Our animal unit in the preschool started a few weeks ago with a visit to the Milpitas Animal Shelter. On Monday, one of the animal patrol officers the children met during the field trip rescued two newborn kittens that were abandoned by their mother and were close to death. Kathrin Winter and her group of frogs have agreed to become their foster parents until they can become available for adoption. Our focus during this unit is on the attitudes of caring and commitment. The children now have the chance to learn first hand what it means to care for an animal and also the commitment it takes. We already have other animals in the preschool, that the children learn to take care of. The newborn kittens on the other hand, need very frequent feedings, warmth and comfort, much love and very gentle care. The children will also be able to learn about the growth and development of these tiny kittens. Their body is still small and fragile, their eyes are still closed and their movements are still very clumsy. In case you are interested in adopting one or both of thse kittens, please talk to Kathrin in the preschool. They can be adopted through the San Jose Animal Shelter in about six weeks.
Field Trip to the Animal Shelter and Pet Store
The children started with their new unit "Ein Herz fuer Tiere". To start off the unit, the groups went to tour a local pet store and an animal shelter to see what is needed to take care of animals. In the pet store they saw how the animals are fed, groomed and even boarded. One group bought a hermit crab for the classroom and will learn all about its needs and how to take care of it.
Another class toured the new state of the art animal shelter in Milpitas. The visit included lessons on when a child should or- not- approach a dog, how to care for animals and what animals the Humane Society cares for. The field trip also included a tour through the facilities and an animal control officer meeting us at the end with her truck! It was a lot of fun! During this unit, every classroom will have a different area to explore for the children from an Animal Hospital, Puppet Theater, Humane Society, Research Center and an animal habitat in our dress up corner. If you have animal costumes, furry fabrics collecting dust at home- just bring them into the preschool!
Legos and Play dough
We all know that children need good fine motor control for school success. The process does begin early, when infants and toddlers reach for and grasp objects. But development and coordination of wrist and finger muscles-necessary for hand writing later- come slowly and require lots of practice. Teachers and parents alike can help children develop fine motor control by providing appropriate materials. Playdough and Legos, are great examples. One of the many skills learned through playing with playdough and Legos is the development of strenth and dexterity in hands. Simply through pinching, rolling and shaping play dough, children develop strength in finger and wrist muscles. Connecting Legos develops hand muscles and the finger grasp, the touching of the finger and the thumb that is important for holding pens, pencils and other tools. Playdough and Legos are both open ended materials. Children can play with these however they choose. These materials not only develop fine motor skills but also provide opportunities for practice and discovery of many math-related skills. Both materials provide hours of enjoyment, many ways to enhance fine motor skills, and great opportunities for intellectual developmenmt. Once again: Play is the way young children learn! Here is an easy recipe for playdough: 1 cup salt 2 cups flour 1 teaspoons cream of tartar 2 tablespoons oil 2 cups water A few drops of food coloring Combine all ingredients in a pan and cook over low heat, stirring constantly, unti all ingredients are well mixed and the dough begins to pull away from the side of the pan. The dough will smooth out after 10 min. of cooking. Remove from pan and knead for 2 min. The dough can be kept in a plastic container for 3-4 weeks.
Kiepenkasper
Mike Fallon, the parentrep for the Fledermaus group reported about the puppet show: Uwe Spillman arrived yesterday for his annual Kiepenkasper performance. He is currently touring the West Coast putting on performances at German schools and German classes in the various public schools with his puppet Kasper. The show ran for a about an hour and was a big hit with the kids. Herr Spillman lives in Germany and travels throughout Europe and the US putting on old fashioned puppet shows in German. It was pouring down rain before the performance, with lightning and thunder as well. The Preschool and Kindergarten assembled in the Gym, put their raincoats and boots in piles and sat on cushions to enjoy the two act show. In the first act, Kasper has his golden gong stolen by a pirate, who hides it on a desert island. The kids helped Kasper build a ship, sail it to the island and trick the pirate into revealing where the Golden Gong is buried. In the second act, Kasper is building a bicycle for his friends’ birthday, but is missing a bike seat. He encounters a wizard who warns him about a hideous monster that is in the area. The monster finally reveals himself, and is actually a bike seat in disguise.
