Books about Planets, Action and Adventure

Grade 2 Assembly - Thursday, March 14, 9:00 - MPR

 All Grade 2 parents are invited to come check out our performance next Thursday. The students have been hard at work creating their own dances and some dialogue for our performance and are looking forward to it. The students are divided into two groups - Astronauts and Planets. 

Costumes

We ask for some assistance with their costumes. So that we can start rehearsing with the costumes on Monday. 

Astronauts

Koichi, Gabriel, Kai, Ciel, Anna, Kanata, Mathieu, Max, Hunter, Eita

I would like to request that the students who are astronauts either wear all white (as much as possible - believe me I know how hard and seemingly pointless it might be to dress some of our kids - especially boys in white pants!) So if they don’t have white pants, then light grey should be alright. Or if they have an astronaut costume (and I know that some do!) then that would be even better, but don’t worry about going out and buying one as we can make do without. Another addition to the costume could be a helmet - but not absolutely necessary, and possibly a backpack (if it is white, silver or grey and could have the appearance of an astronauts jetpack- again, not a necessity just a nice bonus if it can add to the astronaut look). We might also try to add some other details to the clothes with some coloured tape to help them look more like astronauts - or if you want to help them with that at home then that would be helpful as well. When creating their costumes the most important thing to remember is that they will need to dance in it.

Planets

Yuuki, Flora, Moritz, Ren, Alya, Eric, Raul, Jose, Mia

For those that will be planets, I would like them wear all black or dark grey/ navy. If they have dark pyjamas / shirts or pants that have while stars or other celestial / space objects on them then that would be even better. If they don’t them we can try to add some white star stickers to them for the performance. The students have already painted the planet that they will be and they will wear them around their neck/ on their chests so hopefully they will really glow on stage!

This week grade 2 focused on what makes each of the planets in our solar system unique as they researched in books and the internet to find out details about their chosen planets. To share their findings, they began creating posters about the planets and also writing their own dialogue for next week’s assembly. 

They have also been hard at work creating dances for the show! 

On Thursday, we celebrated book day and the students worked on creating covers for their action/ adventure stories that are being printed and published and ready to be read! We also had a lot of fun dressing up in our pajamas for the day!

Here is a special message from DSKI and the Kobe Storks:

Exclusive offer for families of DSKI
Kobe Storks vs. Veltex Shizuoka Home Game
Sunday March 31 
14:00 Tipoff  World Memorial Hall
Free for DSKI students and siblings
Price for adults: 1000 Yen per person
For tickets please click here to book

DSKI Parents' and Guardians
 
Hello, this is Kobe Storks.
We are a professional basketball team in Kobe city.

We would like to announce that Kobe Storks and DSKI collaborated together to have a HOME GAME TOUR EVENT.
Kobe Storks will invite you to attend our home game at World Memorial Hall on March 31 against a professional basketball team in Shizuoka. 

As of February 29, Veltex Shizuoka is currently in 5th place in the Western Conferenceand Kobe Storks is currently in 4th place in the Western Conference. This game is going to be very important for our team to advance in the playoffs.
We need your passionate support to give energy to our players!

We are looking forward to seeing you all in the game on March 31!!

Rotating, Sun Dialling, Rolling and Leaping

 This week we continued to inquire into how the solar system works and plays a role in our daily lives. We experimented with how the Earth rotates to show how the sun moves across the sky and creates night and day.

We also explored how the first clocks were set by creating our own sundials. We also learnt about how it was the ancient Egyptians who came up with the idea for 24 hours in a day. We also learnt about why we have a Leap Year on February 29th, as well as how to tell the seasons by looking at shadows!

We enjoyed a couple of special events this week with a ballet performance on Tuesday, and the Kinder 2 Class assembly on Thursday. 

Speaking of assemblies, Grade 2 will host the next assembly on Thursday March 14th from 9:00in the MPR. All Grade 2 families are invited to join. We started discussing it and made plans for it with the class this week and we will start practicing for it next Monday! 

Ready, Set, Roll!!

In PE this week, we continued using the roller boards and had fun racing around like Mario Kart!

