Kindergarten Blog, Jan. 29: We are the Same, We are Different

No one looks the way I do;

I have noticed that it’s true.

No one walks the way I walk.

No one talks the way I talk.

No one plays the way I play.

No one says the things I say.

I am special, I am me;

There’s no one else I’d rather be.

As we continue to learn about who we are, we’ve also learned how to appreciate our similarities and differences with other people. 

This week, the blue team continued to work on their body picture called This is Me, as well as their self portraits. We also took photos of each child and the children cut their photos in 2 parts. Then the children played the game called Which Parts are Mine? It was a fun game for everybody!

In the yellow team, we learned that our different physical characteristics make us unique. We created a puzzle out of each child’s face, and the children guessed which eyes, nose, mouth, and forehead belong to whom. The children were so keen on the details of their classmates’ features. “This is Ren because he has curly hair,” they said, or “This is Yuuma because his smile is happy.” They are all so observant!

We continued to strengthen our observation skills by playing a game called Guess Who. The children enjoyed figuring out their partners’ mystery character by asking simple questions, such as “Does he have yellow hair?”, “Does he have glasses?”, “Is she wearing a necklace?” They crossed out the characters that didn’t fit the description if their partner answered “no,” or they guessed the mystery character if their partner answered “yes!” 

We also used our body to learn how to count and measure. We wanted to see how tall we are or how long some of our body parts are by using some of our classroom toys. We discovered that Mia is almost 9 markers tall — so is Alya! Leanna is one of the tallest in the yellow team with 12 tiles!

We also learned new rhymes, songs, and practiced our alphabet, too! 

It was a very busy and fun week in Kindergarten! We’re all eager to keep on learning!

Your Kindergarten teachers,

Pam and Azusa

Additional Information: 

1. Please check our school's Coronavirus Health and Safety Policy for your reference through this link.

2. Access more information about the Scholastic book orders through this link.

Pre-KG Blog 19 Connecting our subjects through books

Pre-KG Blog 19  29.Jan.2021

Connecting our subjects through books 

Looking at books, reading to the children and talking about books is much practiced in our Pre-KG classroom, which gives the children a chance for new discoveries, acquisition of new vocabulary, discussions and questions and of course it fosters their literacy.

I am a big fan of the writer / illustrator Eric Carle who understands it to beautifully and creatively combine fun, learning and art. Our classroom owns most of his books and they are extremely popular with our Pre-KG children.

Many of his books like “The Very Hungry Caterpillar”, “Brown Bear, Brown Bear” and “From Head to Toe” etc. have become classics and can be found in almost every household with young children.

Of course many of the books also center around our current unit subjects of “Animals and Food”. 

It is good to see how some children start to choose a book that has a connection to our current conversations in class. 

After we were talking about farm animals and shearing sheep, one of our children wanted to borrow the book “Charlie needs a cloak” by Tomie dePaola, which shows the whole cycle from shearing the sheep to the finished cloak. 

What a great way to deepen knowledge at home!

We also play games with cards that we made from copies of our books and they are a good tool for the children to show that they can understand the book and can make connections between the pictures. 

Every week our Pre-KG have the chance to borrow a book from our school library, so please read to your child and enjoy the discussion that usually follows !

Pre-KG Blog 18 Stepping up their game !

Pre-KG Blog 18  

Stepping up their game !

The Pre-KG children are finding out more and more about their current unit subjects of “Animals and Food” and they have shown that they can not only name objects, but are already able to sort them into categories !

Every child chose a favourite animal and a favourite fruit and succeeded to put them into the appropriate bowl!

Classifying objects, defining similarities and differences, comparing and sorting help children to develop a range of thinking skills for problem solving.

The Pre-KG children also played a board game with a farm theme where they learnt to roll a die, count the dots (math!), move their tractor along accordingly and then find the corresponding animal card.

Even though the game was classified for a higher age, our 2 and 3 year old Pre-KG children were able to wait their turn, follow the rules and they also showed great concentration !

So please play some board games at home, you might be amazed at your child’s skill. Board games really foster a child’s social and mental development.

At the end of the week, the children faced another challenge : Online lessons !

Again, the Pre-Kindergarten children showed that they can observe well and are really improving on their communication skills.

