HJIS Sendai Aoba Class Blogs 2025-26: Week 17

Hello, Orca Class families!

Morning & Afternoon Meeting

To begin our week, we had a special morning meeting as we gathered together with Dolphin friends in our room. this is to welcome our Orca teacher, Mr. Stephan who joined us beginning this Term. On the next day, we started having a guessing game of our classroom rules wherein the teacher shared an example of a misbehavior and what classroom rule should we use to correct our behavior. Everyone were so good at telling which rule should be used. Our morning meetings this week were truly meaningful! Then, we started singing good morning song wherein we formed a circle and danced together as we say hello to everyone. It was such a joy seeing them laughing and holding each others' hands to begin our day. It was followed by checking our calendar time, assigning class jobs, doing a movement song and sharing about our whereabouts through our Class Dojo photos.

In the afternoon, we kickstarted our Term 2 Show and Tell this week. It was wonderful that our friends' different objects and photos about their favorite transportation from Red group. It was engaging and meaningful as we tried to guess what our friends brought/showed. Next week , it will be Blue group's turn. We ended our day through reading a storybook and singing a goodbye song.

Language & Literacy

Pre-K

These are the activities we did from last week to this week. To jumpstart our Literacy time , we started talking about our Raz-Kids book entitled, "The Aquarium". We described the pictures and read aloud the words with everyone. Then, we reviewed phonics Ww this week through activities like singing a song, beginning Ww watermelon craft, and a phonics worksheet. In addition, we did a related Raz-Kids worksheet. Last, our sight word of the week was "my". We aimed to enhance not only their literacy facet but also to lengthen their attention span and enhanced their focus and concentration which is essential to develop their skills and bodies holistically.

Kinder

These are the activities we did for this week. To jumpstart our Literacy time , we started talking about our Raz-Kids book entitled, "So Many Fish". We described the pictures and read aloud the sentences. It was such a delight how Kinder students learn ask more questions as they began to expand their vocabulary words through reading. In addition, we also learned the sight word 'jump' and did a worksheet about it for reading fluency. Then, we talked about Phonics Yy and made a zebra craft to enhance our understanding , and did some related Raz-Kids worksheets. Last, our sight word of the week was "jump". Last, we had a CVC reading comprehension to practice reading fluency. In addition, they also had a Japanese Lesson.

Maths

Pre-K

During this week, Pre-K students learned about 3-D geometric shapes. Some names that we learned this week were “cube”, “cylinder”, “cone”, “sphere” and more. We did activities such as listening to songs about 3-D shapes, we made 3-D shapes using clay and sticks, explored 3-D shapes in our classroom and in everyday objects, and as a review, we made a booklet about what we learned about different shapes. Learning these names of shapes will expand our vocabulary when describing objects in our surroundings.

Kinder

The Kinder students learned about the numbers from 1-50 this week. We expanded on our numbers from 1-30 that we practiced last week and counted all the way to 50. We also reviewed how to use the place value number blocks and counted by ones and tens to find the total number of blocks. We are expanding our knowledge and range of numbers that we can comfortably recognize and count until.

Topic Exploration

This week for our Topic Time we did a number of crafts relating to boats. Through these crafts the kids came to understand how different sea vehicles work, their purposes, and specific situations in which they are used. On Monday we made a picture of a boat in which the children cut each individual piece and assembled it on their own. Afterwards, they designed and decorated it according to their tastes. Through this craft they learned about the main parts of the boat, being the body, hull, and jib (which encompasses all the parts of the sail). On Tuesday, we reinforced this by having the students make an origami version. This all helped tune their fine motor skills as they had to accurately fold their papers to accomplish the task. On Wednesday and Thursday, we had the students make paintings of the the ocean and their dream boat respectively, in order to enrich their imagination and give them a sense of scope in terms of when, where, and how a boat can be used. Finally, on Friday the students made a 3-D craft of a boat with various materials such as sponges, foil, wire, wooden sticks, paper, tape, scissors, and glue. Upon completion, the students were allowed to place their boats in a big container of water to see how and why it floated. We kept the activity open-ended, meaning we allowed the students to veer away from the examples we made so they could use their imagination to its fullest. All of their boats were uniquely theirs. All of the prior lessons we conducted this week culminated in this craft as they came to understand the physics of a boat, the various types, how it floats, and in what situations they are used in.

Free Play

Here are some more pictures of friends playing together in the classroom, in the Big Room, at the park, and enjoying other topics, events and activities at school.