Bye Jeth! Hi Caroline!

Today was our last lesson with Jeth as our KIDFIT instructor. He cannot come and teach us on Fridays anymore due to his studies at university. Hanna will be coming to us from next Friday and we look forward to starting off a new theme in our lessons with her next week. Today was the last day for us to learn about our hearts and how we can take care of them. We listened to our hearts and heard them beating so loudly. Our obstacle course helps keep our hearts beating at a certain rate. We especially love crawling through the tunnel and doing somersaults on the mat. Many of our friends who are older, can do a somersault all by themselves, without Jeth helping them.

 We shared free play time with our friends from downstairs and really enjoyed playing together with them. Tokutaro and Miya played on the carpet with the wooden Kapla blocks together with Lily, Sophie and Sean. Together with Ayaka’s help they built a wooden tower which went as high as they could build it. Jamie and Clodia shared the larger pink and white Lego blocks and make a house together. It was a wonderful morning of co-operative play where we all shared our toys and worked together in small teams. It was so much fun.

We have been involved in a group project making a train upstairs and Miya spent some time at the table helping to decorate it. She used red paint markers to start colouring the body of the steam engine. Nico and Sofia enjoyed playing with the play dough that we brought upstairs.

The reason why we started off the morning together was because Caroline Pover was downstairs talking about how she came to be working for the people of Oshikahanto and what she will do for us in preparation for our matsuri there at the end of March. All the big people who were there listening to her were inspired by her and what she has managed to achieve there since the tsunami and earthquake in 2011. There is so much more to do and our school is playing a part in helping people there – all of us can make a difference!

In the library we read “You are much too small”. We think that sometimes when you are small you can do things that people who are big cannot do and vice versa. Size does not matter, it is the effort that you put into everything which counts more. We sang “Where is thumbkin”.

In the park we all helped prepare our small patch of garden as we are going to be planting on Tuesday next week. We took watering cans to the park as well as shovels. We needed to prepare the soil and make it a little softer as it has all compacted together from the cold, snow and rain over the past few months.

We marked out a space and tilled the soil and then mixed in some water with it. We will loosen the soil again just before we plant on Tuesday. We also asked the ward office to send us plants rather than flowers as the flowers die really quickly in this cold weather. Just before spring time and before we leave the park in our neighbourhood for our move, we will ask them if we will be able to have a garden in Step Park too.

Towards the end of the day, some of us in the classroom downstairs did puzzles and read books as we had not fallen asleep. Many of us are getting bigger and we no longer need nap time so after we have rested we get up and do quiet activities e. g. drawing, cutting, puzzles, games etc. Yesterday we did matching which we forgot to tell you about. We each chose a board with ten pictures on it. The pictures were seasonal pictures depicting summer, winter, autumn/fall and spring. We looked for the individual cards that matched with each picture on our boards. When we had completed one board, we could select another one and do the same thing again.

We want to wish everyone a great weekend; stay warm and hopefully it will be an “almost” spring day on Sunday with temperatures forecast for 17 degrees.

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