Community Circle - Thursday 13th December

As the year draws to a close, we have been doing a lot of reflection on our year in Bicicletta. On Thursday our topic for community circle was "What will you always remember about Prep?"  Here are a few of the children's responses:

• The thing I will always remember about Prep is when we go on bush walks.
• The thing I will remember about Prep is when we do our machines inquiry.
• The thing that I will always remember about Prep is when it’s maths menu time…and the Tasmanian Devil.
• I’m going to miss Prep because I’m going to miss all the fun activites in Prep. 
• The thing I will always remember about Prep is the word wall.
• I will remember about you in Prep.
• The thing I will always remember about is the classroom, community circle and project time.
• The thing I will always remember about Prep is my teacher.
• The thing I will always remember about Prep is when we made the chains.
• The thing I will always remember about Prep is the school concert.
• The thing I am going to miss in Prep is the castle and making things in project time.
• I will remember how I made friends with (other children).
• The thing I will always remember about Prep is to read the time.  I can read that clock right now.  

Transition

On Friday we started our Transition program to give the children a taste of what it is like to be a grade 1 student.  

Bicicletta visited L'alveare (The Hive, otherwise known 1/2/3 downstairs) and spent some time with the current grade 1s and 2s, while the current grade 3s went to visit 4/5/6. We divided into groups, with a mixture of Preps, 1s and 2s  to get to know some of the bigger kids.  We rotated around a couple of activities, including indoor and outdoor games, community circle and maths menu.  

After the transition session, the children shared their thoughts about moving into 123.  

Things that are the same about 1/2/3	Things that are different
They had maths menu like us.	They have different maths menu (how was it different?) because they do different things…it was easier
They use the camera like we do in Prep.	They have more teachers.
They act like us…they make poor choices and good choices. I disagree, because I didn’t see them do any poor choices, I only saw them sit with me.	Well you have more teachers because they have more kids. Because it’s 123 so that means there’s 3 sets of children so they have to have 3 adults around.
They have community circle like us.	They’re mixed together, like the grade ones are with the grade two and threes.
They have the same chairs as us.	The classroom is different, cos it’s bigger.
They have a tiered seating like us.	They have 2 tiered seatings and we only have 1. One’s smaller, because they’re the same size as ours but there’s two because if you put them together it makes one.
	They’re older than us.
	They have 2 box of lego.
	The library is bigger.

Here are a couple of their recollections of things that they enjoyed during this session:

"I liked it, we played games and builded stuff."

"They had really fun maths menu."

"I learned how to, the big Charlie showed me how to use the camera in 123."  

"Well, we had these shapes like our shapes, and they had these pictures of what you could make with them and you had to try and make a picture with them like a candle or all sorts of stuff." (Maths Menu)

"There was another maths menu, and there was some blocks, and there was like pictures same as the animal shapes except the blocks and you had to build them and count how much they were."

We also discussed things that they might be worried about for next year, these included "The grade 1s being mean to me" "Miss Prep…my teachers, maybe some of my friends, because some of them might be up in the other learning community" and "I’m going to miss you and I’m going to miss the room."

A lot of students were already familiar with the space, having visited it with older siblings, friends and buddies or for committee meetings like the Green Team.  The 1s and 2s were very excited to be in a position to help the Preps navigate the room and the activities.

"It’s my brother’s classroom and I’ve been there before and it’s not that strange to me, so I hope I’m downstairs.

"It was my sister’s classroom."

"My friends Ginger and Jade are there."

Please note that we are visiting L'alveare purely for the purposes of transition -  to get a sense of what grade 123 feels like, to experience some of their activities, to get used to being with the older children and being in a different space.  This does not mean that your child will necessarily be moving to L'alveare next year.  More information about next year will be sent out closer to the end of term, and you will have the opportunity to nominate some friends that your child is comfortable with.  We do our best to ensure that children move up with a few friends.