February Everything

February just flew by.  With only three days of school this week, the children enjoyed  activities related to Dental Health and started  learning about Addition, joining two groups to find out how many in all.

Michael added a post to the Teddy Bears Around The World Blog. Click here to view it.

P.E. days will change to Mondays from 10:20-11:00.  Everyone will be in the swimming pool and learning with Ms. Whitney and Mr. Kimura. Please remember to label all articles of clothing, slippers, swimming bags, etc.

And now.............presenting.........our students in action...................

February Everything - slide show

K-1 in Action

The students had an eventful week with many learning opportunities. You can have conversations with your child who would love to share information while viewing the slideshow together.  Here is a brief recap.

A group of  college students who are aspiring teachers from Japan visited us and mingled during our Math class when our students were using a balance scale to measure items around the classroom.  Besides enjoying a cheeseburger and POG for lunch, the college students were running and playing with the Kindergarten children during recess.

February is National Dental Health Month. It is a time to raise awareness about the importance of oral health.  Children get a good start on a lifetime of healthy teeth and gums by developing good habits at an early age and regular dental visits . Everyone has been enjoying the activities in class, which included: Writing letters to the Tooth Fairy and brushing eggs soaked overnight in Pepsi. Other lessons are planned  to promote the benefits of good oral health for our keiki.

Aloha to Shohtaro who returned to Japan  for a few weeks.  Hope you're having fun, but we miss you.

Reminders:
Monday February 21 - Holiday - President's Day
Tuesday, February 22 - Deadline to return consent form for walking field trip to Kuakini Hale Pulama Mau
Tuesday, February 22 - Deadline for HMS Fair contributions and sign up for game shift(s) 
Friday, February 25 - Parent-Teacher Conference

School is Cool

A big mahalo to:

• Mrs. Sanchez who baked cookies for the Student Council's Community Cookie Project
• The four chaperones who  accompanied us on our Dole Plantation field trip
• Mrs. Nagamine who  works endlessly on class projects
• All those who shared Valentine's treats with their classmates

All Valentine's Day treats will be sent home on Monday in the green Long's recyclable bag.  Please have your child return it to school on Tuesday.

The Kindergarten teachers are rethinking our "homework' assignments. It was mentioned a few weeks ago that homework with the daily worksheets would cease at the end of the 2nd trimester.  However, that are many homework alternatives that reinforce learning. Many of the benefits of homework can be obtained through extra-curricular involvement and family-based activities. Here are a few ideas you may find useful:

• Playing games as a family, such as card games, board games, word games and even puzzles promote academic skills (color and pattern recognition, number sense, logic and problem solving skills, literacy skills, etc.);
• Visits to libraries and museums help to reinforce learning on a specific topic, or following up on a child's personal areas of interest;
• Storytelling and make-believe activities encourage children to express themselves creatively – but also provide opportunities to learn taking turns, cooperation and tolerance for the opinions and preferences of others;
• Informal games can encourage a child to make practical use of school skills (shape identification, counting, adding and subtracting, estimation, rounding, etc.) Look for opportunities to challenge your child to apply knowledge during activities around the house, on errands, while travelling or while waiting for appointments.
• Reading to or with a child daily has been called “the only conclusive way to boost their academic success.” (“Homework a homewrecker: Report”) Be sure to offer lots of appropriate literature to your child, and to encourage regular reading.
• Websites such as Starfall , Disney, or PBS Kids   are a few that your children would be totally engaged with. You can click on each of the highlighted titles to be linked to the site.

This free slideshow design customized with Smilebox

Our Photos

The children had a choice of taking a photograph of anything they felt was important to them.  Beautiful photos and comments were the result of their fine work.

Look What We Did This Week!

K-1 Skyped with our Massachusetts pals this week.  Some things our children learned:  there were snow days,  which meant our pals didn't attend school due to severe weather conditions so they will be adding, at this point, 4 school days in June. They also shared some fun activities they do in the snow, i.e.  throwing snowballs, sledding, etc. We shared some information about Chinese New Year and introduced arare since that is a common snack.  A few bags of arare will be sent to our  Skype friends  to taste since we're not sure if it is sold there.

Valentine's Day is Monday, February 14th.  If you wished to share goodie bags with the other students, please bring them in by Friday, February 11th. They'll be distributed on Valentine's Day in the  Long's green recyclable bags.

A few reminders for this week:
Scholastic Book orders - due Tuesday, February 8
Dole Plantation Field Trip - Friday, February 11