It was not Miyashita Monday today
There was a little problem this morning because Miyashita sensei is on holiday and we were not sure what to call today. Was it Meg Monday, Mirai Monday, Maddy Monday, Miles Monday, Monkey Monday, Magic Monday? When we were talking about which Monday we should use, Meg told us: “I think we can say Meg Monday”. We couldn’t decide but what we did know is, that today is Monday. And it is a sunny day. It felt a little bit like spring so we decided to go to the park and have snack there and play there earlier than usual. When we got to the park, we played in the warm sunshine and then had snack under the cherry blossom tree (without cherry blossoms). We saw the shape of the buds and we are looking forward to seeing the cherry blossoms opening soon. Meg said: “I can feel the sunshine on my cheek”. Alona said: “It’s too bright to open my eyes”. We played with Flowers Class friends and had a lovely early play in the park.
Earlier in the morning, before we went to the park, we had a puzzle fiesta with all of us choosing to work on a puzzle and develop our skills further. We also played with the trains, people from all around the world and play dough. Jotaro placed the people in a line and chatted while he was playing. Those of us who were playing with the trains, connected the tracks and moved our trains up and down them. At first Dev was playing with the trains on the carpet. Liezel asked him: “Would you like the tracks to put the trains on?” and he replied: “I don’t need the tracks to play with the trains. They can go around and around”. Afterwards, when he saw his friends connecting tracks, he too joined in and put his trains on the tracks.
We have some new puzzles in our classroom and have a huge floor puzzle with 70 pieces that we did so easily. Our teachers were amazed at how easily we could do it. The picture is of a garden with the soil below the ground, with some vegetables that grow below the ground and roots. Part of the pictures is of the sky and parts of plants which you find above the ground. We noticed that you can find leaves both above and below the ground.
While we were doing the puzzle some of our friends played with the large rubber Lego blocks. One of the things that our teachers are observing about us, with these blocks and some other toys, is how well we work together as a team. Sometimes we don’t even talk to one another but everything that we do, comes together. You don’t always need language to express your thoughts and ideas, you can make anything happen just by being together and working with one another in a positive way.
Before we got to work on our new puzzle, we counted the pieces and managed to find a container that they could fit in. Then Shelley asked us whether we thought that we would be able to pick up the container with the puzzle inside. We did some exercises to bend our knees and make sure that our legs and tummy muscles were strong enough, to life it. We couldn’t imagine how heavy it was until……………….and we were certain that we could pick it up and so we had turns. For most of us, we were surprised by the weight of it and some of us had to stabilize our bodies so that we didn’t fall over. Wow! It was so heavy. And then for the next part of the experience; could we pick our friends up? We chose partners and then tried to pick our friends up! This was not easy at all! Even those of us who had partners who were smaller than we are, we still struggled to pick them up. Our teachers think that we need to do some more exercises to strengthen our upper bodies! We laughed a lot when we tried to pick our friends up. Goh san picked Shelley up and vice versa.
And then Risako did her SHOW and TELL. She brought along some beautiful photos of her visit to “Akiyoshido Cave” in Yamaguchi, where her grandmother lives. The cave looked dark and Meg asked: “Was it scary inside? I can give you a flashlight so you can see”. Risako said it was scary and she was with her mum when she went into the cave. She showed us some pamphlets and she brought along a piece of rock crystal. We touched the crystal and saw that it had sparkly parts on it and it felt smooth and a little wet, even though there was not water on it. Risako said that there is water but you cannot go into the water. We saw that it looked like a lake. Thank you Risako chan for the interesting SHOW and TELL. We want to go to Yamaguchi to see the cave.
Today we didn’t have our proper rest time because we had a full evacuation drill. That means that we all walked to Nanzan Shogakko to practice evacuating the school in an emergency. Our families picked us up at Nanzan Shogakko.
Thanks for a great start to the last week of this term.
Love, all the children in Petals Class.