Term 3 in infants, it’s hard to believe i’m writing this post today!
As with every break, it will take a day or two to settle back into routine in the classroom, but not as long as previous breaks.
I like Term 3 in Infants as you can explore so many topics that remind you of Summer days and sunshine, unlike our recent weather. I have used the Camping, Aquarium and Travel Agents topics in Term 3.
Term 3 is an ideal time to push the oral language and writing in your Aistear areas, encourage the class to use as much of the topic specific language as possible in their groups. I try to have a key vocab display in my Aistear area with new words. As part of the planning and review of Aistear session my class had clipboards each. They had planning sheets for each day and at the end of the week we added them to their folder. I also had a laminated vocab sheet in the pocket of the clipboard to encourage the children to write sentences independently, for some children I also added a list of key sight words to help. Encouraging the children to write in the clipboards is a great assessment tool also as you can identify approximate spelling and transfer of learning. I also left packets of post-it notes in the construction area so they could make signs and labels for that area.
For Junior Infants I also put a focus on sight words in Term 3. If you are using Jolly Phonics you will have come across some tricky words however I would also introduce a further 2 per week to add to their tricky words. I am a big fan of the Word Attack Pack as a resource for Sight words, but there are also many other resources online for Dolch Words.
In Senior Infants I focus on fluency in Term 3 based on their current knowledge of sight words. I will have a more detailed post about this in the coming week.
Teachers sometimes have the Maths Curriculum finished early in Term 3 and want to know what to do, I recommend securing the knowledge they have and focus on problem solving skills and mental-maths skills rather than looking at the Maths books for next year. Games to focus on the missing addend will develop their mental maths skills. I particularly like the games from Ready Set Go. One example is to place counters in a box, counting them as they drop in, then shake the box and take some counters out. Show the class how many counters you have take out and ask them how many are left in the box. By doing this regularly in the class you will develop their recall of number facts. You could also use this game when teaching the story of number.
In Junior Infants you could develop their subitising skills using lots of dice games and domino games. By rolling the dice encourage the children to identify how many dots are on the dice without counting. There are lots of online printable activities to make for these games such as this game from Miss Mernagh. Games could be developed further for Senior Infants.
Happy planning everyone!
If you have any questions please send me a PM.