On Wednesday, January 20th at 10 AM, we will have a special visitor, a professional pupeteer from Germany. All preschool classes, as well as the Vorschule will visit his performance in the gym. Tu/Th children are welcome to attend with their parents.The play is performed in German, showing the adventures of Kasper, a popular children's character, a bit like Mr. Punch. The pupeteer plays from a wicker basket and with much participation (as it should be), the children help Kasper through the stories using lots of German and teach them something of the culture of the country. Above all, it is great fun for children and adults. If you would like to see the show with the whole family, you can attend it on Saturday. The show is put on by the Saturday school, starts at 1 PM and costs $8 per person.
GAIS Program Information Evening
While we have just started a New Year, we are already gearing up for the new school year. Parents have all received the re-enrollment papers. I want to encourage parents with children entering Vorschule in the coming year to attend the Info evening on January 13th. There will be a presentation about the Vorschule to make the program more transparent. I will also hold a parent coffee tomorrow, Friday, Jan. 8th in the Library from 8:45-9:45 am to answer questions about Vorschule.
The Nutcracker Story
One of the preschool classes heard the story about the nutcracker in class. After hearing the story they made plans to do the play themselves, starting with choosing roles and making costumes and props for the play. After doing the play during circle time, the children decided to invite all preschool classes into the gym and came up with ideas on how to create the stage set. As a result, all classes were able to enjoy their play in the gym.
Winter Festival
We hope to see you all on Saturday at our winter festival. We will start with the students performances. The preschoolers will sing first at 2 PM. We will meet the children in front of the stage in the school yard, next to the snowman at 1:50 PM. Parents will be responsible for their children at the end of the preschool performance and will meet them again near the snowman. We will sing a few winter songs and the children can wear either a white top for the performance or traditional clothing (Dirndl or Lederhosen), for our Austrian yodel song and a winter hat. Winter clothes work as well in case it is cold, since the performance will be outside. All songs are on the website and can be downloaded. Afterwards, please stay for cookies and coffee, arts and crafts and a visit by the 'Nikolaus'. Please tell your child's teacher if you are not going to be there.
Read me story
Read me a story-Again! As a parent, you have all heard your child ask you to repeat a story, over and over and over again. As tiring as that can be, repeated storytelling is actually very good for young children. By hearing a story repeatedly, they learn grammar and story structure. They also learn new vocabulary words and learn to associate the words with the illustrations on the page. After a while, they will learn to retell the story by themselves, using the illustrations as cues. Children who hear and retell stories refine their retellings until they can "read' the story by themselves. Even though this may be by recitation rather than word identification, they gradually identify the text with the words they are saying. To develop into lifelong readers, children need opportunities to learn to love books. What better way than snuggling up together and hearing that old favorite again- and again? When learning a new language it is even more important to listen to the same story more than once. If you are not able to read to your child in German, take advantage of our selection of books on tape in the library.
Lantern Parade
Once again, our annual lantern parade was a great success. With the help of a shadow play the story of St. Martin was told. The story is one of the best known legends of St. Martin and how he helped a poor beggar by sharing his coat. The Girl Scouts took the opportunity to organize a coat drive to help people in our own community. The 5-day groups will also organize a collection for children in a transitional shelter in Menlo Park, to show them that there are children right here that have very little and come up with items that we can share with them. Parents in those groups will get more info from their child's teacher. Thank you Hala for the idea and for organizing.
Halloween at GAIS
Two of the preschool classes started celebrating Halloween today. The groups were busy trick-or-treating around school, lighting pumpkins, singing songs, playing games, watching the witch's brew being made and trying to be brave enough to try some. As if Halloween wasn't scary enough, we just received notice of some face paints containing lead. For more info, please go to the following link http://safecosmetics.org/article.php?id=584
Process and Product
As adults, we are concerned with the outcomes of a product of our efforts. We want the report to look nice, the cookies to look great, or the hedges to look perfectly straight. We participate in few activities just for the fun of doing them. In part this is because we are not still learning how to do most of these activities. But do you remember when you learned a new computer program for example? In the beginning you neeeded a certain amount of "messing around"-exploring what would happen if you did this or that.
That is the way it it with your child. Kids are learning new things all the time, and they need the freedom to learn new things without worrying about the product.
Luckily, young children tend to be more involved with the process than they are with the end product. That is why your child may draw all afternoon but may not be able to tell you what he drew. And why one child can pour rice back and forth between pitchers all day long, and another will string and unstring beads every day of the week.
It is hard for adults to look beyond the product of an activity and see what the child is learning from the process. Perhaps he's learning coordination or beginning writing skills or making discoveries about triangles or gravity. He's certainly finding out that doing for one's self is very satisfying-and that builds confidence.
