A Day in the Life: Outdoor Work in the Emeryville Children's House

This afternoon, we took advantage of the beautiful weather to do our work outside.

Each of us found a task to do to help clean or beautify our school environment:

Scrubbing the bikes and scooter clean of dirt and grime,

Washing the towels and placemats and hanging them to dry in the sun,

and pulling the weeds underneath around the play structure. Not to mention cleaning out the bike shed and helping weed and till the vegetable patch! It was a busy afternoon!

Winter Open House in the Emeryville CH

We were so grateful to all the parents and grandparents who came to our Winter Open House!

We had so much fun preparing the fruitcakes and gingerbread cookies, and sewing our ornaments, and practicing our songs, and when the day finally arrived, we were excited to show our families our work and present them with our gifts of ornaments, baked goods, and voices raised in song.

Happy Holidays to all of you from the children (and teachers) of the Emeryville Children's House!

A Day in the Life: Emeryville Children's House

This week, we have been sewing ornaments to give to our parents on the last day of the term. I am sewing sequins onto the felt. They look just like tiny ornaments on the tree. This needle is very sharp, but no one got poked because we were all so careful!

After we sew the sequins onto the felt pieces, we stitch the two halves together to make a little pillow. I am stuffing my ornament with soft craft filling.

My ornament is done and ready to hang up. All of our ornaments will decorate the classroom until the end of our open house next week, when we will give them to our parents. The hook is too high for me to reach. Please help me?

A Day in the Life: Emeryville Children's House

When I wash the table, I make careful circles with my scrub brush. Taking my time, I keep focused on what my hand is doing. 

I hold my teacher's special silver bell as I step on the line. My walk is steady to keep the bell from ringing. This is harder than it looks! If the bell makes a sound, I stand still and take a breath before continuing.

A Day in the Life: Emeryville Children's House

I had my first lesson with the Stamp Game today! I figured out how to exchange categories all by myself.

I am practicing my reading. I am matching the labels to the pictures of food that will be eaten at the Gratitude Luncheon this week!

A Day in the Life: Emeryville Children's House

Lao-shi and I are having a reading lesson. I say the words out loud as I point to the characters. I remember most of the characters, but lao-shi helps me if I get stuck.

Today I counted the Thousand Chain for the first time. It is so long that it won't fit on the floor in our classroom; we have to lay a special mat down in the long hallway!

A Day in the Life: Grandparents' Day in the Emeryville Children's House

Today we invited our grandparents to visit us in the Children's House!

Yesterday, we got ready by helping clean up and baking oatmeal raisin cookies.

I shared a pot of tea with my Grandma!

After we showed our grandparents some of our work, we sang them songs and recited poems in English and Chinese. Here we are reciting a Chinese poem about the seasons.

A Day in the Life: Emeryville Children's House

My friend and I are making peach bread together for this morning's snack!

First I mix the dough...

While she chops the fruit...

Now it is ready to put in the oven!

Pickle Making in the Children's House

Yesterday, one of the children was out watering the garden and came inside to excitedly report that the teachers HAD to come with him to see the cucumbers. They were very big! There was only one thing to do: plan a pickle-making day!

The first step was to wash and slice all of the cucumbers we could pick. We went to the garden twice to get more cucumbers, and then once more to cut some fresh chives from the herb bed to put in the pickling jar.

 Fudge got the cucumber ends as a treat.

The pickling spices smell so good! What is this piece?

With the cucumbers, chives, and spices added, all that remained was to add a little sugar, salt, and vinegar. The jar will sit out on our counter today, then go in the refrigerator for one week. Then our pickles will be ready to eat!

A Day in the Life: Emeryville Children's House

Flower arranging is an art that requires many careful steps.  I'm confident that the result will be very elegant.

A Day in the Life: Mother's Day Projects in the Emeryville Children's House

We have had so much fun last week preparing homemade chocolate truffles for our mothers!

We chose raspberry, orange, and coffee for our truffle flavors.

 We are taking turns stirring the raspberry powder into the agave. We want to make it very smooth and even so that it will blend well into the chocolate!

This orange is so big, it took five of us to zest! 

Blending the chocolate is serious business. We are giving it all of our attention!

While we are waiting for the cream to scald in the kitchen, we are weighing espresso grounds.

After we strained the scalded coffee and cream mixture, we got to add it to the chocolate. We poured just a little into the bowl at a time to make sure the consistency was just right.

The best part of all was when we got to roll the truffles into balls between our hands and dip them in the cocoa powder or turbinado sugar! We are so proud of what we made for our moms, and hope you like your surprise!

Happy Mother's Day with love from the Emeryville Children's House!

A Day in the Life: Emeryville Children's House

I am getting more comfortable using the Story Box to compose short paragraphs. Today I wrote about what I did this weekend! After I wrote my story in my best handwriting, I got to illustrate it.

A Day in the Life: Emeryville Children's House

I am labeling phonetic word objects in English. I am choosing one of the objects on the table, saying the word aloud, then looking for the label that matches it. This is the second box; it has words with four, five, and even six letters!

A Day in the Life: Emeryville Children's House

This morning, I am learning to put the color tablets in order from darkest to lightest. My teacher asks me to find the tablet that has the "most green" or the "most purple". She said I could decide for myself how many sets I wanted to put in order, and I said I wanted to do *all* of them! When other children crowded around to observe me, I asked them, "Can so many people please not observe my work?"

A Day in the Life: Emeryville Children's House

I am learning about descriptive words in English. I have found descriptive words to match each object, and now I am reading them all out loud. I couldn't do this work before today, because some of the words use phonograms that I just learned this morning!

A Day in the Life: Emeryville Children's House

I am practicing making words with the movable alphabet. Today I am practicing words that have "u" and "g" in them so that I can be as confident with them as I am with other letters.

A Day in the Life: Emeryville Children's House

11月15日の七五三のために、千歳飴袋を作っています。

I am making a bag for Shichi Go San, which is going to be observed on November 15th. 

I will fill it with Chitose Ame (thousand-year candy) later next week!

A Day in the Life: Emeryville Children's House

I am cutting apples to share with my friends for afternoon snack.

A Day in the Life: Emeryville Children's House

I don't like to have my picture taken, but I was okay with letting my teacher take a picture of my work. The movable alphabet is one of my favorite things to work with in the classroom and I practice almost every day. Every time I make a new word, I go to my teacher and ask her to come look at it. When my rug cannot hold any more words, I ask her to come look one more time, and then I clean up.

A Day in the Life: Emeryville Children's House

This morning, I asked my teacher if she would give me a lesson on how to weed the mint bed. Now I am practicing how to carefully follow the stem of the weed down to its base so I may pull it up by the roots!