Welcome to the F2T Unit!

Friday, 9 October 2015

Newsletter, Friday 9th of October 2015

This week, we ZOOM, ZOOM, ZOOMED to the moon as we launched our first ever space station in the role-play area! The children put their helmets, boots, spacesuits, and alien costumes on as they buckled up for a blasting adventure in space. They also used new vocabulary we’ve learnt this week such as moon, stars, rocket, spaceship, aliens, boots, helmet, and astronaut. The children even counted to lift off: 10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1.... BLAST OFF!

The aliens are off to a blasting adventure!

It gets bit busy in the space station as the astronauts and aliens prepare to go for a moonwalk!

Astronaut Nini and Trong just landed on the moon!

Ms. Christine also taught us a new song this week called Zoom Zoom Zoom!

Zoom, zoom, zoom

We’re going to the moon

Zoom, zoom, zoom

We’re going to the moon

If you want to take a trip

Climb aboard my rocket ship

Zoom, zoom, zoom

We’re going to the moon

10 – 9 – 8 – 7 – 6 – 5 – 4 – 3 – 2 – 1 – BLAST OFF!

In the workshop area, the children created rocket ships out of recycled toilet paper roll with Ms Thuy. They painted rockets with their favourite colours and decorated it with different coloured sequins. The children named colours and practised proper handling of the paintbrush. As a finishing touch, the children put some glue independently and put the rocket ship’s pointy tip and legs in place.

We're painting our rockets with our favourite colours.

Now it's time to put the finishing touches!

In the small world area, the children played with the spaceship and its launching pad. They made the astronauts hop aboard the spaceship as they pretended to make it zoom into space. They were also very lucky to be able to see the Apollo 11 spaceship launch in our IWB. The children took turns and practised the value of sharing in this area.

The spaceship is getting ready for take off! Zooooooooom!

We had sparkly black playdough, googly eyes and pipe cleaners in the malleable area. The children used their creative hands to mould and roll the playdough to create aliens with lots of eyes, arms and legs. They also rolled balls and said that they made the moon! Well done children!

We've made aliens with lots of eyes and funky arms!

To complete our space theme, we introduced our rocket register to encourage children to practice name recognition. Most of them were already familiar with the first letter of their names and how their names looked like! As the saying goes, practice makes permanent!

Watch our rockets zoom as we click on our names every morning!

On Monday, we had our first Weekend News Sharing during Hello Time. The children talked about where they went, who they played with and what kept them busy during the weekend. We were pleased to hear our children talk about their mummies, daddies, brothers and sisters. Some even went on play dates with their friends. The children were very interested to see photos and hear about their friends’ activities. Many of our students went to see the Disney Show and they were very eager to talk about it! We would like to say thank you to the parents who continue to share their weekend activities with us, keep them coming!

Kaiko points to the dogs that he saw in the Dog Show whilst

Ngan shows photos of her brother Phuc Long.

On the other hand, Hung shows his photos during the Disney Show

as Nini shows how she learns how to write!

David and Kazuki talks about the characters they saw in the Disney Show.
Gianna introduces her new baby sister to her friends whilst Jason
talks about the BBGV Fun Run with his friends Kaiko and TinTin.

This week, we also introduced Busy Fingers, a new area in the classroom where we develop our fine motor skills. The children used tweezers to pick up pompoms and counted as they placed them one-by-one in the Numicon holes.

Keeping our little hands busy whilst we count!

For two days, some children helped Ms Precious make Wibbly Wobbly Strawberry and Orange Jelly in the snack bar. Each child showed excellent control as they poured carefully and mixed slowly. They also had a go at measuring and counting cups of water. The children learnt new vocabulary words such as hot, cold, jelly, pouring, mixing, bowl, and ladle.

Is the water cold or hot?

Watch us do some mixing and pouring!

When the jelly was ready, Ms Precious shook the tray as the children sang the song Jelly on a Plate:

Jelly on a plate, jelly on a plate

Wibble, wobble, wibble, wobble

Jelly on a plate!

Wibble wobble, wibble wobble, jelly on a plate!

What a perfect afternoon treat-- yoghurt with our wibbly wobbly strawberry jelly!

In the foyer, some children played a relay game with Ms Christine. They hopped on different shape mats whilst keeping the ball in between their legs. Upon reaching the last mat, they shot the ball in the net and went back to tag the next player in their team. The children followed the directions very well, showed excellent balancing skills and successfully shot the ball inside the net. We also played the Find the Colour and Shape Game and we are pleased to see that most of our children have mastered the basic colours and shapes already!

We've found triangles, squares, circles and rectangles!

Look at us hop like a bunny!

We started conducting focus group sessions with the children. These sessions are circle time activities where we tap different skills across all areas of learning. Last week, they learnt about colours, being caring and some articulation exercises. This week, we tried to develop their listening and responding skills, name recognition and mastery of shapes.

Ms Clarissa is helping Liam look for his name on the IWB!

Ms Precious leads the class into counting-- 3,2,1 blast off!

"The wheel is circle." shared Ana.

In the library, Ms Clarissa read the story Whatever Next by Jill Murphy. It was a story about a bear who went to the moon, met some new friends and came back just before bathtime. Through the story, the children learned more about space and the things we need to be able to go to the moon. Of course, library time won’t be complete without borrowing a book! The children were very keen to choose the book that they will bring home for mummy and daddy to read to them.

Ms Clarissa showing us the front cover of the book and one of the pages inside.

