Christmas Cookies

Here are some pictures from the Great Gingerbread Adventure --

You all did a fantastic job reading the recipe, measuring the ingredients, and mixing the heck out of the cookie dough (Masa, you were especially good at MIXING!!). They were pretty tasty, weren't they?

I hope you all have a Merry Christmas and a wonderful New Year, too. I don't know about January's schedule yet, but I will post it here when I know.

Happy holidays!

Christie

Skating Party!

Saturday is coming soon -- are you ready to skate?! We are planning to meet at Papio between 10 and 10:30. The rink opens at 10, and I think it would be better to get there early, before it's too crowded. Our plan is that all the families will go there on their own, rent skates, and we'll look for each other on the rink. Sophie, Maya and I are looking forward to seeing you all there!!

Christie

Christmas Party Dec. 15

Hi everybody:

Who's ready to make cookies?? (Me!) Let's get together at Sophie and Maya's house at our usual time -- about 10:30. We'll get busy making some cookies, then maybe have some party games and try singing a few Christmas songs.

Please bring:

1. A smock or apron
2. Any cookie cutters that you want to use (I have some, so if you don't have any, don't worry)
3. Your Gingerbread cookie recipe from last week
4. Your gift for the gift exchange
5. A lunch to eat with everyone. We'll have cookies for dessert!

Last-minute homework!

Hi!!!

Try to do these pages if you have time:

Math 22-25 (sorry to non-Canadians! It's all about Canadian money!)
Science 116-117

AND think about a Christmas song you'd like to sing. Let's practice for the Christmas party!

Christie

December 1 (?!) Homework

December? Really??? What happened to November?

I feel like I haven't seen you all for a really long time! Let's do some more pages out of our workbook before we meet on Saturday, ok?

Pages 70, 71, 72 and 73 look good to me.

If you have time, please try pages 114 and 115 in the Science section, too.

See you Saturday!

Christie

Homework for Saturday,17th.

Hello everyone,
I'm posting about the homework for Doug.

Please work on English pages 78 to 81; A Visit to Grandma.

Go for it!

See you all on Saturday.


Mie

The Big Fright Night

Sunday night started out with a rousing game of Pin The Wart On The Witch.



Then you guys were off into the deep dark woods of Minami Koen on an ogre tracking exercise! Just when we thought we were safe, a werewolf terrorized the house! Oh, hey, wait a minute... it was only Graeme!




One creepy story with lots of gross body parts to touch later,



It was cake time to celebrate Kyle's birthday!



Happy Halloween, everybody -- it was lots of fun!

Party Prep

You guys all did such a great job getting ready for the party! Here's a few photos of the action...

Super pumpkin cleaners / carvers!




And pumpkin seed roasters!



Then it was on to the sticky business of popcorn ball making :-)




Finally, remember when we discovered the bad driver in the garden???

HEY! How about some homework?

We haven't done any homework for a couple of weeks so let's try to do a little catching up. Try to do these pages in your workbook for Saturday:

Math: pages 18, 19, 20, 21
English: pages 66, 67, 68, 69

(We have read something about bears before so this should be a piece of cake!!)

See you Saturday!

Christie

p.s. I will try to post some pictures of our Halloween party soon...

Next class and the Halloween Party

Next Saturday, our class is going to be held at Sophie and Maya's house. Please come here by 10:30 to help make treats for the Halloween party on Sunday! Bring an apron or smock, and you can bring a bento, too, if you want to stay for lunch. We're going to carve some pumpkins, make some popcorn balls, and do a few other things to get ready.

THEN, on Sunday, please come here again (AGAIN?!) at about 6:00. It would be best for you to eat some dinner before you come. We'll put on our costumes, play some games, try Doug's adventure walk, and then enjoy the homemade treats! We plan to finish at 8:00 (it's a school night!).

Hii River outing -- Learning about water pollution

Well done today, gang! I enjoyed watching your faces as you tasted the different water solutions in the classroom before we headed to the river! At the river you did a great job of cleaning up the garbage we found (hey Angus, did you take that cash card to the police station?!). I was also impressed with how well you did spelling the names for all the different kinds of trash. Here are some photos from today:



Some of the local river life ...



Back at the classroom, everybody records their findings:

October 20th Class

Hi! I am looking forward to seeing all of you today. If you see this before you come to Ropponmatsu today, please bring an extra pair of shoes and socks. We are going down to the river to talk about pollution, so I'd like you to have an extra pair of shoes and socks in case your feet get wet.

