Pre-Kindergarten 2021/22/23

Friday, December 1, 2023

Pre-KG 2023/ 24 Blog 14 Oh Tannenbaum !

Pre-KG 2023/ 24 Blog 14

Oh Tannenbaum !

Die Weihnachtszeit ist voller Gesang, Gerichte, Gerüche und Formen, die wir mit diesem Zeitraum assoziieren.

Beim Plätzchenbacken benutzen wir verschiedene Förmchen und überall wimmelt es von Sternen, Engeln, Krippenfiguren und Weihnachtsbäumen. Viele dieser Dinge kann man schon an ihrer Silhouette erkennen und dazu zählt sicher die Form des Weihnachts- bzw. Tannenbaumes.

Der ist übrigens schon einige Jahrhunderte alt und wurde zum ersten Mal in Deutschland aufgestellt.

Eines unserer beliebtesten Weihnachtslieder heisst “Oh Tannenbaum” und hat einen recht tiefsinnigen Text.

Oh Tannenbaum

Pünktlich zur festlichen Saison wurde dann an der DSKI am Montag, 27.November 2023 der schuleigene Weihnachtsbaum erleuchtet, festlich geschmückt mit von den Kindern gebastelten Ornamenten.

Begleitet von unserem Schulchor und den leuchtenden Augen der Kinder ist es immer ein besonderer Anlass und die Pre-Kindergarten Klasse war natürlich mit dabei.

Jede Klasse bekam auch einen vom PTA liebevoll gestalteten Adventskalender, der dann am nächsten Tag voller Freude von den Kindern geöffnet wurde.

Herzlichen Dank an den Schulchor und Ms.Azusa und den PTA für die tolle Unterstützung und Vorbereitung.

The Christmas season has arrived and we associate this time with a variety of songs, aromas, special food and shapes.

We use cookie cutters in different forms and everywhere we can see stars, angels, nativity scene figures and Christmas trees.

The tradition of the Christmas tree is several centuries old and started in Germany. One of the most beloved songs is “Oh Tannenbaum - Oh Christmas tree” which actually has a very meaningful text.

So right on time for the festive season, we had a light up ceremony for our DSKI Christmas tree on Monday, 27th November which was beautifully decorated with handmade ornaments by the children.

The school choir’s performance and the bright eyes of the children made for a special occasion.

Every class also received an Advent Calendar, lovingly crafted by the PTA which was happily opened the next day for the first time.

A big thank you to the choir, Ms.Azusa and the PTA for their wonderful contribution.

So the shape of the Christmas tree makes a fantastic base for an array of activities, be it decorating with stickers, a geometric art tree or the start of a multilayered project.

The little Pre-Kindergarten children enjoyed doing art in front of our school Tannenbaum and showed incredible interest, patience and skill when painting 35! Christmas trees in bright green colour using the by now familiar shaving brushes.

You are just amazing, Pre-Kindergarten children!

And you continued to shine by putting lots and lots of sparkles on the Tannenbäume !

The finished Christmas trees for our school’s Weihnachtsmarkt / Christmas Bazaar turned out very beautiful and yes, you will be able to purchase them !

With so much beauty in mind, the Pre-Kindergarten children went on a quest to find other sparkling Christmas trees and you would not believe it, but Rokko Island has turned into the hub of these, coming in all shapes and sizes.

Wunderschöne Weihnachtsbäume überall auf unserer Insel ! Die Kinder freuten sich sehr so viele verschiedene Arten zu entdecken.

To take our learning a step further, we looked at other shapes of trees and discussed that these are actually living ones with roots and leaves growing.

The children touched different types of bark and put their arms around various sizes of tree trunks.They were fascinated by everything they saw and enjoyed the colour of the foliage.

There were ideas about the size (Why so big) and the leaves, so the children are ready for discussions in their new unit about living things.

But before that, we will taste the treats of Nikolaus, whose special day comes up next week on 6th December.

Lasst uns froh und munter sein !

Viel Spass beim Öffnen des Adventskalenders, bei selbstgebackenen Plätzchen, Mandarinen und heissem Kakao !

Sincerely,

Anita Ursula Mönch

DSKI Pre-Kindergarten homeroom teacher

Playgroup / EY German

Friday, November 24, 2023

Pre-KG 2023/ 24 Blog 13 Fun with Colours and Shapes

Pre-KG 2023/ 24 Blog 13

Fun with Colours and Shapes

Since the beginning of the school year the Pre-Kindergarten children have been on a journey discovering the world of “Colours and Shapes” and while the learning never ends (even for adults), we have started to wind down our unit with some special activities.

The week started with a fabulous birthday party for Matias whose whole family attended the celebration.

The Izquierdo/ Nakazato family are very creative with making colourful pinatas and they did not disappoint: They brought a beautiful yellow pinata in the shape of a CAT shovelcar, much to the delight of his sister Veronica and the Pre-Kindergarten children who tried to hit the pinata, first reluctantly, then with more energy and finally could get the bounty of cookies und Gummibärchen. As there were so many goodies, the class happily shared with their friends of K1 and K2.

The children also received lots of toys and each a beautiful felt ornament handmade by Matias’ grandmother. Happy 3.Birthday, dear Matias and thank you to the family for all their love to the Pre-Kindergarten.

To get into the mood for the birthday, and understand the concept of breaking a colourful pinata with a stick, the class watched a catchy song called “Rompe la pinata” . We also used instruments to move along to the song and the shakers were very popular.

Rompe la pinata

So on Tuesday, the Pre-Kindergarten children got to choose their favourite colour ball from a selection and then as many colourful beads as they wanted to make their very personal shaker which they used to joyfully dance along to the pinata song.

After that we got ready for outdoor unit exploration, starting with shopping for our unit baking on Friday.

The Pre-Kindergarten children are always given plenty of opportunities to interact with the Rokko Island community, so they have learnt to collaborate well and have become quite principled. They did a fantastic job finding and purchasing the flour mix for our waffles and behaved very respectfully in the shop.

To practice for the Christmas event, we then went to our special outdoor stage where the children sang and performed and afterwards had a well deserved treat.

There was more practice for the Christmas performance on Wednesday, this time on the outside deck and in the Multipurpose Room with all the friends of K1 and K2.

The children also hung their beautiful handmade Christmas ornaments on the school Christmas tree and they were the first ones to do so.

On Thursday we had OPEN DAY at DSKI and many visitors. The Pre-Kindergarten children were quite unfazed by the amount of new faces coming to their classroom and showed amazing focus on their subject work.

We had prepared a worksheet and lots and lots of different colourful shapes. The children showed good knowledge and great creativity - by first matching, shapes, then building different images like robots, rockets and submarines out of shapes and finally by connecting two corresponding shapes using a crayon. Well done, everyone !

Finally on Friday, the class got ready for their baking activity. With the help of their teachers, the Pre-KG children happily mixed pancake flour with eggs and milk, poured it steadily into the waffle iron and waited patiently. To their delight, the waffles turned out very well and yes, they were squares. Everyone enjoyed the tasty treat and some lucky teachers had big smiles on their faces, too.