literacy Pro quizzes we can! At the start of each term, we sit a Literacy Pro Reading Test to see if we have improved our reading and gone up to a new coloured book. It is very important to do at least one quiz per week to ensure we are practicing our reading, fluency and comprehension skills. 

The people who had completed the most quizzes went up by the most points, so it really is a wonderful program that works effectively when used regularly. Mrs S is nearly running out of stickers with the amount of people getting stickers on their chart for completing quizzes! It has also been wonderful to see people receiving certificates at assemblies for completing lots of quizzes.

Keep up the wonderful work Room 21 and enjoy getting lost in books.

We have read nearly 3 million words!

Look how many quizzes we have completed.

 

Spelling Term 4

We have been so busy throughout the year that we have covered all of the Year 3 Phonics Sounds! Spelling lists this term will be a review of some of the phonics sounds we are having difficulties to implement in our writing.To find out which Phonics Sounds we needed a little bit of extra practice on Mrs S gave us a spelling test. 

If you notice that some of the sounds have already been covered throughout the year and some of the words are the same that is why! After all practice makes perfect. 

Spelling rules!

 

Library Term 4

This term to ensure students are getting the most out of their Library sessions, instead of having one period of Library each week for 40 minutes, Library will now run on even weeks (2, 4, 6, 8, 10) only and are now double sessions. This means each even week students will get an 80 minute Library lesson.

The students are extremely excited for this change to take place as it is less rushed and they really get a chance to indulge in books! Please help to remind us to pack our library books each Wednesday during even weeks. 

Happy reading! 

Old Socks

Our class came up with an amazing way to keep our mini whiteboards clean and tidy by using none other then..... SOCKS! If you have an odd sock that is missing its partner, has a hole in it or is simply too small these days please send it into class (washed please) so we can reuse them as mini whiteboard rubbers. Not only do we have clean whiteboards but we are also helping the environment by using old items for new things, therefore reducing the amount of rubbish. Pretty cool right!

Send in your old socks!

 

EDU Dance Money

Just a reminder that EDU Dance money is due in this week as our dance lessons start on Wednesday. This is a compulsory activity for all students as it forms part of their Health and Physical Education Program, and the dance is performed at the end of year Presentation Night.

ALl the students love to get their groove on, so please get your money and permission notes in ASAP.

Thank you! 

Term 4

Welcome back to Term 4!

Once again, we have a very busy term ahead of us, but the class focus will still remain on the teaching and learning of Literacy and Numeracy. 

This term we have:

• Swimming lessons in weeks 7 and 8
• EDU Dance in preparation for our end of year presentation night
• Presentation night
• School Centenary Fete on Sunday the 1st of November
• Reports home to parents

It truly is hard to believe that there are only 10 weeks left of Year 3! Looking back at the start of the year it is incredible to see the progress each and every student has made. I am really looking forward to seeing how much more we can achieve over the next 10 weeks.

Thank you for your ongoing support,

Mrs Caris Szczepanik 

Assembly!

Just a reminder that our Assembly is this Friday the 25th of September. Everyone as been extremely busy learning their lines and practising their plays which are looking very impressive! Please make sure you arrive at school on time on Friday with your costume on ready to go.

Break a leg Year 3s!

Student Fete

To celebrate our school turning 100 years old this year our school had a Student Fete. Our class decided to make Rocky Road to sell. We had to apply to the Wattle Grove Bank for a loan of $80 to make our product. Each of us were on a specific team to ensure our stall ran smoothly. We had a finance team, decorating team, set up team, selling team and an advertising team. We constructed a Business Plan for our stall and presented it to Ms Roberts who thought we did a fantastic job. Ms Roberts then gave us our $80 to purchase everything we needed to make our product and decorate our stall. 

There was a lot of work involved in making our product, selling our product and we even needed to consider how our stall looked so we would attract our customers.  We made over 80 Rocky Roads and sold them all! We were all so excited when we sold out. We raised over $80 to spend on class room items that we get to use this year!

We are still looking at what we would like to purchase for our classroom but stay tuned so we can update you on our purchases in the near future.

Our class all dressed up!

Our stall all set up.

Our team ready to sell

Smiles from our selling team

 

Uniform Award

Room 21 is extremely proud to announce that at the last senior assembly our class won...... the Uniform Award for having the most amount of students dressed in the correct school uniform! Mrs S was thrilled about the win and so were we. Check out the trophy we received!

Well done Room 21. Keep it up!

Very proud of ourselves!

 

Congratulations Room 21

I would just like to say a huge CONGRATULATIONS to all the students of Room 21 for their outstanding History Posters! I am so proud of the efforts and creativity that each student put in, to ensuring their projects were presented incredibly with detailed information. Each poster shows a lot of hard work and I am one extremely proud, happy teacher.

The posters are now hanging up in our room for everyone to see the hard work we have put in. Please feel free to come in and have a look!

Mrs Caris Szczepanik
Class Teacher

The Day I Fell into a Book

For our Big Write Session last week, we had to write a narrative using our imagination all about pretending that we fell into our favorite book! We had to help the characters of the book solve a problem. We also had our own problem to solve like how are we going to get OUT of the book?

Here is us with our favourite books!

Below are some examples of our writing at the exact moment we fell into our books!

Ella

It was a stormy night! It was raining cats and dogs and I was snuggles in my warm bed. I had just started reading my favourite book, Pandamonium! It was about the Zoo animals who borrowed the Zoo Keepers keys. Then..... ZAP! I got zapped by lightning!

Joshua

The street was pitch black when Mum was driving home. I was about to go to sleep but before I did I read a Horror Henry book which was a little bit creepy! I flicked through each page. SUDDENLY a dreadful, terrible black hole stretched its slimy pitch green hands out and sucked me into the horror book!

Charlotte

On a frosty night, I was relaxing on the lounge with my pillow behind my head and my blanket was on top of me. I was reading a book called Green Princess Saves the Day. When it was midnight, I was about to turn to page 10.....

30 arms pulled me into the book. I thought I was in the book but I wasn't quite sure!

Jack

One sunny, beautiful, green morning I was in my bed snuggled up. I was reading Little Aussie Adventures. When I was reading my book my sisters came in annoying me! They finally went back to their rooms to have a nap. Suddenly.... I was sucked into a black hole! Right before my eyes was an ants nest.

McKenna

I was in an orchid, the sun was shining like a camera flash that never turned off. I was under an amazing, wonderful, memorizing pink lady apple tree. I was reading Cat and Mouse in a Haunted House. It was suspenseful. Under the tree i fell asleep.... 

History Posters

Last night the students in Room 21 brought home their coloured card so they can start constructing their "How Schools Have Changed" Posters. Just a reminder that their posters are due Monday 24th of August Week 6. If you need more information please look through our blog as the project information sheet is posted on there or feel free to arrange a time to discuss the project.

I really hope the students find assembling their posters a lot of fun and that their creative juices will flow!

Mrs Szczepanik
Class Teacher