Welcome Y! Y will be in Rainforest for the rest of our summer days. Hope you and your family will have a great time in Matsumoto!

We started the scorching hot week with cool pool play and a game Pass the Water. This game needs close communication, asking your friend ‘are you ready?’ and waiting for an answer ‘yes’ before you pour and pass the water! We played Pass the Ball too, but with our eyes closed! Easy, difficult and why? I can’t see, too far I can’t reach. I can’t hear him. Good communication requires good listening, speaking, body language and facial expression.

The highlight this week was Build It Up! Make a tower go as high as you can but only with what you have. In pairs and groups, Rainforest explored balancing cups, containers, paper plates and listening to ideas, trying them out, not giving up and trying again! The ooohs, the aaahs, the oh no, yes and the claps of joy filled the classroom. ‘He copied my idea. Too many parts. No, not like this (and with pushing of cups). Let’s try this. Maybe here.’ We reflected on the activity. We had one goal and that was to build a tower as high as we can. We learned that we could share ideas and try out the same thing because it worked for others. We learned not to give up and try again.

With the book ‘The Night Iceberg’ by Helen Stephens, we examined Tofta’s causes for her conflict. In recognising signs of conflict, we can better understand and think of solutions.

For Literacy, we worked on our high frequency words and had spelling quizzes. In sentence writing, we noted that we need to start with a capital letter and end with a full stop. We have progressed to the next level of RAZ books (Reading A-Z).

Rainforest has started practising their dance for Sports Festival. We have chosen Aloha Hawaiian theme for Rainforest! We will be dancing to Disney’s Moana soundtrack ‘How Far I’ll Go’. Till next week, have a lovely weekend!