Class News

Year Four Class News

Term Two has been very busy for Year Four!

In Week One we had an incursion with the Water Corporation. We looked at the use of water in Aboriginal Culture. They challenged us to go home and seek a leak around our homes to help with conserving water use in our households. We also learnt about sustainability and how wastewater is treated so it can be returned safely to our oceans.

This term we are also learning about European Explorers and travelled to Fremantle to visit the WA Shipwrecks Museum. Here, we saw the rebuild of the hulk of the Batavia which was found shipwrecked off the coast of WA. We were so excited to look at all the artefacts in the museum which told us more about the life of an Early Explorer.

In the Shipwrecks Museum, there was a guided tour where we learned about a famous European explorer whose name was William Dampier and all of the jobs that he had. We got to hold some ancient artefacts that were: a book, cannon balls, an hour glass, a quill, ink and lots of other cool artefacts. Another activity was finding artefacts in the museum.

We ate lunch in an indoor part of the museum and some people sat outside, but it was really cold out there! It was so windy that we thought that we might blow away like a kite! After lunch the two classes swapped over and got to do the other activity.

We walked against the wind all the way to the Round House. Unfortunately, because of the strong wind, the cannon did not get blasted in the ocean, but we did get to go into the Round House and saw a deep, deep well in the middle of the Round House. A man demonstrated how deep the well was by throwing a cup of water down. We were all waiting silently to hear the water drop down. We were waiting and waiting until the water finally splashed at the bottom of the well.

We had a fantastic excursion and want to say a huge thank you to the parent helpers that made this excursion run smoothly. We think all of Year Four would agree that this was definitely one of the best excursions ever!  

Year Four Wildcats Incursion
On Wednesday 22 May the Year Fours were surprised with an incursion from nearly everyone’s favourite basketball team, the Wildcats. The player that ran the clinic was none other than the captain, Damien Martin. We were so excited and thrilled! Damien showed us some fun basketball games to play. At the end of the session we took a photo with Damien and thanked him for coming to visit us at Infant Jesus School! 

Year Three Class News

The Year Three children have begun Term Two with lots of enthusiasm.  Our overarching topic for this term is ‘Australia’ and the students are eager to explore this place that they call home.

In Religion, the Year Threes have commenced the term focusing on moral choices and ordinary choices. Our Catholic Learners have come to understand that just like Jesus, we can choose what is right. Next, they will be focusing upon Jesus’ promise of the Holy Spirit to strengthen His followers. The unit introduces the children to the power of the Holy Spirit and how Catholics today receive this special strength of the Holy Spirit through the Sacrament of Confirmation. The Year Threes will also discover the human experience of belonging to a community.

During English, the Year Three children will continue to develop their reading skills of comprehension, accuracy, fluency and vocabulary. They will focus on a few reading strategies such as; Comparing and Contrasting, Making Predictions, Drawing Conclusions and Finding Word Meanings in Context. The Year Threes will be exposed to a variety of text types in particular Recounts and Information Reports. As Motivated Learners they will continue to study the patterns in words and learn new sounds to assist in their spelling. The children have started to complete an assignment about a ‘special place’ in Australia which they will present to the class.

In Mathematics, the Year Threes will investigate the relationship between addition and subtraction and use this understanding to solve everyday problems that they encounter. The Innovative Learners will also explore fractions in everyday situations and create written, pictorial and physical representations of halves, thirds, quarters, and fifths. Time will be a large focus of our learning and we encourage every child to be exposed to analogue clocks at home. Our Life-Long Learners will learn how to read analogue clocks to the minute and develop an understanding of the relationship between common units of time. They will discover angles in our classroom and classify them according to size. In Statistics and Probability, the students will develop their understanding of chance and will be encouraged to use chance vocabulary regularly in their daily conversations. The children will continue to play games, chant, write and sing their times tables to develop fluency. 

Our Humanities and Social Sciences program will focus on the children understanding the location of the states, territories, capital cities and other major features of Australia. The Contemporary Learners will discover the major attractions of our country and develop an awareness of our continent. The children will look at how each capital city is unique and how different cultural groups have shaped our nation. They are currently developing their artistic skills as they paint Ken Done Australian landmarks Later in the term, these Play-Based Learners will be creating their own imaginative landmark using clay. The children will also use computational thinking as they learn how to create a hyperlinked game on Keynote about Australia. 

In Week Seven the children are Connected Learners as they go on an excursion to Perth City. They will explore natural and man-made features and use primary sources to discover how the features of Perth has changed over time.

What a crazy term we have ahead of us. Lastly, the Year Threes can’t wait to present their Assembly item in Week Nine. These Leaders as Learners will surely put on a spectacular performance.

Sport News

Interschool Swimming 
On Thursday 9 May, the Infant Jesus Swimming Squad ventured to HBF stadium to compete against seven other schools for the B Division Inter School Swimming Carnival. The team all tried their best in their events, with some children taking home place ribbons and achieving personal bests. The sportsmanship and determination displayed at the carnival was simply outstanding! The day was very exciting as Infant Jesus School started at the top of the leader board and remained a front runner for the whole day. We ended up coming second by only 38 points. A special thank you must go to our parent volunteers; Mrs Allpike and Mrs Soh. Your support throughout the day was very much appreciated!

Faction Cross Country Carnival
I am very happy to announce that the 2019 Infant Jesus Cross Country Carnival will be held at Lightning Park in Noranda on Friday, 28 June 2019. The children have been practising their Cross Country in their Physical Education lessons. The carnival will be run throughout the day, with each year level having a designated race time period. More details will be in the newsletter closer to the event.

A summary of the distances each year level will run is below: 

Cross-Country Running Club
As our Year 1-6 children prepare to challenge themselves at the end of the term with our Faction Cross Country Carnival, I would like to introduce the Cross-Country Running Club. This provides the children an opportunity to improve their fitness to give themselves the best opportunity to achieve their goals at the carnival and it is also a great way to improve their physical and mental health. Running Club will occur on a Wednesday and Friday morning at 8am on the oval right up until the carnival. All children are invited to come and challenge themselves. If you are wearing your winter uniform, then wear your sport shoes and change into your black shoes ready for class. In the event of rain, we will cancel for that day.

When:  Wednesday and Friday at 8am starting Week 5 (Wednesday, 29 May)
Where: School Oval
Who:    Year 1-6 (Pre-Primary are welcome to come and challenge themselves as well)
What to bring: White sport shoes if you are not wearing sport uniform

Year 6 Winter Sports Carnival
Due to the large number of schools participating in the 2019 Winter Carnival, the CPSSA decided to split the schools into an East and West division. Due to this division, the date of the Winter Sports Carnival has been changed to Friday, 21 June 2019.

The competing schools in our CPSSA are:
St. Helena’s, Holy Cross College, St. Brigid’s Primary, St. Brigid’s College, Good Shepherd, St Peter’s, Mary MacKillop, Infant Jesus School.

The venues are:
Soccer – Yokine Reserve
Football- Coolbinia Oval
Netball – Noranda Netball Association Courts at Garson Ct, Noranda

If any parents are able to help on the day of the carnival, please email or leave a message at the office. We will require a coach and umpire for each team, any parent help is greatly appreciated! The teams are just about finalised and will be released shortly.

Mrs Lauren Jenkins
Sport Specialist