The cold weather kept us inside this week.  The children had a lot of fun with the indoor recess activities.  They constructed rocket-ships, airplanes, and bunny houses with the Magnatiles, played Sleeping Queens and Loot, and grew gardens to feed the animals.  We are hoping for warmer weather next week so we can get out and expend some energy!

We were introduced to the artwork of Japanese artist Katsushika Hokusai, specifically his famous “The Great Wave off Kanagawa.”  We learned how he created his art by carving several plates of wood, then applying paint to the carvings and creating a print in layers.  We practiced this type of woodblock printing at the art table with some heart “carvings.”

We read the stories I Am Tama, Lucky Cat by Wendy Henrichs and The Beckoning Cat by Koko Nishizuka, both stories about the Japanese Lucky Cat and how he brings good fortune.

For a science activity we reviewed the difference between living and non-living then discussed and sorted photos of living organisms into the plant and animal kingdoms.

We began learning about Chinese New Year and the Chinese Zodiac Calendar, which we will be learning more about next week.  We read the stories This Next New Year by Janet S. Wong and The Cat’s Tale by Doris Orgel.

The art table was busy with students making koinobori carp streamers for Japanese Children’s Day, coloring their feelings buckets, stamping their passports, and printing with the heart carvings.

The students were very engaged with puzzles this week.  Every day our language area rug was covered by puzzles being constructed by groups and individuals.  They were really using their visual discrimination skills to match shapes and colors together to assemble them.

We had a special visitor on Thursday with Believe in Books.  Curious George came to see us.  We listened to the story Curious George and the Dump Truck, then gave George hugs, high fives, and waves.  Each child got to pick a book about Curious George to take home.

During science Friday students had fun mixing colored water to make new colors.  They each had three small dropper bottles, one of each primary color, red, yellow, and blue, which they used to make the secondary colors of green, purple, and orange, then mixed them all together to make brown.

Gerry Scott joined us to read a story for circle then the children had fun circling letter sounds in the Friday message and dancing with scarves.