February 26 - Welcome to Ukraine

Rainy but happy Tuesday! The Buds are here again! Welcome back Rupert! We know that you enjoyed seeing your relatives in Australia. We missed you so much and we’re so glad that you’re here with us having a great time and enjoying every moment with the toy cars, animals and of course, friends and teachers. Rupert could actually recognize some animals in the box and as he was showing them to his teachers, he would also make a sound of that particular animal. On our activity tables, we found some cutting materials and scissors. Dominik was the first one to try it and he was really good. He cut some diagonal lines, then straight lines and a circle. The first try was very challenging for him but when his teachers told that he needed to cut slowly and patiently, he was able to do a clean cut of the shapes and dotted lines. Great job Dominik! Rupert, Leanne and Sofia started coloring on their apples. We told them to hold the posca markers correctly and they were able to do that but with a bit of supervision. Leanne was doing it well and she chose the pink color for her own apple.

   Our circle time was very interesting. We sang the ABC song in a different way. John was showing us a tambourine. And then for each letter he sang, we had to tap the tambourine so that the song could go along. We had to do it slowly in the beginning until it got faster and faster. It was fun and all of us were able to make soft and loud sounds. After that, John showed the whiteboard with our faces on it. One by one, we identified each face and said the names out loud. We also had to recognize our names in letters so that we could put them beside our faces. Some of us would need to practice more in recognizing our names. We know if we do this quite often, we’ll be able to recognize our names on our own.

                We also had a visitor today. It’s Maryna! But she wore a different outfit and she looked stunningly beautiful. She had this crown that has sunflowers laced with a blue ribbon. She looked like a princess fairy in the pixie forest. Ukraine was her country of origin and she showed us interesting facts about her country’s flag and places. She asked us about what colors we see in the flag. Sofie said that it was blue on top and Dominik said it was yellow in the bottom. She also asked about the meaning of these colors and we made several guesses and she eventually told us that the blue color was the sky and the yellow one was the sunflowers. Furthermore, she showed us an embroidery from Ukraine and she also mentioned that her country is very cold that right now it is covered with lots of snow. She let us have a look at the pictures and most of the places there are indeed covered in white which is the snow.

                Maryna did some traditional Ukrainian dance for us too. She was dancing gracefully and the music was so lively and joyful. It looked easy and we felt that we could dance with her too. So she taught us a few steps and we then danced with her. She counted the dance moves slowly, and we followed it as much as we could. We tried our best. Leanne, Sofie and Rei were so focused and tried to copy Maryna’s movements. Great job!

                  It was an amazing presentation from our dear friend Maryna! She also let the girls try her flowery crown and the girls really felt like a princess from Ukraine. It was so funny that Rei even looked in the mirror just to see her face. The Buds enjoyed every bit of it and we hope that we could experience more of these activities from Ohana. The song we sang for you was from our hearts! Thank you again Maryna!

We didn’t go to the park because of the rain but we surely enjoyed our time inside the classroom. We got some manipulative trays and we used tongs to pick the beans from the tray and put them in a cup or bowl. Other kids scooped it with a spoon and did the same.

               We also had our art activity for the color book. This month was all about pink. We got some paper-folded hearts and colored paper. Our teachers let us identify what the color was in it. We all said that it was pink. And then John showed us how to rip the paper into several pieces. Then, we had to use a spatula to get some glue; we managed to put the glue on the ripped paper and pasted it on the heart. We did this slowly but it was a great way of practicing fine motor skills.

                 Some of our kids were also playing dressing up. And it was so cute to see Sofie as Peter Pan and Lisa with a big crown. Sofie, on the other hand, was actively showing her teachers how cool she was in Peter Pan costume. Nikolas loved to dress up too. He put on a helmet and wrapped a big scarf around his body. He was walking around and humming a song. He was like a king in that costume. Kaia was trying to speak a lot more for she always said “car, red car, Kaia likes… “and so on. Kaia was also very patient with her heart art activity. She also had some good fine motor skills in ripping and pasting the paper. Great job Buds!

We had a great time again in Ohana. See you all tomorrow. Happy Thursday!

Lots of love,

John, Sayaka and Maki