Pre-KG 2026/ 27 Blog 8 Autumn is here / Der Herbst ist da !

 Pre-KG 2026/ 27 Blog 8

Autumn is here / Der Herbst ist da !

After a very hot and long summer, temperatures are slowly dropping and everyone can enjoy outside activities again without being worried about a heatstroke.

The weather is still mild and warm though and depending where you are in Japan, you can still enjoy a swim in the ocean.

Last week the Pre-Kindergarten children joined K1 to learn more about transportation and they started to talk about boats as well.

This week then the children built some boats and ships with lego and made them float which was a lot of fun.

Autumn has some distinctive food to offer and among the yummy treats are persimmons, apples, pears, grapes, chestnuts and sweet potatoes.

The children role played again making a lot of autumn bentoes which included grapes and apples. 

One of our girls cleverly said that Brezel are also seasonal food because they are eaten at the Oktoberfest!

And the baby dolls got some grapes as well !

Finally our sweet potatoes which took a rest for some weeks (to make them sweeter!) were ready to be eaten, so Ms.Miho and Kasane's mum boiled them in the kitchen and then the "Potato" train went to room 4 to help cut them ! 

How delicious those homegrown sweet potatoes were ! And thank you for helping us, Ms. Iwasaki !

Besides eating seasonal food, some of the fun in autumn is definitely flying kites, jumping into rain puddles or piles of leaves and collecting, playing and creating with fallen leaves. 

This charming German song depicts some of the joys in autumn, called Herbst in German!

Der Herbst ist da !

We also started to collect some autumn leaves and while on our walk said hello to Grade 1, who were practicing for Sports Day !

Leaves are perfect to make art with and they can even be used for STEM projects to see what sinks and what floats. 

Some insects use leaves as a boat, especially to stay dry after the rain or when they cannot swim, so we talked about that and tried to have our (toy) insects, the lady bug and the fly float on leaves like they are using a boat. 

The children soon found out that the fly was too heavy and would sink while the ladybug would float. Great STEM inquiry, girls !

There is a cute German song about a rainy day where insects use leaves as an umbrella.

Es regnet, es regnet

And part of this season in Japan is the annual sports day, so the children again practiced their running and "Tamaire", the popular ball collecting game. Let's see how fast the EY will be at collecting all the scattered balls !

On Friday the Pre-Kindergarten and K1 classes also enjoyed one of Mr.Lubin's afternoon art sessions where the children made an autumn themed wreath using leaf cutouts in a variety of colours. We already hung it up in the classroom!

This week additionally we had the joy of a new friend joining our class!

A heartfelt welcome to little Tsuki and the Kato family to the Pre-Kindergarten classroom.      We are so happy to have you with us and are looking forward to many adventures together!

And talking about adventures, little Anne and Jane went on a holiday with their parents and sent cheerful greetings from abroad together with beautiful photos of the precious time with their lovely family.

We missed them a lot and we are much looking forward to seeing them after the holidays and celebrating their 3rd birthday together !

Wishing you all beautiful autumn holidays!

With kind regards, 

mit freundlichen Grüßen, 

Anita Ursula Mönch

DSKI Pre-Kindergarten homeroom teacher 

Playgroup / EY GFL & Deutsch      

German Saturday School homeroom teacher

Pre-KG 2026/ 27 Blog 7 / K1 Collaborative learning - Colours & Transport

 Pre-KG 2026/ 27 Blog 7 / K1 

Collaborative learning - Colours & Transport

The week after our big, fun and very successful Oktoberfest started on Tuesday and highlighted the ongoing and wonderful collaboration of Pre-kindergarten and K1 by combining their subjects in a lot of interesting activities.

As all the children are learning the colours in English as well as German, we started by repeating these with some search games including finding a car in a certain colour. 

The children had so much fun looking for the right car and were very proud when they got it.

It is always amazing to see how fast children pick up another language, so for the parents to not fall behind, here is a quick language game you can do at home to improve your German.

Oh, and "was fehlt" means "what is missing", so you have to guess the missing colour.

Deutsch lernen - Farben

The children continued their learning by connecting a certain colour car (rot) with the same colour garage (auch rot) and again they did a great job.

They also listened and sang along to one of their favourite German songs called "Papas rotes Auto" which teaches colours and has a story to each car which is also interesting for our native speakers.

Papas rotes Auto

On Wednesday and Thursday the children did  transportation themed puzzle challenges and showed a great concentration span. We have some keen puzzlers who can complete puzzles with a lot of pieces !

Another activity was stringing little wooden vehicles and traffic signs which also improves concentration and fine motor skills. 

Here again the children strung with patience and were happy about their long chain of transportation.

Imaginary play is always included and we had children pretending to go on trains, planes and ships. Two friends boarded the big ship aka the wooden house and waved goodbye from the deck ! See you there !

In every kindergarten program there should be a lot of movement and on top of our usual outside time we did a roller race. This was the first step to practice for a race on sports day by implementing easy rules like driving around obstacles and of course, taking turns. 

The game went really well and the children stayed in their attributed group and used a scooter in which might have not been in their favourite colour. Good job, everyone!

Reading books about a new subject always helps children to understand more of the matter, expands vocabulary and gives opportunity for comments and questions.

Easy worksheets with colourful images and the task to connect also enhance interest and language skills.

After learning so many new things, it was time again for more Sports Day practice, this time in groups and team colours ! There will be an orange team and a green team and the children wore their jerseys without fussing. 

They then raced along the school's hallway on their mini Benz cars up to Ms.Anita, gave a high five and then raced back to their team mates !

 In between Ms.Anita was able to take some cool pictures! Bravo, Pre-Kindergarten and K1 children for taking turns and showing off your gross motor skills ! Those cars were fast ! 

On Thursday afternoon the children also went on a transport search finding many different types in the school's vicinity and ticked them off the chart that Ms.Hanna had provided.

And finally, on Friday, the children practiced another race in their P.E. lesson, this time on the big yard !

Everyone really tried their best and we witnessed some amazing collaboration. 

Well done, Pre-Kindergarten and K1 children, we are always happy and proud to witness your friendship and helpful attitude to each other.

Special thanks this week go to Ms.Hanna who led K1 and brought a lot of creativity, enthusiasm and cheerfulness into the classrooms.

And a big thank you from all of us to Ms.Harumi who helped guiding the children through their first weeks of school with lots of care. Ms.Harumi is needed upstairs in Grade 1, so she will leave EY, but we are always looking forward to her coming back and saying hello !

To round up a fantastic week, the children challenged themselves to even more learning about transportation in German.

Fahrzeuge auf Deutsch

Please enjoy acquiring new vocabulary with your child in a stimulating way !

Viel Spass beim Lernen der Namen für die verschiedenen Fahrzeuge auf Deutsch !

With kind regards, 

mit freundlichen Grüßen, 

Anita Ursula Mönch

DSKI Pre-Kindergarten homeroom teacher 

Playgroup / EY GFL & Deutsch      

German Saturday School homeroom teacher