🌎 Happy Earth Day! 🌎 We celebrated earth day today by joining our efforts together to make our EY1 Earth Collage. Some students also chose to make their individual earths to take home. We also talked about how our individual efforts to reduce waste can help save our Earth. Specifically, after washing our hands, if we only need one paper towel to dry our hands, we should take just one. We watched a video and learned that paper comes from trees!
Video we watched – “How Paper Towels Are Made from Trees“
This week is the start of our Term 3. It’s hard to believe that we are already in our last term of the school year. Before too long, we will need to send our EY1 students to EY2. “No goodbye!” as we’ve often heard this year. We will continue to thoroughly enjoy learning together until that time.
We would also like to take this opportunity to welcome Nabil and his family to the EY1 class and community. Nabil has an older sister in Grade 3 who has been attending KIS for two years now.
Our students continue to enjoy the added responsibility of being Special Helpers. Thank you to Kim, Elsa, Mabel, Ella, Elle, Vicky, George, Asher, Soma and Summer. We appreciate your efforts to model being good examples and to help us stay organized throughout the day.
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This Week’s Learning & Fun
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Unit of Inquiry
This week and next week, we will revisit our Who We Are unit of inquiry on “Relationships.” We started by looking at brain images of someone with a growth mindset versus someone with a fixed mindset. A person with a growth mindset will try different things, take on challenges and learn from their mistakes. In doing so, synapses happen and new pathways are created. Next week, we will extend this learning to friendships – befriending people who may look different from us, trying different friendships and exploring what it means to be a good friend.
Math and Literacy
The morning questions and the data collected continued to be a great source of math and literacy learning for our students. Research is showing that it is easier for students in this age group to connect with the concept of “number path” as it is more concrete, rather than the “number line,” which can be a bit abstract for them. The students have certainly demonstrated that this week by sharing their answers to the questions about what they have done over the holiday and then by “reading” and making sense of the data.
Fun Friday
In this week’s main Fun Friday activity, we challenged the children to try something different – Vegemite bread. Hopefully, this activity sparked synapses and new pathways in their brains. Be sure to ask them about their experience. For those who are not familiar, Vegemite is a spread that’s made from yeast extract. It is relatively salty and is mainly eaten in Australia and New Zealand. Because of its intense flavor, Vegemite is one of those foods where people either love it or hate it.
School Photos
Another special event this week was the student photos. Again, the children were challenged to go out of their comfort zones and do something new and different – school photos! Some embraced the whole experience. Some tolerated it and for a few others, it was not their thing. We honored the children, wherever they were at. The most important thing was that they were open-minded. They all ventured to the huge Auditorium, watched and waited patiently. They were all fabulous!
Photo Gallery – Week of Apr. 18th-22nd
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Parenting Corner
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Mind in the Making – The Seven Essential Life Skills Every Child Needs
by Ellen Galinsky
In her book, Ellen Galinsky “outlines seven essential life skills that all draw on the executive functions of the brain – the network of abilities that allow us to manage our thoughts, emotions and behavior as we pursue goals.” We highly recommend it, if you haven’t had a chance to read this book yet. In addition to the information shared, she also has practical tips and suggestions for parents for each of the life skills. Starting from this week, each week we will share one of the life skills mentioned in her book and some main points from that skill.
The good news is that these “essential life skills can be taught with support and practice.” The other good news is that “it is never too early–or too late–to promote them.” For more information about the focus and self-control life skill, see the links below.
- Focus and Self Control – mindinthemaking.org
- Skill 1: Focus and Self-Control – Teaching Young Children Vol. 9 No. 3, NAEYC.org
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Upcoming Dates & Reminders
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For Next Week:
- April 25 – EY1 Swim Day
Bring swim bag and all necessary items.
. - April 27 | 10:30am | Primary School Q & A
[ for meeting link, please see email “Parent Update from HOS – April 22nd” ]
. - April 29 – House Day
Students to wear House Shirts to school
. - April 29 – Library Day
Bring books back to swap!
. - April 29 | 8:30am – 9:45 | HOS Coffee Morning
[ for meeting link, please see email “Parent Update from HOS – April 22nd” ]
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Looking Ahead…
- May 2 | Labor Day Substitution, May 1 (school & office closed)
. - May 4 | Coronation Day (school & office closed)
Thank you for your continued support and partnership! Have a restful weekend!
EY1 Team 😊
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