On Friday, Ms Christine invited the children to go on a journey through space. We put our helmets and boots on and zipped up our spacesuits for a zooming ride on a spaceship. The children were very responsive during the discussion as they pointed out the sun, the moon and the planet Earth. The children counted the planets and some stars. They also learnt some new words like astronaut, falling star, planets, spacesuit, and space explorers. We zoomed our way towards the hot sun and the moon where we met an astronaut. The children had so much fun singing the Zoom, Zoom, Zoom song and counting backwards from 10-1!

The children definitely had a BLAST! We will carry on with zoom, zoom, zooming to the outer space next week but for now, may we all have a restful weekend!

Have a restful weekend everyone!

Ms Christine, Ms Clarissa, Ms Precious and the F2 Team

NOTICES:

HALF TERM HOLIDAY
(17th October-25th October)

SWIMMING BAGS
Please remember to bring in your child's swimming kit every Mondays and Thursdays.
Please also put your child's swimming costume, towel and swimming things in a proper bag.
NO DISPOSABLE PLASTIC BAGS PLEASE

LIBRARY BOOKS
Please remember to return your child's library book on or before Wednesday.

Friday, 2 October 2015

Newsletter, Friday 2nd of October 2015

Brilliant Book Days

We’ve had such a splendid time celebrating our love for books the entire week. We began our celebration by coming to school dressed as our favourite book characters. The boys came in as pirates, superheroes, princes and ninjas; whilst the girls looked stunning in their princess gowns, fairy costumes and other characters from various story books.

F2's strong superheroes!

Gorgeous princesses in their gowns!

We were very lucky to have met Mr Steve Barlow and Mr Steve Skidmore, successful English authors of over 200 children’s books. Together, they told the story of the Pied Piper of Hamelin which was about a mayor whose town was infested by rats. He then hired a piper who claimed that he could free his town from rats! The children enjoyed joining in the story by doing some actions and by making some rat noises. One Steve acted as the mayor whilst the other Steve played the recorder and pretended to be the piper. All the children, and even the teachers, enjoyed the story! Thank you very much Mr Steve and Steve!

The Two Steves leading the children in doing some rat sounds!

Mr Steve playing the recorder as the Pied Piper

In the afternoon, the F2 children gathered up in the F1 classroom to listen to the story of ‘Aliens Love Underpants’. Ms Clarissa narrated the story whilst all the other teachers acted out in their colourful alien costumes. The children laughed and cheered as they saw their alien teachers ‘steal’ some underpants!

The F1 aliens trying on some underpants!

The F2 aliens posing for a photo wearing their multicoloured underpants!

That was so much fun!

On Tuesday, we all put on our lovely pyjamas and gathered up on the carpet for Snuggle Up and Read! Mr Ian made a surprise visit to the children and read them the story ‘Aliens in Underpants Save the World’. The children learnt new words such as ‘meteorite’ and ‘spaceships’. Afterwards, the children enjoyed watching The Gruffalo film whilst having a delicious cup of hot chocolate and a marshmallow.

Time to read some books in our pyjamas!

Yummy marshmallows and hot chocolate waiting for us!

The children absolutely loved our delicious treats!

Mr Ian tells the children how the aliens' ginormous underpants saved the world from the meteorite!

The Gruffalo film was definitely a hit!

At the end of our week-long Book Days celebration, Ms Mary also came to read the story ‘The Pig in the Pond’. It was so much fun as the children joined Ms Mary in making animal sounds such as “Oink oink”, “Quack quack”, and “Honk honk”!

Ms Mary reading the story, The Pig in the Pond

We would like to say a big THANK YOU to all the people who made our Book Days extra special! The children definitely had a fantastic time! We love books!

Aside from all the book day activities, we’ve had quite a busy week! The children are continuing to get used to our full day routine and we are pleased that most of them have been settling in well.

On Tuesday, Ms Christine played Egg Race and Touch the Colour and Shape with some children in the foyer. The children showed excellent hand-eye coordination and good balancing. They also practised taking turns and teamwork! It was lovely seeing them cheer for each other! The Touch the Colour and Shape game was a hit as well. In this game, different coloured shape mats were set up on the floor and the children quietly searched for a particular shape or colour and hopped on it. After finding the correct mat, they stood up and touched their feet. We are pleased to share that the children showed excellent balancing and listening in this fun activity!

The children balancing on shape mats. Vivi won the game!

Look at us doing some egg-cellent balancing!

On Wednesday, Ms Clarissa and Ms Precious introduced the mark-making book which each child has for drawing and writing. With their developing pen grips, the children enjoyed drawing different figures such as themselves, their Mummies and Daddies. Some also drew aliens! Keep it up F2!

The children having a go at drawing on their mark-making books!

Mr Sun has been shining brightly these days and it makes our children more excited to go to the splash pool. This week, the children enjoyed the kickboards which they held onto whilst practising their kicking legs in the water. We are pleased to observe that our children are becoming more confident as they have also begun putting their heads in the water and blowing some bubbles!

Fun under the sun!

The children having a go at kicking their legs! Well done F2!

The Soft Play Room was also such fun this week as the children sang different songs and played some group games. Some of them also learnt the Penguin Song with Ms Christine. Using their bodies, they waddled like a penguin and were introduced to the concept of ‘right’ and ‘left’. You can see the Penguin Song through this link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=He5Xu11HBkM

Penguins attention! Penguins begin!

(CHORUS)

Have you ever seen a penguin come to tea?

When you look at me a penguin you will see!

PENGUINS ATTENTION! PENGUINS BEGIN!

Right Flipper (Flap right arm)

Repeat Chorus