Learning Enrichment News
Over the last few months, we have continued to explore the power and wonder of the written word during Learning Enrichment classes. Golden Hill was fortunate enough to acquire several of the 2024 Children’s Book Council of Australia’s award -winning texts, to help inspire our students. One of these, ‘Hope is the Thing’ (Johanna Bell/ Erica Wagner) gave rise to some beautiful and moving poems by both Class 3 and Class 5 (literacy support) students.
Journal writing has also continued to be an important part of our writing practice in Class 3 and 4, with some original and accomplished writing being inspired, in particular, by responding to the work of Australian artist Shaun Tan:
In Class 4, students have been focusing on learning to increase their critical awareness as readers, by writing book reviews. In both Class 3 and 4, we have now begun to turn our attention to Indigenous texts as part of the students’ Spirituality and the Dreaming focus. We have used Venn Diagrams to consider the similarities and differences between ourselves and Yolngu children in North East Arnhem Land and are now focusing on the Noongar dreaming story ‘The Carers of Everything’ shared by Elder Noel Nannup, to understand how story holds Country in and around the South West of WA.
In Class 5, students have been rewriting a scene from the Class 5 play, ‘Into the Labyrinth’. Students have been asked to replace the character of Theseus with that of Ariadne, a Cretan princess, in the scene where Theseus battles and slays the Minotaur, and reflect on how this unsettles our notions of gender roles. Parents, be prepared for some different conversations around the dinner table this term!
During Term 2, Class 6 focused exclusively on bringing greater depth and complexity during narrative writing, through focusing on narrative point of view, tone, dialogue, tense, character development, setting and description. This resulted in some striking and original narratives, as seen in Faith’s wonderful story about a seed:
Class Six will now be honing their craft when writing persuasive texts, as well as learning the stunning ‘Lost Words Blessing’; the musical evolution of both ‘The Lost Words’ & ‘The Lost Spells’ books written by acclaimed author Robert Macfarlane. Rudolph Steiner emphasised the critical importance of goodness, truth and beauty in education, with a particular emphasis on beauty in primary school. ‘The Lost Words Blessing’, as well as the award-winning texts the students have been studying, help us to appreciate the importance and beauty of language; its vital role in connecting us to each other and the incredible planet on which we live.