End of School Year Party Fun

What a wonderful party it was today to celebrate the end of the year. It was great to see so many of you attend to celebrate a successful and exciting year together. It was also a time to feel a little sad at saying ‘goodbye’ to our close friends Blue, Clodia, Allie as well as our graduates Beckett and Sophie. It is always an emotional time for all the teachers to see the children moving onto new places and experiences. It really tugs at your heartstrings and leaves us all close to tears when the time comes to actually say bye-bye. Before we started the party we had a little bit of time to play on the carpet area together. The train set is always popular with the children and this morning was no exception. Something we did do a little differently this morning was to put out the train tracks box but not put out any trains until we had put together lots of track. If we put out the trains at the same time they usually build about a meter and then move the trains back and forwards rather than building one long track that they can all play together on. We also had some new wooden blocks which were given to us by Sharee. They were very big blocks and quite heavy and solid. The shapes were interesting too with big arcs as well as triangular blocks and window or door shaped pieces. Allie and Clodia worked together and made a block train station while Tokutaro made ‘The Tokyo Tower’. The children then helped the teachers prepare for the party by rolling up the library carpet and helping fold the large carpet mat so the floor space was clear. Once the parents had arrived we were able to start our party by making a large circle together and checked all the mummies listening and looking skills by playing a ‘put your hands on your (body part) game together. Some of us were watching and copying rather than listening which made us all laugh. We then sang our funny ‘Open them, Shut them’ song which was so confusing and made us all laugh. We then all got ready for our special song and dance performance with our friends in the class. The first song we sang was our ‘Old McDonald had some vowels A,E,I,O,U’ song with cards. They all sang so beautifully and held up their cards at the right time. Well done guys!! Our Second song we sing quite often going to the park when it is a sunny day ‘You are my sunshine’. They love this song and enjoy getting the ‘sunshine’, ‘happy’, ‘skies are grey’ and ‘love you’ cards to show. We realy loved singing along to the Japanese songs ‘Haru ga kita’, ‘Cho-Cho’ and ‘Tulip’ songs with actions and our origami tulips. It was great to use some of our Japanese for this special occasion. We stood and really enjoyed dancing to the ‘1,2 buckle my shoe’ song and all enjoyed it when the CD player decided to skip and were wondering if it was going to keep on and on playing the same song. Luckily Share was nearby and managed to stop it for us. We all sat down with our mummies and daddies to play the next game ‘pass the parcel’. When the music stopped we unwrapped one layer of the parcel to find a gift eraser in lots of different shapes. We all felt so proud of our little eraser toys. Soon we got into 2 teams and played a game with chopsticks and some small things that are really hard to pick up. In each bowl there was a pom-pom, a pinecone, a bead, a bean and a button. We needed to use the chopsticks to pick up the things and transfer them to our friend’s bowls. We raced and raced and cheered on our friends until one team won. It was then time to say a few words about our children who are leaving and Beckett and Sophie who are graduating. Shelley joined us from downstairs and together we presented Beckett and Sophie with a graduation certificate with all the teachers in the class names on it. They shook hands and posed for photographs too! Congratulations to you both. Thank you to everyone who provided all the delicious food, cups, plates and napkins for the party snacks. There was so much to eat that we only managed to eat a little for lunchtime because we were so full. Thank you, thank you, thank you. We headed straight for the park to burn off some energy and were very lucky it was not too hot. Thank you all again for such a wonderful day. We hope you all enjoy the portfolios and gifts. All our Love, Darren, Nanako, Ayaka and Sharee