In language the students continued working on their creative writing stories and are getting closer to publishing them. Next week we hope to have a little publishing party on DSKI Book Day on March 7th. 

Continue reading to find out more about our book day!

We will be having a lot of fun reading and book activities for the students to enjoy, helping build and foster a love of books and reading. 

We also invite your children to wear their pyjamas to school. Getting into pyjamas and reading at home just before bed is something a lot of children do. So, coming into school in their pyjamas and reading will be a good way to connect this and promote the fun and joy of books.

Parents - during the day we would like to invite you to come in and read to the children. You can do so in any language that you would like to! Please bring some books from home you would be happy to share.

Please just let your child's homeroom teacher know. Email them to organise a time that works for both teacher and parent.

Culture Week

March 26 - 29

We will be having a week filled with fun activities, celebrating all the cultures in our school! 

More information to follow next week but - we are looking for parents to help out!

You can - 

• Show or teach games / sports / toys from your country

• Play a traditional instrument, teach a song, or create arts and crafts 

• Teach the students a dance or movements special to your country

• Prepare a native dish with the students 

If you are interested please let your homeroom teacher before March 8 (Friday).

Space Innovations for STEM Week

 This week was all about Science, Technology, Engineering and Math as we focused on Space Innovations for STEM week. After their initial brainstorming session, the students clearly identified 3 areas to focus on: Space Technology,  Terraforming (changing a planet to make it just like the Earth) and finally Space Tourism. 

Once they decided on their topics they had an opportunity to chose partners from the other members who were interested in the same topic or they could also work alone. They spent Monday researching their topics and then on Tuesday they started to plan out what type of project they would would like to create and present. 

The students were very focused on the task and worked hard towards finishing their posters, models, and slideshows in time for today’s STEM exhibition. Thanks to all who came today! It was great seeing so many parents there! (Even if it was a bit crowded!)

G2 Assembly: March 14

Now that STEM week is over, Grade 2 will start preparing for our next big event - hosting the G2 Assembly on the morning of March 14. We hope to see you there!

Moon Phases and Movement

 This week, we focused on our closest neighbour in the solar system, our moon, as we looked at the different ways the moon changes in the night sky. We looked at how the different phases occur through scientific experiment using flashlights and a ball of play-doh to represent the sun and moon. This was a really fun activity for the students as they worked together with a partner to see if they could recreate the different phases and shapes of the moon. It took some time but eventually the students were able to recreate the different phases. 

We also began planning our ideas for next week’s STEM week. In grade two we are focusing on innovations related to space. Some of the students decided to make space tourism their focus. Another group of students decided they want to look at how we can terraform another planet to help it resemble the Earth. And a third group decided to focus on technological innovations related to space by making changes and improving different types of space equipment such as space drones, spacesuits, jetpacks, etc. 

Over the weekend the students have been asked to do some research on their chosen topics. For example, the students working on space tourism should research one or two planets in the solar system to be able to have some idea about the planet and what conditions would be like if they could go there as well as things they can see or do there. For those who chose terraforming as their topic they should research what ideas scientists currently have for making another planet similar to the Earth.

The third group should look at the current version of the different objects that they’ve chosen and research how they work and find out what limitations or problems that they might have. Some of the topics they have chosen to re-search are: base cars/ space buggy to explore the surface of a planet or moon, a space drone that can fly over the surface of a planet and explore, as well as space suits and how to make them more resistant to the extreme temperatures of things like the sun etc. Please check with your child to find out what they are researching and give them some time to read up on it before Monday so that they have some ideas before doing more research at school.

In math we began working on multiplication and division and during language the students continued working on their creative writing stories. They shared their stories with classmates to get some feedback and made some edits before they began typing them in. Many students made great progress as they kept adding more details to the stories. They also enjoyed quizzing each other before their spelling tests today.

In PE we continued working on rolling sliding and gliding using the roller boards for different types of movement races and also to play a pirate game stealing beanbag treasures from one pirate ship while other students tried to defend it.

We also had a special posture and movement lesson together with Mr. Didier Hartmann on Wednesday and the students demonstrated their ability to swing and do pushups and handstands and had a lot of fun dodging the stick in the stick game!