It’s been a very busy start to the term for Year 6 Blue. The students are now busy with their daily learning and are making very pleasing progress. They are looking forward to the school musical and all the other exciting learning opportunities on offer throughout the term.

“ I had lots of fun teaching the little kids in Year 1 & 2 about traditional indigenous dancing. I got to teach them the Black Duck Dance” Makaya TK

Religion
We have begun working through a unit titled “Pioneering Christians”.  Throughout this unit the students will learn about the significance and the wisdom of / writings of the Saints, including St Mary of the Cross MacKillop, for communities of believers. They will Locate and record information about the contribution of pioneering Christians (laity, clergy, religious) in Australia (c.1850 CE – c. 1900 CE) to the preservation of faith and the shaping of particular communities, including Indigenous communities. 

Year 6 had the opportunity to attend the NAIDOC Mass at St Bernards in Week 1. It was a great opportunity to come together with the other South Coast schools to celebrate Mass and acknowledge some of the Indigenous students across the region.

“I loved doing my Confirmation because I want to learn more about God” Benji P

“I enjoyed doing our saints projects and I learned a lot about St Joseph” Kade C

“We just started our new novel ‘Once’ and just finished the first chapter and I’m excited!” Elyse B

English
We have been working in both our Spelling Mastery and Reading Mastery groups to hone our skills to improve our reading and writing skills. In class we are reading the novel ‘Once’ as our class novel. We have been using this as a springboard for our writing and research. Once is a 2005 children's novel by Australian author Morris Gleitzman. Set in 1942, it is about a Jewish boy named Felix who lives in Poland and is on a quest to find his book-keeper parents after he sees Nazis burning the books from a Catholic orphanage in which had stayed for 3 years and 8 months.

“I like doing Spelling Mastery because I learn new words nearly every day” Levi D

“ English is an important subject to me because learning English isn’t just morphographs and vowels, it’s about expressing yourself through sentences and stories and sharing your emotions with other people” Ruby H

Maths
In Maths we are enjoying working in our Connecting Maths Concepts (CMC) groups Monday - Thursday. These groups are helping to consolidate learning of key concepts with the four operations, in particular multiplication and division. 

On days when CMC is not run, Year 6 has been learning about column graphs. They have investigated how to read and interpret frequency tables and column graphs.

”In Maths I love how it challenges me” Xavier L

“I struggle a bit in Maths but this year I am getting so much better” Elka H

“In Maths we have been learning how to create common denominators when working on fractions” Cooper C

Geography
This Semester Year 6 will be learning about Asia. We have started the unit by watching several short videos highlighting many of the countries of Asia and some of the landforms and interesting features.

“We have started to learn about Asia and the countries in it. I’m so excited to learn more” Lila W

Science
In the Earth and Space Science unit we are currently studying examines the composition of Earth and its atmosphere and the processes occurring within them shape Earth’s surface and its climate. The class will learn that sudden geological changes and extreme weather events can affect Earth’s surface.

“I’m looking forward to learning about earthquakes and volcanoes” Mitchell W

“At the end of last term we baked cookies in science. They were pretty good” Billy I

“It’s amazing how tectonics plates move” Jimmy H

Art
We have used our Art time well over the past fortnight. We have created optical illusion art pieces as well as lead sketches and watercolour art inspired by wattle flowers. We have also begun rehearsals for the Year 6 dance item in our upcoming school musical.

“We have been working on the musical lately and I am really looking forward to it” Sophie VW

“In art we have been learning about optical illusions and it’s so fun” Aria S

PDHPE
On Thursday afternoons Mr Paul Hill has been teaching Year 6 a personal safety unit. The students have been very engaged. They have also been playing a number of games focussed around soccer.

“I like doing soccer for sport” Ky N        

“I am very excited to keep learning about safety and soccer” James D      

STEM
Our current STEM group has been busy constructing their water bottle rockets. These will be tested at Carroll College in Week 4. 

“It is fun creating water rockets and going to Carroll College to learn about forensic science” Spencer S

Mr Matthew Harpley
Teacher 6 Blue