Be patient. Allow your child the time to grow and learn through the various processes that are part of the task. Enjoy watching his or her development.
Game Night
Last week, the preschool held its annual family game night. With about 90 parents, children and teachers, the event was very well attended. After a dinner of pizza, sushi, veggies and fruit, most were very engaged in outdoors games as well as board games. It was also a nice opportunity to meet and chat with other parents. Overall, a very fun evening for all!
End of unit: "Hey, that's me!"
All preschool classes have finished their first unit of "Hey, that's me". During this unit the children learned more about themselves and their classmates. The emphasis was also on classroom routines and rules, as well as their roles and classrooms resposibilities. All classes did different activities to support the unit, which you can read about in your teacher's infomails on the website. At the end of each unit you will receive a portfolio that will show you what the children have been doing in the class and the progress that went on during the unit. Take some time to look through the portfolios together with your child. This is also an excellent opportunity to get a dialog going about preschool. With the help of pictures your child might be better able to share things about their day and you might be able to learn the names of their classmates as well. Provided lyrics will help you learn the songs. Our next goal is to record many of the songs we sing in preschool and put them on the website, to make it easier for you to sing with your child.
Peace Day
Last Monday was Peace Day. Peace is a very abstract concept for preschool children. In the preschool, peace means that we want to get along with each other without fighting and hurting each other, even when we really, really want to have the toy another child is playing with, for example. We talked about how to solve problems and conflict's on a level the children can understand. We also talked about how it feels when children won't let children play with them and introduced our rule: "You can't say- you can't play" or "Alle duerfen mitspielen". We have a blue circle with a pictogram of children holding hands in a circle to symbolize that rule. You can ask your child to point one out in the preschool. Puppet plays and role play are excellent tools to teach preschoolers new concepts. We used both last Monday and Tuesday to teach the children about conflict resolution and asked the kids to actively participate in solving the problems presented. Problem solving and conflict resolution does not happen on peace day alone, of course. It is an ongoing learning process and will be used every day, all year long. It also lays the foundation for the culture of our school. We want the children to show respect for each other, for themselves, their environment and their learning.
How to help your child become bi-lingual
While GAIS provides a language immersion environment, there are many things only you can do to help your child through this process. Here are some tips that help you improve the language absorption of your child:
The daily morning circle time and activity times are the best daily routine for language learning. Through finger-plays, songs, stories and discussions they are immersed in the language in a natural way. Also take advantage of the following recourses: GAIS library with hundreds of German books, CD’s and DVD’s, GAIS annual German book fair, extra curricular class (Deutsch Sternchen)andSummer school.
If you have an occasional babysitter, try to have a German one. Even though not a practical solution for everyone, getting a German Au-pair can be a great solution for your child care and language needs.
If you show your child that you think it is important and fun to learn another language, your child will tend to think the same way. GAIS also offers adult language classes, so does the German Saturday School and other local adult schools and colleges.
If you speak German, make sure you speak to your child in German and be consistent.
Also, check our GAIS website. In the parent section, under German Language Resource, is an excellent list of websites and information.
Sand Day in the Preschool
The preschool celebrated its annual sand day. The day started out with the delivery of a big truck load of new play sand, which needed to be hauled to the sand area. We accomplished that with much help from parents and the children, who were busy hauling sand by wheel barrows, Tonka trucks, buckets, etc. The children did sand art, baked a cake and finished the day off with a giant volcano.
Sigg Bottle Recall
The kids are back in school and it’s time to pack lunches again. We always encourage parents to use re-usable bottles and food containers to cut down on unnecessary waste. Many parents like to use the Swiss made Sigg aluminum bottles. If you do own a Sigg bottle, please be aware that they have found trace amounts of BPA in the lining of the bottles, made prior to 2008. The bottles are easily recognized by a golden interior color. The good news is, that your old bottles (no matter how old and dented or where they were purchased), can be easily replaced with new bottles at Whole Foods. Other stores may do the same but I personally tried Whole Foods and got all my bottles replaced.
First Week of School
This is the first week of preschool. For many this is a big transition into a new setting and new routines for others it was a week of meeting old friends and making new ones. Tonight will be our Back-To-School Night, an excellent chance to learn more about the IB program and the preschool in general, as well as a chance to meet with your child's teacher and other parents. The evening will start at 6:30 in the school gym.
