Monday's Yogis

Miyashita Monday! That’s what today was. Our classroom was not whacky today, it was marvelous and magnificent and magical and all the things that we could think of that start with an “m” sound. We started off the morning, taking photos of our friends. We took full length photos of one another which we will be adding to our page in our Portfolios that has our weight and height on it. We are just about to finish putting all our work into our Portfolios, so that we are ready for the end of the year party, when we present them to our parents. We also are checking to see that we have all our work in them, that we did during the year. We have enjoyed being a part of making our Port-folios and choosing what we would like to put in them. We used the camera and took the photos instead of our teachers. This was fun for us since we haven’t had much chance to use the camera during the year.

During the morning we spent our first day, playing with our 3D neighbourhood. We loved using cars and adding other accessories to it. We had a big traffic jam in Azabu Juban because the red light was broken. When Shelley said that she had to get to the airport, and she was worried that she would miss her plane, because of the traffic jam, Miles said: “It’s okay, the police will take you.” Shelley said: “I didn’t do anything wrong, and don’t want to go in the police car.” Miles said: “The police will lead you there.” Then Shelley felt better. The traffic jam was still there at the end of the day! Maybe while we are home, the traffic light fixers will come and fix the red light. The cars have been stuck for such a long time.

In gymnastics, we played a fabulous game called “Wan, Nya, Boo”. Wan is for a dog, nya is for a cat and boo is for a pig. We were in groups of three children and each one of us was an animal. We danced around in our groups and when Miyashita sensei said a sound of one of the animals, that person had to leave the group and find another group. We therefore had to remember what animal we were. When we found a new group, Miyashita sensei would check with us to see that we were all in the correct group. We put up our hand when he called out our sound; and each time, we were correct. It was such a fun game with all of us full of smiles. When we do some exercises in gymnastics, we choose how we are going to do them. You can see that some of us lay on our backs to go underneath the elastic, and some of us went on our tummies.

After gymnastics we did some Yoga with Hisami and as always she lit a candle in order to create the right am-bience. A few of us went upstairs to the garden on the deck to water the flowers. It was a hot weekend with only a little rain, so we think that the flowers need some water. We know that later this week it will rain, but for now, we feel that the flowers need food and nourishment.
We sat together for our morning meeting and noticed that we had a new teacher in the class. We were not sure what her name was but we thought that maybe she came from another country. Junto thought that she came from China and he was correct. She is a student from Toronto, Canada and she is studying to be a teacher so she came to Ohana International School for her International placement. Some of us knew the other students name which is Ziqi, because it was her birthday on Friday and we celebrated with her in Buds Class. We played a game to try to work out her name.

Shelley: What letter of the alphabet does Ziqi start with? Children: The last letter Shelley: What is the first letter of the alphabet? Children: A Shelley: Okay, I’ll give you the second sound in her name now. What is the first sound in my name? Children: Sh……. Shelley: Quite right. So her name starts with an “A” and the second sound is “sh”. Junto: Ashley All of us: How did you know her name? Junto: I heard it before.

So today we welcomed Ashley into our classroom and we think she enjoyed herself. Hisami, Ashley, Junto, Dev, Yurika and Mirai went to the park, to make the soil soft in our Ohana garden, as we are getting some new flowers tomorrow, which we will plant there. We noticed that some plants like the hot weather and some don’t. Some of the flowers in our garden in the park, don’t like the sun and were plants that preferred the winter season and some of spring. So, we are replacing them with plants and flowers that like the sun and heat of summer.
While they were in the park, we made some birthday cards for teachers who have their birthdays in June and July. There are so many teachers who have their birthday in June and July. It will be like working in a birthday factory! We also continued our new snack time, and ate whenever we were hungry or wanted to. Shelley had her breakfast at the snack table so Junto and Mirai joined her for their snack. We are loving the freedom that our teachers have given us, to make choices and choose when we want to eat. They want us to try to think about our own hunger rather than just eat because that is part of our schedule. So they changed the schedule so that we could have more part in decision making.

We’ve come to the end of another day when we did many of our favourite things, like singing, gymnastics, art, playing, taking care of the garden, discussing, chatting, eating etc. We have such a short time left with our class of 2018-2019, we want to make the most of our time together, and fill each other up with joy and all the things that make us feel good.
Thanks for a Marvelous, Musical, Magical Monday.
Love all the children in Flowers Class.