Pre-KG 2024 / 25 Blog 34
Body, Family, Peace and Nature
What a fantastic and enriching week we had at Pre–Kindergarten while covering our subjects of „Body and Family“ and extending the learning beyond the classroom !
The Pre–Kindergarten children continued to learn about the body, by revising and adding new vocabulary and dancing to the „Head , shoulders, knees and toes“ song with much more accurate movements.
Ms.Priyanka keeps on guiding the class through a variety of yoga poses and here, too, have the children ( and teachers!) shown much improvement!
The Pre–Kindergarten children also joyfully play with the kitchen items in our classroom and create meals.
While the children are learning that it is very important to move your body, they also are starting to understand that the body needs food to grow .
We always talk about the food the children are eating at school and appreciate all the effort that has gone into making it and the delicious ingredients that it contains.
Strawberries, crackers, apples, blueberries, chestnuts, cheese….yummy! Tomatoes, broccoli, onions, corn, shrimps, meat, rice and noodles – how delicious.
So to give the children an idea where the food comes from which makes their body grow and to involve the parents in our unit learning , we made a trip to the Peace and Nature Farm in Ozo, Kita–ku, Kobe with our school bus.
Peace and Nature has been founded by Bahram and Shinobu Enanloo in 2003 with the mission ( quote) to create a safe and secure environment and food, help raise future green leaders and send messages from Japan to the world.
Green leaders are defined as people who learn from nature, know local and social issues and act toward solutions.
Hyogo Japan / Peace and Nature
My own family has been involved with Peace and Nature from the beginning and my children have spent many days together in nature learning about growing rice and taking care of the environment.
Peace and Nature has also been welcoming many of our DSKI classes and families for their meaningful workshops and we support each other through sponsorship and events.
What better way to learn about food , environment, green spaces ( our Pre–Kindergarten STEM week theme) and the joy of working together with friends and family than go on a trip to the farm, starting with the youngest children in our school, Pre–Kindergarten!
So off we went on the school bus with our gentle school bus driver, Mr.Fujita – from Rokko Island up the Rokko mountains, through tunnels, past lush green fields and beautiful traditional Japanese country houses to the Peace and Nature Farm where we were greeted with big smiles by Bahram and Shinobu Enanloo as well as Mr. Kan Aoki, their vice director.
We carefully listened to Mr.Bahram’s explanation about the natural environment that includes frogs and sometimes snakes, took some Pre–Kindergarten group pictures and then went on a short walk to greet a local farmer and look at the rice fields getting prepared.
After snack time, the workshop started with Mr.Bahram showing us how to walk on the field and where to pull the onions, so they would come out smoothly. The children eagerly pulled and harvested their own onions which they were very proud of.
They also made discoveries of tiny frogs, beautiful flowers and lots of fragrant herbs in the herb garden which were shown and explained to them by the Peace and Nature Team. We all could take some herbs home for making tea and for cooking with !
The children, parents and teachers loved the experience in nature and we even made some new friends from the local Ozo Kindergarten.
After having lunch which tasted so much better outdoors and which was accompanied by Mr. Derek playing a song on the guitar, it was time to say goodbye with a beautiful heart–shaped card the Pre–Kindergarten children had crafted together with Ms. Anita.
Thank you very much, Ms.Shinobu, Mr.Bahram and Mr.Kan for this valuable experience teaching us about nature and sources of food !
We really appreciate your kindness and hope to be back soon !
With the green lushness of nature still fresh on their minds, I talked to the Pre–Kindergarten children the next day again about the importance of taking care of nature, having green spaces and food and we looked at our toy food and books on the subject.
Sustainability is such a difficult word, but broken down it makes sense even to little ones and the Pre–Kindergarten showed a good grasp of what is needed in future cities to survive.
It is always humbling to see how brilliant the children are and I am looking forward to the day when they will become our green leaders.
We will continue with our research and building green spaces during STEM week and the children will be showing you the process of their learning and the results next Friday!
On the last day of this busy and wonderful week we had a whole school emergency drill, which was a combined earthquake and tsunami drill and again the Pre–Kindergarten children showed how much they have grown mentally and physically. Not only did they listen carefully to all the important and life saving instructions, but they also lined up orderly and walked all the way to the local Elementary School which will be our refuge in case of disaster and back to DSKI.
What a fantastic job, dear Pre–Kindergarten children, during this whole week !
We are much looking forward to more discoveries and adventures next week !
As the weather is getting hotter, please stay cool, wear breezy clothes, drink plenty of water and have your child bring a hat to school.
And please enjoy your onions !
Kind regards, mit herzlichen Grüßen,
Anita Ursula Mönch
Pre–Kindergarten homeroom teacher Playgroup / EY Deutsch & GFL
German Saturday School homeroom teacher
No comments:
Post a Comment