Dear Parents and Guardians,
Happy Holidays! It's hard to believe that the end of 2014 is right around the corner. I hope that you all have a wonderful winter break, and I look forward to hearing about all of your exciting adventures when we return to school in January!
Happy Holidays! It's hard to believe that the end of 2014 is right around the corner. I hope that you all have a wonderful winter break, and I look forward to hearing about all of your exciting adventures when we return to school in January!
I am finally (mostly) caught up on photo uploads from the past few weeks. Thank you for your patience! You can view all of the photo slideshows on the Trimester 2 photo page. In reverse chronological order, here we go:
湯圓 (STICKY RICE BALLS)
This Sunday, December 21st, will be the Dongzhi Festival (Winter Solstice Festival). This is a traditional Chinese holiday that includes making and eating 湯圓 (sticky rice balls, aka glutinous rice balls). Since we won't be in school that day, the Dragon students celebrated the holiday a bit early by making their own 湯圓 this morning! Check out the pictures on our Flickr site. Each child should also have brought home a sandwich baggie with some leftover 湯圓. If you want to make your own (super easy...all you need is glutinous rice flour and water!), or if you need instructions on the cooking process, check out this YouTube video (we used brown sugar, and did not use the pandan leaves). Here are our finished products before we cooked them:
This Sunday, December 21st, will be the Dongzhi Festival (Winter Solstice Festival). This is a traditional Chinese holiday that includes making and eating 湯圓 (sticky rice balls, aka glutinous rice balls). Since we won't be in school that day, the Dragon students celebrated the holiday a bit early by making their own 湯圓 this morning! Check out the pictures on our Flickr site. Each child should also have brought home a sandwich baggie with some leftover 湯圓. If you want to make your own (super easy...all you need is glutinous rice flour and water!), or if you need instructions on the cooking process, check out this YouTube video (we used brown sugar, and did not use the pandan leaves). Here are our finished products before we cooked them:
OWL PELLETS
Our owl pellet lab was a huge success! Each Dragon scientist had his/her own set of lab tools...a pair of gloves, tweezers, toothpicks (for picking apart some of the bigger pieces), a magnifying glass, a recording sheet, and of course the pellet!
Our owl pellet lab was a huge success! Each Dragon scientist had his/her own set of lab tools...a pair of gloves, tweezers, toothpicks (for picking apart some of the bigger pieces), a magnifying glass, a recording sheet, and of course the pellet!
We found TONS of bones, and compared our findings using some bone charts. It was a bit hard to tell, but it seemed like we had some bones from mice, voles, and birds. Check out the pictures on our Flickr site.
STONE SOUP
We celebrated Thanksgiving in Dragon class by working together to make a delicious veggie "Stone Soup"! We had all sorts of vegetables, ranging from kale to white radishes to butternut squash. We took turns adding our vegetables into the slow cooker in the morning, and then (im)patiently waited until late afternoon to taste our final product. Our classroom smelled so wonderful throughout the day! Please check out the pictures on our Flickr site.
We celebrated Thanksgiving in Dragon class by working together to make a delicious veggie "Stone Soup"! We had all sorts of vegetables, ranging from kale to white radishes to butternut squash. We took turns adding our vegetables into the slow cooker in the morning, and then (im)patiently waited until late afternoon to taste our final product. Our classroom smelled so wonderful throughout the day! Please check out the pictures on our Flickr site.
READ-A-THON PAJAMA DAY
To celebrate the hard work of the students, we ended the Read-a-Thon with a special pajama day. I can honestly say that this is one of my favorite days of the school year. I wish that we could wear pajamas to school every day! Check out the pictures on our Flickr page. Also, this Thursday morning (December 18th), we will be announcing the winners of the Read-a-Thon challenges at our special awards ceremony. Please join us in giving a HUGE round of applause to all of the student participants!
To celebrate the hard work of the students, we ended the Read-a-Thon with a special pajama day. I can honestly say that this is one of my favorite days of the school year. I wish that we could wear pajamas to school every day! Check out the pictures on our Flickr page. Also, this Thursday morning (December 18th), we will be announcing the winners of the Read-a-Thon challenges at our special awards ceremony. Please join us in giving a HUGE round of applause to all of the student participants!
ANIMAL SHOW AND TELL
We are in the midst of our very exciting Animal Show & Tell week! So far, we've had wonderful visits from Christopher's fish (ZZ-ZA), Jason's rat (Biscuit) and turtles (Bubbles and Stella), and Kevin's snails. We will finish out the week with Chen Lao Shi's parrot as well as Annika's cats (Calvin and Hobbes). Other pictures will be posted in January!
Once again, I hope that you all have a relaxing and enjoyable winter break. See you in 2015!
Best regards,
Suen Lao Shi 孫老師
We are in the midst of our very exciting Animal Show & Tell week! So far, we've had wonderful visits from Christopher's fish (ZZ-ZA), Jason's rat (Biscuit) and turtles (Bubbles and Stella), and Kevin's snails. We will finish out the week with Chen Lao Shi's parrot as well as Annika's cats (Calvin and Hobbes). Other pictures will be posted in January!
Once again, I hope that you all have a relaxing and enjoyable winter break. See you in 2015!
Best regards,
Suen Lao Shi 孫老師