Pre-elementary Newsletter

Friday November 30th 2012.

From the class of Meng-Ni Shih

Special Events

Family Fun Day on October 26.

Happy Birthday Noah on October 31.

Field trip to Bank on November 16

Field trip to Survive Alive on November 30

CLASSROOM NEWS

Guest speaker from post office on December 3

Accomplishments

The students did a wonderful job for the unit celebration. They are very confident and exciting to sing Mandarin songs out loud. We all have a great time at the family fun day!

Reminders

The weather is getting cold. Please bring an extra uniform sweater or jacket for your children.  They will be able to wear them as needed

Please call the classroom number or email Diana and me before noon if your child is going to the child care or carline.

Any supply donations of tissues, cups, ziplock bags (big and medium), and clorox wipes would be greatly appreciated.

PYP NEWS

Our second unit of inquiry is “Our community” and the purpose of this unit is to inquire how we organize ourselves. The central idea is that there are people in our community who help us in different ways. We hope your children to learn the following key concepts: form, function, and responsibility.

There are various learning activities of the inquiry “Our Community”.

Reading and visual activities

-Recognize the function of community

-Listening stories about the role of community helpers

- Matching jobs with community worker roles

Art and Craft activities

-Drawing the type of my community- rural, urban, suburban

-Community map-students design and create their own community including things such as hospital, bank, post office, fire station, etc. They glue the pictures of the worker in the correct building.

-Role playing- students make the hats of police officer and fire fighter.

-The book of my community

-Field trip to the post office, bank, and fire station

Students got a deep understanding of the concept of community and why we should live in a community. They understood the role and importance of community members as it was reflecting in their questions. What would happen if there were no fire fighters? Many people would die if fire men were not there to help us. Moreover, they learnt how to accept others perspective and also that community is made up of the views and thoughts bought by the different community members.

These learning experiences will enable your children to develop particular attributes of the learner profile: inquirer, reflective, and open-minded.

We provide engaging, play-based activities that allow your children to develop a confident sense of self, problem-solving skills, and positive attitudes toward learning. During the circle time in the morning, I review the essential classroom agreements with children. This gives them practice in problem solving, helps them see themselves as

SOCIAL AND EMOTIONAL AREA

part of the group, and makes it more likely that they will cooperate. In discipline, the students learn what to do, not just what not to do.

We set up a clear discipline system. There is big score board could persuade students to keep good behavior and manners in order to earn more smiling faces. Therefore, they can develop the following social and emotional skills in order to be ready for school: ability to follow directions, ability to focus on a task, and ability of self-control.

FINE/GROSS MOTOR SKILLS

My goals were to increase the fine motor materials available in the classroom environment, and to plan activities and materials that are interesting and fun so that children would be motivated to use them and would choose them during their free choice time.

Children use their hand muscles to squeeze the chopsticks in order to pick up each pom pom and place it at the plastic ice tray. They need to count it in Mandarin from number 1 to 20. Moreover, Children place the paper on the carpet square and use the toothpick to punch holes all along the black lines. When they are done, they can hold their paper up to the light and see the light shining through the holes. Kids enjoy it and it is a great fine motor practice.

Gross motor control refers to the movements of the large muscles of the body.Children acquire new gross motor skills by practicing a movement or activity until that particular skill is mastered.

-Jump with two feet together, on one foot, forward/backward, over obstacles, repeatedly in the same spot, from a chair, from a bench to the ground, far, high

-Cross one leg over the other while walking

-Throw an object at different distances and at different targets

-Crawl forward, backward at different speeds

During the morning circle time, we review the following Mandarin vocabulary together. For the reading time, the children listen to stories regarding these Mandarin terms.

Basic Mandarin Vocabulary

灰色 (grey) 彩色 (colorful) 棕色 (brown) 粉紅色 (pink)紫色 (purple) 橙色 (orange) 白色 (white) 黑色 (black)脖子 (neck) 手臂 (arm) 眉毛 (eyebrows) 大拇指 (thumb)臉 (face) 舌頭 (tongue) 手指 (finger) 背 (back)指甲 (nail) 肚子 (stomach) 橢圓形 (oval) 立方體 (cube)長方形 (rectangle) 星形 (star) 心形 (heart) 圓錐體 (cone)圓柱體 (cylinder) 上 (up) 下 (down) 長 (long)短 (short) 矮 (short) 高 (tall) 外面 (outside)裡面 (inside) 遠 (far) 近 (close) 朋友 (friend)星期一 (Monday) 星期二 (Tuesday) 星期三 (Wed.) 星期四 (Thursday)

LANGUAGE

星期五 (Friday) 星期六 (Sat.) 星期天 (Sunday)PYP Unit 2 Mandarin Vocabulary

市區 (urban) 郊區 (suburban) 農村 (rural) 銀行 (bank)學校 (school) 消防局

(fire station )警察局(police office )

圖書館(library)

郵局 (post office) 醫院 (hospital) 餐廳 (restaurant) 公園 (park)消防員(fire fighter)

滅火器 (fire distinguishers)

消防栓(fire hydrant)

消防車(fire truck)

警察(police man)

警車(police car)

口哨(whistle)

手銬(handcuffs)

醫生 (doctor) 護士 (nurse) 麵包師 (baker) 老師 (teacher)郵差 (mail man) 農夫 (farmer) 牙醫 (dentist) 獸醫 (Vet)

We help the kids to develop “number sense” recently. It is difficult to define precisely, broadly speaking; it refers to “a well-organized conceptual framework of number information that enables a person to understand numbers and number relationships and to solve mathematical problems that are not bound by traditional algorithms” (Bobis, 1996).

Matching leads to understanding the concept of one-to-one correspondence. When are doing the matching activities, it becomes possible to match two sets.

Sorting-When children do sorting activities, they need to look at the characteristics of different items and find characteristics that are the same.

Ordering is foundational to our number system. In pattern activities, children have to be able to put items in an order.

The students practice pattern activities frequently in order to recognize in a series of shapes, numbers, and colors.

MATHEMATICS

Calligraphy is known as the art of fancy lettering. Practicing calligraphy is not just producing beautiful calligraphy works; it is also a branch of learning Chinese and discipline. Teaching children calligraphy can help improve penmanship and encourage creativity and attention to detail. When they pay attention on writing Chinese calligraphy, they learn how to recognize Chinese characters too. The kids love and enjoy writing Chinese calligraphy.

THE ARTS

Wednesday December 5th - Spirit Day "Wear lots of stripes" Thursday December 20th –Winter Break Begins, dismissal at 2:45 pm December 21st through January 7th – Winter Break, No school, No childcare available. Wednesday January 9th – Spirit Day “Wacky Wear” Thursday January 17th –P.A. Meeting from 8:30-9:30. School’s cafeteria. Monday January 21st- Martin Luther King Jr. Day, No school, No Childcare available. Tuesday January 22nd- Pre-entry visits for kinder and First Grade 8:30 - 10:30 am WednesdayJanuary 23rd – Pre-entry visits for Pre-Kinder 8:30 - 10:30 am Thursday January 24th – Pre-entry visits for 3YOP 8:30-10:00 am Friday January 25th – Children’s Day Assembly 8:30-9:30

CLAENDAR