Pre-KG 2022 / 23 Blog 19 Marine life and love

Pre-KG 2022 / 23 Blog 19

Marine life and love

The ocean, rivers, lakes and waterfalls, in fact any body of water (yes, including swimming pools) provide the kind of environment that is calming for our nerves and yet stimulating.

Our Pre-Kindergarten teachers, Ms. Anita and Ms. Chinatsu love the ocean so much that both named their sons “Kai” - with the kanji for “sea” in Japanese.

Well, who doesn’t like to sit on the beach looking at a beautiful sunset or sunrise and listen to the soothing sound of the waves. Besides the health benefits, many people are fascinated with marine life. 

No wonder that the Pre-Kindergarten children have shown interest not only in fish (and the fishing games ), but many different species in the water and they have become quite knowledgeable, even in different languages.

So there are fish, whales, sea horses, octopus, rays, turtles, crabs aka Fische. Wale, Seepferdchen, Tintenfische, Rochen, Wasserschildkröten, Krebse or  sakana, kujira, tatsunotoshigo, tako, ei, mizugame and kani.

The children again wanted to go on a search for aquatic life on Rokko Island, looking at the different bodies of water and as before, they found nothing.

But with so many foodies in our class, the talk came back to eating fish, octopus and shrimps, so we visited the local Daiei supermarket and spotted a lot of edible sea life. 

The children were quite stunned by the variety - how fantastic it s to have so much seafood available in Japan !

Additionally, the children found two pink sculptures outside that looked like sea snails, so they were quite happy with the result of their search.

Still, we decided it was time to make our own sea life, so the children coloured 4 different species which we laminated and put clips on, to fish with our handmade fishing rods.

Now all we needed was our own little fish pond, so the children converted a collection of recycled rectangle boxes and decorated them with waves to look more authentic. They were very happy with their own creations and had lots of fun fishing.

Having gained more insight into marine life, the children then decided it was time to challenge themselves to a sorting task. 

Looking at the vast amount of animal figurines we own, many of them from the fabulous German Schleich brand, the children tried to find every animal that swims or lives by the water to display it in the sea box. 

They were really firm in their choices and so proud upon completing the task. 

Well done, Pre-Kindergarten!

On Friday, we had another new friend visiting our Pre-Kindergarten class for a trial and the children gladly showed and shared their handmade fishponds, marine animals and fishing rods.

So what about the love in the headline?

Well, there is not only our love for the sea and the heartwarming friendship among the Pre-Kindergarten children, but we also celebrated Valentine’s Day this week.

The children made lovely cards for their parents and Elias brought a delicious cookie heart for each of his friends in small bags which he had decorated with a hand painted tag. 

Thank you so much Elias for caring and sharing!

Next Monday we will also share fun, laughter and some sweets at our Carnival (Karneval in German ) at school. Even though you might associate Carnival with Rio de Janeiro or Venezia it is quite a big event in Germany, but it actually depends on which area you hail from.

The region around Cologne (Köln) and the south of Germany celebrate in a very lively manner.

So please encourage your child to dress up for the occasion and let’s have a lovely time together.

Yours, 

Anita Ursula Mönch

DSKI Pre-Kindergarten homeroom teacher 

Playgroup / EY German