Week 22: Celebrating 100 Days of Kindergarten

Dear Family,

We hope you all had an amazing week! As for us, we had an incredible 100 Days of School themed week filled with joy, creativity, and celebration. We spent the days counting down, sharing ideas, bringing our imaginations to life, wearing our beautifully painted T-shirts, and even baking cookies for everyone to enjoy. It was truly a blast! Our children felt proud, excited, and deeply understood the meaning behind celebrating how far they have come. The entire school was filled with smiles, laughter, and a wonderful celebration spirit as we marked this highly anticipated milestone together. Well, read on to explore the other activities we’ve been busy with and don’t forget to check out our 100 Days of School pictures at the end of the blog!

Large Group

Our large group time is always lively, joyful, and full of excitement, it’s truly one of our children’s favorite parts of the day! They love participating, sharing, and learning together. Along with our daily routines such as sharing about their weekends, setting the date, helping our caterpillar grow bigger, and reading our large group book of the week, “Fire”, which beautifully taught us about togetherness and teamwork. So this week, our large group topic continued to revolve around Planet Earth as we explored different landforms. Our children learned about them through songs, colorful clip art on the board, and fun discussions. They even challenged themselves to sound out and spell the names of the landforms on the board. It was an engaging lesson that sparked curiosity and helped our children deepen their understanding of the amazing planet we live on.


“My weekend was good but I don’t wanna tell you guys more” -Solomon

“We went to TinyTown again but with Nai this time and we went with Liyat’s car and it has TV inside” -Leul

“Vally is super easy to spell than the other” -Kian

“I like this one, the island cause it looks like a beach” -Yadon

“River flows free” -Lubono


Literacy

Our literacy sessions this week were creative, meaningful, and filled with love. During our first session, we took learning outside by the monkey bars, where our children designed and created their very own letter cards. They explored different hard and soft papers, chose their favorite colors, snipped, glued, and decorated freely each card as unique as its creator. We let the cards dry and saved the excitement for the next day. In our second session, we brought the cards back into the classroom and turned them into something very special; letters for their beloved moms. Each letter began sweetly with “Dear Mom” and often ended with a heartfelt “I love you.” The goal was to introduce our children to expressing their own thoughts and emotions through writing while practicing reading and writing in a meaningful way. Although spelling is still developing, every child tried their best to make their message clear and the love behind each word truly shined.


“I want to make a T-Rex and then write” -Samuel

“I have a lot to write for my mom but my paper is too small” -Solomon

“This is mom yeah? I’m correct?” -Ismael

“Maybe I will go home and read it for my mom because I don’t think she can read this” -Kian

“I love you mom and Betselot and me” -Yemariam

“Where is my mommy, mommy” -Nai (singing)

Math

This week in math, we happily continued building on last week’s number words by introducing 11–15. During our first session, we explored these new number words together, reading them aloud, sounding them out, and practicing how they are spelled. Our children then took turns coming to the board to match the numbers with their correct word forms. In our second session, we reinforced this learning with a matching worksheet activity. Our children carefully connected each number to its word, using their memory and reading skills to complete the task. This practice helped strengthen both their number recognition and early reading skills, showing them once again how math and literacy work beautifully together.


“Fourteen is like four and teen like when you grow up you be a teen” -Leul

“It’s always matching again and again like last week?” -Liyat

“They are very easy for me” -Solomon

“Eleven” -Betselot

Science

This week in science, we took a step back to review the states of matter, as we welcomed a few new friends into our class this semester. To make sure everyone felt confident and included, we began with a lively class discussion where our returning children proudly shared what they already knew and helped guide their new classmates. Together, they practiced identifying solids, liquids, and gases by naming everyday objects and explaining their thinking, which showed wonderful teamwork and understanding. For our second session, we took our learning outdoors for a fun matter hunt. Our children searched around, excitedly pointing out and collecting examples of different states of matter. They became very creative and thoughtful in their choices, confidently naming what they found and explaining why it belonged to each category. It was a joyful experience that strengthened their science knowledge while encouraging collaboration, curiosity, and exploration.

“The sanitizer is a liquid and not the bottle. The bottle is solid” -Lubono

“Look! Water! Liquid!” -Yemariam

“If I blow air, it’s gas” -Kian

“Look, Hanna’s water is also liquid” -Yadon

“Is our shadow solid or gas?” -Leul :)

“No, it’s not both. Shadows are not real guys you can’t even see it when there’s no sun” -Solomon (which also made us review our shadow lessons from last semester)

Art

Our art this week was beautifully connected to our 100 Days of School celebration. The whole school came together for a large mural painting, and each class had a turn to add their own creative touch. When it was our turn, we took the activity outside by the big boards, where our children worked in groups and let their imaginations shine. Each child contributed their own ideas, colors, and designs, creating a vibrant piece of free art that truly reflected their creativity and the final mural turned out absolutely amazing!


“Is this what Abigu’s and Lutanda’s class made?” -Liyat

“Let’s do more colors” -Ismael

“Look, I draw monster” -Samuel

“What about the school van? It still didn’t come. Are they going to draw when they come later?” -Leul

“Let’s save some space for them then so they will have a space to draw on” -Solomon

“I wrote 100 again” -Lubono

Football Friday

As always, our Football Friday was fun and full of energy! We began with warm up exercises, including football drills using cones; running in and out of them and practicing ball passing. After warming up, they were divided into two teams and, under the guidance of our coach, Mr. Tesfaye, they played enthusiastically and showed great teamwork. We would also like to extend our heartfelt thanks to all of you for your cooperation in sending our children in football jerseys or appropriate sportswear; it truly adds to the excitement and makes the experience even more special!

“See like how we talked in class fall down a little and I didn’t cry today” -Leul

“No, we score the same 2-2” -Ismael

“Yadon, we’re on the same team okay so we are gonna win” -Lubono

“Everybody OUT” -Liyat

“Me, I want to play too” -Yemariam

100 days of school moments...

Next week’s schedule:

Monday – Math, Literacy

Tuesday – Literacy, Science

Wednesday -Library, Math

Thursday - Science, Music

Friday - Library

Specials:

Monday- Art

Tuesday - Gym

Thursday - Ethiopian center/ clay

Reminders and notes

• Please make sure that our children are wearing suitable clothes on Monday as we have art class and activities get messy sometimes.


• Every Wednesday and Friday is library day. Our children will be bringing home a book of their choice in their library folder, so please make sure to read the book with them over the weekend. Please return the folder the following Wednesday so they can get a new one.


• Every Tuesday, we have gymnastics, so please ensure that our children come dressed in comfortable and loose-fitting sports attire to facilitate their exercise.


• Every Friday, we have football, so please make sure our children wear their football jerseys if they have them, or any comfortable shorts.



Thank you for celebrating our 100 days of learning with us! Stay tuned for more fun, growth, and joyful moments ahead!