In the Classrooms

Langley
The Langley children have been exploring how light moves and reflects using torches and lamps in our little dark tent. They have been fascinated with the star lamp which looks like the night sky reflecting on the roof! If you put your hand over the top, or your face, the stars show up on there as well! We’ve been singing ‘put a spot over there’ as we move the torch around the room to see where it will appear. It’s been on the roof, on the ground, on the couch and on our bodies. It’s very exciting to see who can find the spot first!
Kind regards,Jess, Adele, Kerry and Jennifer

Mead
Dear Parents,
While we have been exploring 'Shadowlands' this term, the Mead children have shown a huge interest in nocturnal animals. We have been reading lots of books about nocturnal animals and have been making some amazing animals out of junk materials to house in our nocturnal corner in the classroom. There was great excitement when we announced to the children that we were going to visit the nocturnal house at the Adelaide Zoo! The excursion was a wonderful opportunity for the children to see some nocturnal friends scurrying around and hiding in caves and trees. The bat and potoroo enclosure was highly entertaining with a great action for the children to watch! Once we left the Nocturnal House we all enjoyed a leisurely stroll around the Zoo stopping to look at animals that took the children's fancy, before meeting in the rotunda for a picnic lunch. A huge thank you to all the parent helpers for your time and assistance in making the day such a success.
Best Wishes,
Emma, Susan and Emma

Cooper
This week we have been reading Baby Bilby Where Do You Sleep? in Cooper room in preparation for our trip to the zoo. The children have been thinking about and discussing nocturnal animals and were very keen to find a bilby at the zoo... and guess what? We did! The Nocturnal House was very exciting (and no one was afraid of the dark). We saw many night creatures but by far the most popular were the bats which were flying spectacularly across their enclosure and hanging upside down. Outside we enjoyed the beautiful sunny weather and saw many favourite animals and enjoyed a picnic lunch in the rotunda. We had fantastic help from our Cooper parents who joined us for the excursion - they did a brilliant job! Thanks!
Kind regards,
Ali and Susan

Chapple
Chapple Room has been intrigued with our Solar System and what lies beyond! We’ve been so interested that we’ve learnt that there are facts about space that are real and true; things that astronomers and scientists know to be correct. We have even made our very own Solar System! We’ve also created a book to record all these things and to help teach you some of the things we know! Please come in and read this book with your child we’re sure you will learn so much! Here’s a sneak preview:

· The moon looks like it changes shape. There isn’t any water or air or animals or plants on the moon.
· A group of stars is called a galaxy. Our galaxy is the Milky Way.
· Space has many different temperatures. Some are so hot and some are so so cold.
· Saturn’s rings are made out of ice and rock dust.
· Jupiter is very hot. Jupiter has a Great Red Spot. It is a huge storm.
· There are more than 60 moons for Jupiter.
· The Earth is the third planet from the Sun and we live there.
· Asteroids can be made out of stone, rock or metal. Some have big holes in them.
· The first man on the moon was Mr Armstrong and ‘Buzz’ Aldrin.
· Big dishes can hear messages and signals from space. The Parkes dish helped the world hear about our first visit to the moon.
· There are lots of volcanoes and lava on one of Jupiter’s moons.
· If you go to the moon you would be squashed as flat as a pancake. It has really big gravity.

On Thursday we had a wonderful time at the zoo! It was so exciting to venture into the Nocturnal House and we were fascinated with the bats especially! All the various primates were also a big hit. A special thank you to the wonderful Chapple Parents and Grandies who supported us on this field trip!
Kind regards,
Kate and Juliana

Edgerley
We have enjoyed creating our space story for artsPACes this week using our video camera and dictaphone. We particularly enjoyed listening to our own voices played back to us. We used lots of different types of shadows and reflections to build our story about going to the moon. We hope that some of our parents can visit the Shadowlands Cinema during artsPACes and view what we have created.
We enthusiastically traipsed around the zoo yesterday and were amazed at the facts we already knew and could share about animals. Julian was able to teach us something new before we even got on the bus, showing us the grooves on the ground at the bus stop that help blind people know where to stand and wait. It was quite a wait for the bus but we enjoyed sticking our hand out when we saw number 141 coming down the street. At the zoo we loved the cheeky bilby and bats that hopped and flew in front of us at the nocturnal house and particularly enjoyed watching and listening to the meerkats. Luca did a great job of following the map and telling us where we needed to go. After the zoo we had a run on the lawn, turned cartwheels with Mr Kerber and had a climb in the roots of the ’monkey’ tree, the perfect thing for a glorious sunny day. What a wonderful trip and thankyou to all of our parent helpers.
Regards
Mel and Rosalie