See you soon!
Christie

Halloween Plans

The BIG PEOPLE have been discussing Halloween and it looks like we are going to have our party on Sunday, October 28 (Kyle's birthday!). This year we are not going to go trick or treating in the neighborhood, but we are going to go on an adventure... Doug said something about finding an OGRE'S NEST in the Tani area!!! Sounds scary....

The party will be a costume party, so start thinking about how you will dress up!!

Making a party is lots of work, so we have decided that we should all work together to make homemade treats for the big day. Instead of meeting in Ropponmatsu on October 27, let's meet at the Provenzanos' house to make all sorts of delicious goodies! Bring your aprons and get ready to read some recipes and see what we can make. Does anyone have any good ideas? Let me know!

Sports Day-o-rama!

Monica and Maya both have their kindergarten sports days this Saturday, so the Provenzanos and Noguchis/Morrisons will not be at the group this week. Richie and Jojo's Dad, Scott, said he would lead the group this time, though, so I hope Masa, Nina, and Nozomi will all join them, same time, same place.

Good Job!

Hey everybody -
You did a great job today on our science lesson. I was proud of the way you worked in pairs to find out about how some solids will dissolve in hot water and others won't. It was also fun to see how some liquids would be absorbed by paper or cloth, and how the oil actually floated ON the water instead of dissolving!

Here are some pictures from today...

Homework time!

Hi guys... I'm a little late with your homework assignment this week. Sorry about that. I hope you enjoy it, though!

1. Please finish the workbook chapter about beavers (pages 64 and 65).

2. Do your dictionary words on the spelling practice handout.

3. Now, let's do something on the internet. We enjoyed reading about the Canadian Beaver, so now I'd like you to go and find out about another animal. Go to this website:

ZooBooks

And find an animal that you are interested in. Click on the letter that the animal's name starts with. (For example, if you want to know about kangaroos, click "K"). If they don't have the animal you were thinking of, try a different one!

Click on the picture of the animal you want to read about. Then, I'd like you to find out 2 things:

i/ What they eat
ii/ Where they live

In your notebook, write about the animal you chose. Tell me it's name, what it eats, where it lives, and one other new thing you learned about it.

See you Saturday!!!

Christie

Homework

Hello, busy people!
I have been looking through our workbook and I have decided we should do some reading for our homework. Let's do pages 62 and 63 for homework. We can do a little spelling test in class to help us remember how to spell some of the words in the story.

I'm looking forward to seeing all of you on Saturday!

Christie

(Here's a hint about the story on page 62!)

Welcome Back!

It was great to see everyone today! I enjoyed hearing stories about your summer adventures. I am looking forward to doing lots of fun lessons, games, and activities with you this fall.

For your homework this week, please finish your picture and postcard message. Next week, please bring the postcard AND the address of the person you want to send it to.

Also, I'd like you to do a little work in your Triple Smart workbook -- let's look at the Math section. Please try pages 14 and 15. It's the first time for us to do multiplication in English!!

See you next Saturday!!
Christie

Log House Fun II

Log House Fun

Well, we survived the typhoon and the rain and had a great time, didn't we?? Here are a few pictures...

Tie Dye Extravaganza

Hey, campers! Here are some pictures from our tie dye adventure:

11 p.m. Friday

Hi everyone! Yes, a typhoon is coming ... we still don't know how things will work out. It's now 11:25 p.m. Friday night and I'M still planning to go to class and make tie dye t-shirts. Please let us know if you think you can't make it. About the log house plans, let's talk about it at class. Maybe the weather forecast will be clearer then, too.

Good night!
Christie

Just a little bit of homework

Hi gang -- I think I told you in class but I wanted to post it here, too. This week's homework is the last 2 pages of Chapter 2 (English) that we did in class last week. Please do pages 60 and 61.

For our tie dyeing project, please make sure you wear some old clothes and maybe bring a smock, too.

See you Saturday!

Christie

Log House Sleepover July 15

Hi Kidz and Families!

We have been thinking and planning and thinking some more, and it looks like our plans for the log house sleepover are all set.

If possible, we'd like people to come to the log house at about 1:00 or 1:30, after lunch (or you can bring a bento to eat there, if you like). Kids, please wear your TIE DYED SHIRT if it's all ready to go!! We'll get the kids busy putting up tents and getting things organized, then we'd like to go on a walk up the hill, doing a scavenger hunt along the way as we go to Karan Waterfall (if the weather cooperates).

On Sunday, the kids will have free time to play in the yard or go up to the creek to look for frogs, bugs, etc.

For your information, the log house has a large, flat yard where we will set up the tents. Most adults will sleep in the log house (futons and mats are provided), and the kids will be in the tents. At least 3 adults will also sleep outside to keep an eye on the kids. The house has a large hinoki bath and one toilet. We will have to line up for the toilet! The house is located on Route 263 in the village of Ishigama. You can get there by bus if you don't have a car. I will bring maps to class on Saturday.


