Important Notices School is closed on Friday 1 June for Teachers INSET Day. School is closed on Monday 4 June in lieu of Vesak Day (Saturday 5 May). Field trip on Thursday 31 May for our Exit Point “The Olympics”. Look out

for letter and permission slip end of next week. Our last Pottery session for this term will be on Thursday 12 June. Dr. Roby Marcou will be speaking at Learn Different Wednesday, 30 May.

Details on the brochure attached. Please reserve your seats early as space is limited to 20 people. Fee is $40/person.

BIWEEKLY

NEWSLETTER May 7 — 18th, 2012

1 0 W i n s t e d t R o a d , B l o c k C # 0 1 - 1 6 , S in g a p o r e 2 2 7 9 7 7 T e l : + 6 5 6 8 3 6 1 1 2 8 F a x : + 6 5 6 2 3 5 6 7 9 7 w w w . l e a r n d i f f e r e n t . c o m .s g

I’ve noticed many parents coming to me concerned over their child’s auditory pro-cessing abilities and its effect on learning. For instance, a common concern sounds like this – “My child’s teacher told me that my son can’t hear properly in class. He is starting to fall behind in reading and spelling. The school counsellor said that I should have him assessed for auditory processing disorder. How do you assess an auditory processing disorder, and if he has APD, can you do anything to help him?”

APD is defined as a deficit in the auditory pathways of the brain that results in the inability to listen (Richard, 2001). As such, a multi-disciplinary screening process con-ducted by educational psychologists, audiologists and speech therapists is recom-mended to eliminate the influence of other factors such as IQ, attention, language disorders, peripheral hearing losses and memory on a reported listening and learning dysfunction. Once these factors have been ruled out, a comprehensive diagnostic audiological assessment can be conducted to determine which aspects of the audito-ry pathways are affected.

Management These are generic management options, therefore it is strongly recommended that you consult your speech therapist regarding managing your child’s APD. Every child’s APD profile is different and may include some of the following: Phonological awareness training Same/different training for the identification of non-speech sounds Prosody training (i.e. therapy for interpreting tone-of-voice cues) Exercises which require child to multi-task (e.g. sing and draw at the same time;

processing of heard information in the presence of noise) Modifying the classroom and home environment Speech therapy for APD

References Richard, G.J. (2001) The source for processing disorders. East Moline, IL: LinguiSystems, Inc. Cameron, S and Dillon, H (2005) Auditory Processing Disorder – from Screening to Diagnosis and Man-agement – A Step-by-Step Guide. Audiology Now (Winter, 47-55)

What is Auditory Processing Disorder? By Speech Therapist, Ruyi Tong

“ Auditory Processing

Disorder or APD is defined as a deficit in the

auditory pathways of the brain that

results in the inability to listen.”

Page 2

For the past two weeks, our class has been en-grossed in activities involv-ing our IPC unit “Olympics’’. In Science, our students learned about how exercise affects the body, and then we expand-ed the topic into more in-depth research about a healthy balanced diet. In History, we looked into how the Olympics began and linked it to Internation-al Learning. We watched several videos about the ancient Olympics, which showed a re-enactment of ancient Greeks holding an opening ceremony. We also watched selected vide-os of the modern Olympics and saw how the host country celebrates the opening and the lighting of the torch before the official games started. We all ap-

RECEPTION TWO , MS. ASHLEY ’S CLASS

preciate the amount of planning that goes into those ceremonies. After watching the videos, we started sharing our ide-as and observations on how the Olympic Games have changed over the years. Next, students were asked to choose one an-cient and one modern game that they liked best and to create a miniature person (made of pipe clean-ers) representing a particu-lar event. The most challenging part of the week was when we had our “Olympic Quiz Ball”. We partnered our students with their as-signed buddies and asked them to work together throughout the game, mak-ing sure they agreed on their answers. We were a bit surprised at how well

YEAR ONE , MS. KATRINA’S CLASS Ending! In Maths, our stu-dents were busy learning how to multiply using arrays, and later on mastering their 1,2,3,5 and 10 times table. Pretty impressive for Year 1! Today, to celebrate the spirit of the Olympics unit and to add some healthy competi-tion, the whole school went on a field trip to the Ameri-can Club where they strengthened some muscles and learned to bowl. Every-one had a great time.

