Busy busy bees

We hope our mums had a fun coffee morning while we were busy having our fun time at school. We continued working on our canvasses which are evolving daily. Downstairs we had some visitors come and look at the school and we are happy to be welcoming Santiago from Columbia and Abiya from India in our class on Monday. They are both three years old and we look forward to spending many fruitful days with them and our teachers. Upstairs we will welcome Andres Felipe who is Santiago’s brother. On our second canvas we pasted some transparencies with pictures on them and we also pasted some of the mono prints that we made yesterday. The transparencies had pictures of flowers on them and there is also one with part of Tokyo tower. If you look really carefully at the painting you may be able to see Tokyo tower. Shelley looks at the canvas carefully all the time as if to ask it, what it needs but we think that paintings cannot talk! We hope that she knows this! She seems to think that she knows what she is doing.

 We also made our own individual works of art using some of the same materials that we used on the canvas. We used pieces of white paper as our base and brushed glue on the back of the pieces that we were pasting on to it. At the small activity table we played with coloured paddle pop sticks. We collected them in our hands and tried to see how many we could hold and then we laid them on the table and tried to count them. We spoke about things that sparkle in the sky at night and sang “Twinkle, twinkle little star” and then Shelley showed us how you can make stars from paddle pop sticks. There were two kinds; one that was made with five sticks and one that was made with six sticks. They are both stars but slightly different in shape. We all chose the five sided one and will decorate it soon. Our new friend Abiya sat at the table with us while we did drawing and cutting. She also came to the park and then she told her mum that she was not going home with her, but she was staying with us.

Upstairs we were divided into three groups at activity time; one group made cards for painting; the second group looked at a book called “How to catch a star”. We had a selection of different coloured paddle pop sticks and tried to make either a five pointed star or a six pointed star. We tried to make a star shape with the Kapla blocks however they were too short and fat. This activity followed on from the story that we read during library time. It is the story of a boy who wants to catch a star however he just couldn’t. He saw its reflection in the ocean and then a star fish washes up on the beach. He was so happy to see the star and thought that he had really caught one that was up in the sky. We counted the points on the star in this story and there were five. The third group added green paint to the large canvas using spoons to make lines and brushes to splatter. Each of us rotated to a new activity when we completed one of them. Oliver, Noa and Sophie hid behind a large piece of newspaper so they didn’t get splattered with paint.

 In circle time we practiced some social skills related to greeting people when you see them. We said “good morning” to our teachers and friends and then said “how are you?” Our friends answered “I am fine and you”. When we had free play time, Noa, Yossi and FJ all dressed up together. Yossi was a pirate, Noa said that she was an animal doctor and FJ was riding the heart motorbike cushion. Sophie, Emily and Noa all completed their pretty flamingoes by adding feathers and sticking the flamingo onto its base so that they can stand up.

We are sorry to hear that so many of our friends, their siblings and parents are not well. We send our love to everyone and wish you all well and hope that you will be back at school soon. We want to send a special get well wish to Christine as she is really not well. Please take a rest and we are waiting for you to return to Ohana when you are much better.

Tomorrow will be a treat as we are baking with Yossi’s mum, Chana. She is coming to bake special challoth with us. Challah is the bread that Yossi and his family have on the Sabbath every week and it is so delicious!

Love always Shelley, Darren, Nanako, Ayaka, Christine, Goh, Liezel and Sabine.