Meals:
We will provide food according to the following menu. After all the shopping is finished, the cost for the food will be shared between all of the families. If anyone in your family has special dietary needs or if they want to eat something different from the menu, please be sure to bring food that is appropriate for them.


Our menu for dinner on the 15th is this:

BBQ Hot dogs
BBQ Hamburgers
Salads (see below -- salads will be pot luck)
Dessert
Drinks: Cold tea and water
Hot tea and coffee
Adults who would like to drink beer, wine, or other alcoholic drinks, please be sure to bring them yourself.

About the salads, I'd like to ask the following people to prepare a salad to bring:

Mie (Potato salad)

And these three ladies, please make your specialty!
Ayako
Seiko
Mayumi
Greek salad, green salad, pasta salad, broccoli salad, anything is ok. Please prepare enough for about 20 people (10-12 children, 10 adults) to have a small portion. (If anyone CAN'T make a salad to bring, for some reason, please let me know so we can make other arrangements.)


Breakfast on July 16th

pancakes with maple syrup
bacon
eggs
fruit
yogurt
Drinks: orange juice
hot tea and coffee


Other things to bring:

Toothbrush, shampoo, etc. for personal use
Bath towel and face towel
Pajamas
Shoes good for walking (sneakers ok)
Change of clothes
*IMPORTANT* Flat sheet, towelket/blanket and pillow for each person


Kids please also bring:

Pencil case and writing notepad
Other items for playing outside:
sports gear (balls, jump ropes)
net for bug catching,etc


E-mail me with any questions!

Thanks -
Christie

Homework

Hi everybody! I have sent the homework to your parents' e-mail address. Please ask them to print it out so you can work on it. If you don't have the story, here it is again:

The Magic Window

Once upon a time a poor glass maker was asked by the king to make a square window for his grand palace. The palace sat on top of a very steep, high mountain, making it difficult to reach. When it was time to deliver the window, the glass maker took great care to wrap the window to protect it, then began his long journey up the mountain. As the glass maker climbed higher and higher, he stumbled on a rock and fell. Alas, the window broke into seven pieces! Try as he might, the glass maker could not put the window back together. The glass maker was very discouraged and wanted to give up. After trying again and again to fix the window, something wonderful happened – a winged horse emerged from the broken pieces! Magically, each time the glass maker arranged the seven pieces, another beautiful creature sprang forth! He decided to show the magical window to the king. The king was so pleased with the magic window that he asked the glass maker and his family to live in his castle and make glass windows for the whole kingdom! The moral of the story is this: the glass maker never gave up. His bad luck became his good luck!

Artwork

Homework

Hi, Gang!

About our homework this week, I'd like to do a little in our workbooks. We did pages 106 and 107 of the Science section in class, so I'd like you to finish chapter 2 of Science by doing pages 108 and 109. You might want to get Mom or Dad to help you with some the new words:

dormant
hibernate
migrate

On page 109, if you don't know which parts of the map are North America, South America and Mexico, ask your Mom or Dad to help you find them in an atlas or encyclopedia. If you don't have one at home, click on this link to see one online:

Online Atlas

Click on North America or South America to see the different parts of the map in the the textbook.

See you Saturday!
Christie

Categories

Great job with our lesson today, everybody. I really enjoyed hearing all of your ideas for different categories for the pencils, soybeans and leaves. Here are some pictures of your efforts:

A fun word game to try...

The cabin looks like a fun trip!

I found a nice word game that I think everyone will like.

It's called "flip words". Give it a try!

FLIP WORDS!


Look at the letters and see if you can find words. The letters of the words can be vertical, diagonal, backwards or even curving around (not necessarily in a straight line.

Click the letters of a word you've found in order, then when all the letters are highlighted, click "submit word".

The longer the word, the more points you get. And it the first letter of the word is in the puzzle word at the top, it will appear. If not, it the letter will appear at the top left (this part of the game is like Hangman.) Enjoy!


(Kids may need a little help from a grown-up in guessing the word(s) at the top, but I bet you can find a few in he bottom section.)

Overnight Field Trip

Hi Gang:

As many of the Moms and Dads know, we have been talking about doing a sleepover field trip in July. Ask your Mom and Dad if your family is free to join us for one night, July 15. We are hoping to go to a log house where many of you have been before. Here are some pictures of the house and the area --




We can have a barbeque, go hiking up the mountain to the waterfall, check for fish and frogs in the creek, hunt for insects -- you name it! Please let us know if you and your family can come.