February Class

Dear Apple class parents,
This is Teacher Eddie here writing to tell you about our February classes. During the month we did a lot of review work to help cement what the kids have previously learned. We had already finished our phonics workbook, so we spent the month doing a variety of worksheets that helped them to review short vowels, long vowels, consonant blends and consonant diagraphs. We also went back over all of the phonics readers that we have studied so far this academic year. The kids did a great job and showed that they had remembered a lot of it.
Our theme for the month was a continuation of jobs, with a focus on what they would like to be when they grow up. They also learned how to explain their choice with their limited vocabulary. We also briefly studied Chinese New Year vocabulary with them and played some games to reinforce the words.
We had already finished the Math workbook, so we spent some time doing worksheets to practice sequence, and also reviewed numbers up to 100. We even spent some time practicing basic addition, which will feature heavily in their next math workbook.
We completed some fun and simple art projects that went with the theme of the month, and this allowed the students some time to practice their fine motor skills. During the science time we learned about solids, liquids and gases, and also learned a variety of adjectives to describe things. During the teaching of this I blindfolded them and asked them to describe objects by feeling them. The kids enjoyed this, and this helped to reinforce the new words.
Finally, I just wanted to wish everyone a happy new year and hope that you are all healthy, happy and enjoying life.
Eddie

Reading Video

Dear Parents,
It's Teacher Eddie here. I wanted to tell you about what we studied during the month of January 2015. Our theme for the month of January was 'Jobs People Do'. The students learned a large number of jobs, and three sentence patterns to talk about them. You can hear these patterns in the videos we have made. During this month we spent a lot of time on phonics. I really want to help the students improve in this area, and get better at reading. We completed our workbook 'Step Into Phonics 4' during the month, and also spent a lot of time reviewing a mixture of short and long vowel sounds. You can also see this in the videos we have made. Now that the book has been finished, we will be doing worksheets to review all that we have learned so far. Some of these have been sent home in the communication books to show you.

We also spent a good amount of time reading our small phonics readers together this month. This month's book was book 10, called 'Trish and Chad'. This book focused on the consonant diagraphs th, sh and ch. Throughout this book there was also a lot of short and long vowel practice. We also spent time practicing sight words, and you can see some of these in the videos we have made. During science we studied the continents on Earth, and located Taiwan and other places on a world map. We completed our math books during the month too, and now the students have a good grasp of numbers up to 20. We will continue our math practice with worksheets during the month of February.

I hope you're pleased with the progress of your children. It is a pleasure to teach them, and we have a lot of fun together. I will continue to send some work home in their communication books, and sometimes ask them to do phonics reading at home.

Thanks,
Teacher Eddie

Wendy

Tyler

Jerry

Jenny

Howard

 

Here's some photos of our Thursday morning. In the photos you can see our phonics bookwork writing time, and our Christmas speech practice. I was very happy to see the faster kids helping the slower kids with their bookwork. They are also getting much better at their Christmas speeches now, which is nice to see.

Here's some photos from our visit to the park on Wednesday. The kids had a great time, and we were very thankful for the great weather!

November's English class (with Teacher Eddie)

Hello parents and family! My name is Teacher Eddie and you may remember me from previous events at the HESS Datong school. I taught the Apple class for most of November, and during this time the students studied the 'Neighborhood' theme. In the theme part of class they learned a lot of place names, and some prepositions of position to help talk about them. Our sentence patterns asked where they were, where they wanted to go, and where they had to go. We also had a short part of the month that was dedicated to Thanksgiving. The students practiced how to say what they are thankful for. Also during the month we read the HESS phonics reader 8, which is named 'Vroom Vroom'. The students used this and the phonics workbook to study phonics, and focused mainly on long vowel sounds and consonant blends. I made a short video with each student to show their knowledge of these areas.

Also during this month the students continued their math and science studies. They completed several pages of math, focusing on numbers  between 10 and 20. They recently have started to study the concept of more and less. During science time the students studied day and night, and the solar system. You may have seen the day and night worksheet that the students took home with them. When we studied the solar system the students looked at all of the planets, and their position in relation to the sun. Sometimes during class we sang some classic kids' songs to break up the lessons. The kids especially liked the 'Teddy Bear' song.

I hope you enjoy the videos of your children studying English. I apologize for my unsteady hands, but I am not a great photographer!

Thanks,
Teacher Eddie