In the meantime, you are probably anxious to hear what your child is doing at preschool all day. The question of "What did you do?" often elicits an answer of "I don't know" or always a favorite: "Nothing". Children are busy and active throughout the whole day but often lack the words to express it or have moved on to other things. Sometimes, you may find your child more talkative at bedtime, rather than right after they are picked-up. Keep informed about what is happening at preschool and use the info as a conversation starter. Avoid questions that produce one-word answers and ask specific questions. At bedtime, you can ask your child to give you 'good news' and 'bad news' about their day and talk them through any conflicts they may have had. If you ever worry about what your child tells you, check with the teacher. She may be able to give another perspective of what happened and can also give you feedback, if your child isn't able to tell you much about their day.
End of summer letter
As the summer winds down, the start of the new school year is fast approaching. For some of the children this will mean their first entry into the world of preschool. To help make the transition smoother, we will have a parent picnic on Saturday, August 22 from 12-3 PM. This day has traditionally been our big workday before the school starts, getting all the rooms in order for the new year. We have been busy with many of those tasks over the summer. This way, you can focus on getting to know the school a bit better, showing your kids around, meeting the teachers, talking to other parents, etc. Returning families can catch-up with others after the long summer and can help welcoming all our new families. Please bring a pot luck dish to share for a common picnic and eating utensils for your personal use. The picnic will be held school wide but considering the needs of the smaller children, we will stay on the preschool grounds.
There will be an orientation for new families at 1PM to inform about the first days of school, preschool procedures, etc. The location of the orientation will be posted at the school on that day. It will take place either in the preschool or the gym.
The first day of preschool: For the 5- and 3-day group, the first day of preschool will be on Monday, August 24th; the 2-day group will have their first day on Tuesday, August 25th. The first day is an orientation day for new parents and children alike. Children may come with their parents and stay as long as they like to meet their teachers, find their cubby and explore all the different areas of the preschool. The regular daily preschool routing will start on the following day. If you or your child anticipate separation anxiety, please talk to your child's teacher during the orientation day or parent picnic on how you plan to address the separation. Some children are natural risk takers and come bounding into the classroom eager for new adventures. Others are more naturally cautious and require more time and reassurance to feel safe and at ease. There is no one style fits all prescription and we will do our best to make the transition as smooth as possible. Make sure you don't slip out when your child isn't looking, as tempting as that may be. Children need to know when you are going and be able to say good bye.
If this is your child's first experience in a preschool setting, it helps to read books with a starting-school theme. Local libraries and bookstores are usually well stocked at this time of year. Reading stories about school helps the child understand what to expect and encourages her to ask questions. It is also good to go over the daily schedule with the child, talking about some of the things she will be doing while at school (circle time, eating snack and lunch, playing, painting, riding a bike, story time, etc.). We discourage bringing toys from home, however if a special stuffed animal or blanket helps your child with the transition, they are more then welcome to bring that. Sometimes, even a family photo can help the child feel more secure in their new environment.
We are still enrolling children and will notify you of your child's group and teacher by next week.
On August 27th, we will have a Back-to-School Night for all preschool parents at 6:30 PM.
If you have any other questions, comments or concerns, please don't hesitate to contact me by e-mail at
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or call the office at 650-324-8617 and I will be happy to return your call.
We all look forward to welcoming you into the GAIS community (or welcoming you back) for another enriching and fun filled school year.
Mother's Day Celebration
One of the highlights in the Preschool is our annual Mother's Day Celebration. This is a day when all moms are invited to come in for a 'Kaffeeklatsch' or breakfast. Two groups already celebrated the big event today. All mothers were greeted with flowers, which was followed by songs, gifts, big hugs and a big buffet.
The children have been busy all week, practicing and preparing for it all and it has been fun to watch all the excitement and anticipation.
Preschool Unit "Our Five Senses"
The preschool children continued with their unit of the five senses. This week, most children explored the sense of sight. Besides talking about the eyes and what children can discover with them, they also explored what it might be like if you can't see. The children got to see and, of course, feel a book written in Braille and navigated around the classroom with an authentic white cane. They also made their own canes for further exploration and tried other activities blind-folded, such as playing, eating, painting, etc.
Trying this showed them the limitations one experiences when one sense is missing but also the things one can do despite of this. Relying on the sense of touch teaches the children to become more aware of this sense and and they have also been increasing their vocabulary in describing what they see and feel. Here are some of the quotes from the children: Wenn man blind ist, dann muss fuehlen um zu lesen, ... dann schreibt man mit einer Maschine, ...dann braucht man einen Blindenstock,...you can't see the birds,...you can't see what you want to read,...you can not see where you want to go,...you can't see where your food is.