Cheers class for a job well done!

This week, Dillon's dad brought in step-by-step instructions on how to make an Angry Bird using coloured modeling clay. Dillon and his Dad have been making lots of angry birds at home and they offered to teach the class how to make them. Thanks to Mr. Ng for bringing in the materials and to Dillon for con-ducting the workshop and for sharing his hobby and hidden talents with the

Class. We had heaps of fun! As for IPC, this week our students are inventing their own musical notes by creating sounds using their own bodies. We saw lots of tapping of cheeks, stomping of feet and clicking on fingers to only name a few of the musical notes that they created. The students were then asked to draw a musical symbol to rep-resent their sound. These

notes and sounds will be used to compose a piece of music for their fa-vourite sport that they have already chosen. For Maths, the children are still covering money as a topic. We did coin rubbings and we prac-ticed counting our 5's. For Literacy, we have finished most of our comprehension books. The children are getting a better grasp on their sentence structures and

they were able to answer some very tricky questions. Of course the winner did not receive a Gold medal or Laurel leaf, but they did get a chance to a lucky dip from our lucky dip bag.

In Literacy, our Year 1 stu-dents learned composi-tion. They worked diligently at improving their reading comprehension and are working on expressing their ideas by selecting words using a dictionary and the-saurus. They also had to organize their stories which involved a Bold Beginning, Mighty Middle and Excellent

spelling errors. We will be moving on to the next col-oured book for our com-prehension. Lastly, we ended the week with a field trip to the American Club for some fun bowling! See you next week.

Page 3

RECEPTION TWO , MS. KARINA’S CLASS

RECEPTION ONE , MS. GETTY ’S CLASS

continue to work with the long vowel sounds in the following week. This week ended with the spirit of sports-manship from our bowling field trip held at the American Club. The children had an opportunity to practice their coordination when they bowled and at the same time learn the rules in the game.

Great job, everyone!

Everyone is an athlete

for our latest IPC unit

“Olympics”. In History,

we learned so much

about the Ancient Greek

and Modern Olympics

and compared the simi-

larities and differences

between them. In Arts,

we said ‘hello’ to the

mascots for the 2008

Beijing Olympics and this

year’s Olympic mascots

Wenlock and Mandeville

as we learned how im-

portant they are to the

the children played buy-ing and selling during Maths. We worked to-gether to turn the class into a small shop! We sold items available in the class and pasted the price tags on the items. The children applied their skills in counting in 2’s, 5’s and in 10’s when counting their money. They did an outstanding job at adding different values of money togeth-er.

This week was the busiest week as the children did a lot of research activities about Greece and its neighbouring countries. They learnt to locate Greece on a map and dis-cussed the geographical features of it. The chil-dren also gathered some information on similari-ties and differences be-tween Greece and its neighbouring countries. They created their own fact sheets and had an opportunity to present their findings during as-sembly time. Two thumbs up for their hard work and enthusiasm. Learning about money became more exciting as

Olympics and how they

were created. We drew

and decorated our own

mascots and designed

our own Wenlocks and

Mandevilles. We wel-

come you to come see

our creations! The stu-

dents worked diligently

in Literacy wherein the

younger group focused

on their sounds (r, j, v, y,

w) and blending c-v-c

words, while the older

group learned consonant

blends, spelling and sen-

tence writing. In Maths,

we focused on further

developing our addition

problem-solving skills

and practiced using our

methods.

We ended the week

with a field trip to the

American club for a fun

time of Bowling. The

In Literacy, the children were introduced to the long vowel sounds. They made vowel posters and sang the song about long vowel sounds. They played vowel game “a-e- i-o-u, you can do what I can do” while learning the long sounds of the vowels. The children will

kids showed their bowl-

ing stances, slides and

follow-throughs trying to

get that elusive strike.

It was an awesome way

to end the week. Have a

great weekend!

Every child deserves the right to be taught in the way he or she learns best!