What a busy week with lots of learning opportunities and great game players ! 

Well done, Pre-KG !

KINDERGARTEN BLOG, Jan.22 : Who Are We?

 “Who are we?”

This was the question that kicked off our new unit of inquiry in Kindergarten.  

“We are all people,” they said.

“We are children, too.”

“We are students in DSKI.”

“We are all friends.”

“We all have a family.”

The children have discovered that they are all similar in many ways. In the yellow team, they’ve connected this with a book called, “We Are All the Same, We Are All Different” This book is special because it’s written by children just like them! 

To see how they are similar, the blue team and yellow team children looked at the mirror and pointed out the parts of their face. They saw that they all have a pair of eyes, a pair of ears, a nose, and a mouth! They drew their self-portrait, and they came up with wonderful artwork that shows their similarities!

On another day, we talked about the other parts of our body that we have. The Kindergarten children noticed that we don’t only have a face, we have a body, too! The children traced their body on a big sheet of paper with the help of a friend, and they used their creativity to decorate their work! In the yellow team, they also labeled their work to identify the parts that they’ve drawn. 

To see how they are different, the children went on different fun challenges. In the blue team, they were challenged to measure their height and weight, and they noticed that everybody has a different size even though they are the same age! In the yellow team, they made handprints, footprints, and drew their families and interests — they measured their height with string too! 

In our online classes, the children learned that they are special even if they are different from each other. In the yellow team, they discovered that they have different likes, hobbies, and skills through a show-and-tell session of their favourite artefacts. They also gathered a collection of artefacts that's all about them!

It was a fun week of learning about ourselves! We will include our photos once we go back to school. We can’t wait to learn more.

Your Kindergarten teachers, 

Pam and Azusa

Pre-KG Blog 17 The Year Of The Ox …..and a lot of fruits

Pre-KG Blog 17  

The Year Of The Ox …..and a lot of fruits

A happy new year 2021 to all our Pre-Kindergarten families! 

May this year of the ox bring us all some much deserved strength, positivity and peace of mind.

The Pre-Kindergarten children are very fond of cows and sheep. Since we have moved smoothly into our next unit of “Animals and Food” at the end of last year through “wooly” art projects, the children have shown great interest in the animals' eating habits. 

No, cows don’t like fish or meat, but they love green grass. 

But they would NEVER eat the plastic grass on the Sheraton hill, according to our clever children.

As already mentioned in a previous blog, the children also love their bentos and they love their snack boxes as well. As these include a lot of fruit recently, the children were very eager to learn all of the names.

Then the Pre-KG s children looked at all their toy fruits and veggies and matched them to their puzzles. 

To satisfy their curiosity further, we went on an exploration walk to the nearby Daiei supermarket, where the Pre-KG children could find plenty of fruits. 

The children already know most of the names, so we can move on to our big book of fruit and vegetables called “Eating the Alphabet” and expand the children’s vocabulary. 

Do you know what a gooseberry is? Please look it up with your child.

With best wishes for a fruitful year, please all stay healthy and on the green side of life !

 Welcome back to school, unicorns and butterflies! We hope you had a nice winter holiday.

The Kindergarten rooms were bustling with activity the past week. Eager and excited voices can be heard as the students reconnected with their friends after a long break. 

Here’s a sneak peak into the fun that we’ve had in school: 

The Blue Team came back with big smiles and enjoyed the first week with their friends. The way they played together changed a little — they now enjoy playing in bigger groups than before! They made a zoo together and had a fishing game without having problems in taking turns.

The Yellow Team welcomed their new teacher, Ms. Pam! They got to know her better through games, stories, and explorations in and out of the classroom. New routines were introduced to go hand in hand with the ones that are already in place, and essential agreements were made together to encourage ownership. They also welcomed the new year through a letter scavenger hunt in the playground. Can you guess what they spelled? 

Next week, the Kindergarten team will begin a new unit focused on the transdisciplinary theme, Who We Are. In this unit, we will inquire into how the increasing awareness of our personal characteristics and abilities, and those of others, allows our self identity to develop.

We will learn about our physical characteristics and social traits, and celebrate our similarities and differences with other people. 

It’s going to be a fun journey to self discovery, indeed!