Rainy Day
Pitter patter pitter patter….Outside, that is what it sounded like all day long. Then we remember once again that just before Tokyo is under the beaming Summer sunshine, comes the rainy season when it rains and rains and rains. At the park, you might have spotted the beautiful hydrangea at full blossom in colors of pink, purple, blue and white. Look carefully at its leaves because you will see lots of holes in them and you wonder who has been eating away the leaves. It is also the time when we put on our raincoats and welly boots and explore the wet world—splashing in the puddles and collecting rain drops in a bucket. There is so much fun :) Even indoors, there are so many things we can do. Here is what it looked like in Buds today...
Morning Activities
Making Juggling Maracas
We cannot believe that our Shape Carnival will be coming up next week along with our End-of-year party! Everyday, we are so busy preparing for the BIG day. Today, we made hand-made maracas. All the colorful eggs on the table, brought us all a smile :) We could each choose two eggs and then using a small spoon, we carefully poured in some dried beans and beads. We showed how good we have become in holding and using a spoon. Once the two pieces where tightly closed, we used posca markers to decorate our own eggs. It was a bit tricky keeping the eggs in place to draw on them because they kept rolling over the table…!
Papier Mache
Together with Erika, we dressed Mrs. Pink Balloon with strips of newspaper and a mixture of flour and water (1:1). It was so tempting to throw Mrs. Pink up in the air and bounce it up and down. It was good that it was secured in a box—this way, it was easier for us to add the mixture with paint brushes while we had to think about taking turns with our friends :) We wonder how this sphere shaped object will be used...
Sticking Manes On Our Lions
Thanks to Goh-san who is always so gentle and patient with us, we worked more on sticking the strips of yellow and orange construction paper around the painted paper plates. The teachers will make few more finishing touches and then we hope to show you our lions very soon!
Slides, Tunnels, Lego Blocks and More
The floor area is always so busy—each engrossed in our imaginative world! Now that we have been exposed to the fun effects of a mirror, H wanted to explore it more! This is also a great chance to be vocal about our needs and ‘demand’ what to be taken out, just like C insisted the slide to be out. Many friends also wanted to take out the babies and enjoyed a quiet time with the baby reading books. Some other friends took out the musical instruments like the other day and performed a great show!
Circle Time/Music & Movement
Not being able to go out to the park, we took this opportunity to do lots of movements. In our first circle time, we started on a slow tempo, pretending to hold a beach ball up in the air and then turning into an ice-cream cone. Next, on a fast tempo, we shook our heads up & down/side to side, bent our knees and jumped around, got down on our tummies and spread our arms like wings and crawled on our hands and knees like a happy/angry cat. We also had fun walking on slow and fast tempo as we listened to the music carefully so that every time the music stopped, we also had to stop! We also loved making a pizza with our rhythm sticks!
In our second circle time, we played two Japanese games: 1) Mukkuri Kuma-san and 2) Kagome Kagome. For the first game, we gathered and sang around the sleeping bear and when the hungry bear woke up, we all run away! For the second game, we made a circle holding hands, singing and walked around a teacher who was covered in a white cloth. When the song finished, the person who stood right behind the teacher in the middle called out the teacher’s name and the teacher had to guess who it was! It was so exciting to see a teacher under a cover that you can imagine many friends trying to peak underneath! E and L volunteered to ‘hide’ together with the teacher :)
Love from all the children in Buds xoxo