Tsukuba International Preschool

Now Accepting Students for September 2010

admin — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 21:00:05 +0000

Tsukuba International Preschool (TIP) is currently accepting applications for the 2010-11 school year, which starts in September.

TIP is a full-time preschool (ages three to five) for children of all nationalities. (If you are interested in English education options for older children, please see the Tsukuba International School website.) The school employs two fully qualified teachers (from Australia and Japan).

Tsukuba International Preschool has an Open School Day once per month to allow people to come and visit the school, observe some classes, and talk to the school staff. If you would like to have more information about the school, these Open School Days are a perfect opportunity for you to see the school in action. Click here to make a reservation to attend one of the Open School Days.

If you are interested in learning more about Tsukuba International Preschool and our application procedures, please contact the school.

Thank you for your interest in our school!

No-yeast Pizza Dough Recipe

Skye — Mon, 21 Jun 2010 06:00:09 +0000

This is a very easy to make pizza recipe from ingredients that you probably already have in your kitchen. This recipe makes 5 small pizzas.

Ingredients:

2 cups plain flour

1 teaspoon salt

2 teaspoons baking powder

2/3 cups water

1/4 cup vegetable oil

Method:

1. Mix flour, salt, baking powder and water in a bowl.

2. Knead the dough on a floured counter for about 2 minutes.

3. Roll (or stretch) the dough out into 5 small circles, about 0.5cm thick.

4. Spread oil over bases with fingers or the back of a spoon.

5. Spread your choice of pizza sauce on top, and add any toppings you like, with cheese on top. (Corn seems to be popular topping)

6. Bake at 200 degrees for about 15 minutes or until golden.

7. Eat and enjoy!!

This Week at TIP: June 21st, 2010

Skye — Sun, 20 Jun 2010 21:36:46 +0000

Wow, who can believe it’s our last week of school already? How time flies by! Last week we filled our afternoons with making things from our junk box, playing in our new sand box, moving and painting to music and even making mud cakes! We have just three days left of school now, and have some more fun things planned.
We would also like to take this opportunity to thank all of our families for their continued support throughout the school year. As you know, this was TIP’s first year in operation and we feel very lucky to have been a part of this experience. It has been an absolute delight for us to spend our days learning and growing with your children.
Thank you, and we wish you all the best for a happy, healthy and safe summer break.

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Monday

This morning we will make pizzas. We will also make some tanabata wishes in English for our tanabata tree and make some decorations for our party tomorrow.

Tuesday

Today is our Potluck Graduation Party. We will have a small ceremony in our classroom followed by a Potluck picnic lunch. There are no scheduled learning activities in the afternoon, so children who will stay until 3 o’clock will have a quiet time and free play.

Wednesday

Today is our last day of school for the year! We will spend the morning cleaning our classroom and packing up our belongings to take home. In the afternoon we will play some games or watch a children’s movie.

Thursday

No school today

Friday

No school today. Parent-Teacher Conferences will be held in our classroom. There will be no child-minding for TIP children at TIS, so please feel free to bring your child along with you to your conference.

Summer Activity Calendar: June-August 2010

Skye — Sat, 19 Jun 2010 02:50:57 +0000

We have put together a calendar which contains literacy, maths and other activities that you can do with your children every day of the summer holidays. It is specifically designed for P2 children going into P3, but it can also be a nice challenge or opportunity to review some things for our other students. Just click on the link below and download to your computer. Have a fantastic summer!!

Summer Activity Calendar (PDF)

This Week at TIP: June 14th, 2010

Skye — Mon, 14 Jun 2010 10:21:16 +0000

This will be our last full week of school for the school year. Last week, our class reflected on things that they enjoyed over the year, and made a list of things that they would like to do again, or do more of before we finish up. Some of the things that made the list were cooking, play time, Mt. Fuji flower art activities and making something from our ‘junk bag’. We will try and make our way through this list over the next week. We will also talk about two important celebrations that are coming up, tanabata (star festival) and Father’s Day, and make something special for each.
Unfortunately our herb plants that we planted back in golden week haven’t grown too much, but we have still decided to make cheese and herb pizzas. We are currently working hard as a class to score ‘6 pizzas on the whiteboard’ and are scheduled to make these on Monday June 21st and eat them for lunch.
Have a wonderful week!

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Monday

Today, P1 & P2 will work on something special for P3, while P3 do some rhyming activities. We will also read a story about dads and draw a picture of our own dad.

Tuesday

Today we will work on finishing up some unfinished language arts projects and make Father’s Day cards.

Wednesday

This morning we will read a Clifford story about Graduation Party’s and talk about our own and what we might need to do to prepare.

Thursday

This morning we will do some writing activities and move our bodies and paintbrushes to different music. In the afternoon we will use our imaginations and make something from our junk and craft boxes.

Friday

We will start our day with PE today. In the afternoon, Mrs. Hiromi will do some Tanabata activities with all the students.

This Week at TIP: June 7th, 2010

Skye — Mon, 07 Jun 2010 02:06:34 +0000

We have been lucky to have a week of lovely weather that saw all the children participate in water play activities, as well as planting sweet potatoes.

As we wind down from our last unit on animals, we will spend some time talking about summer and doing some summer activities this week. In art we will move away from sketching and combine crayons and paint for seasonal art experiences.

In language arts and maths, we will all participate in daily number and patterning activities and rhymes. P3 will continue their phonics, writing and rhyme activities, also looking at words that end in ‘ck’ this week. We will continue doing some time activities as we talk about our daily routines and sequence events. P1 & P2 will continue reviewing letters and letter sounds with our Letterland program and also continue their independent literacy activities. June 10 is also Toki no kinenbi (時の記念日) in Japan, which is a day that people reflect on the importance of time.

Have a wonderful week!

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Monday

This morning we will work in small teacher-led groups on letter and sound activities. P3 will also talk about things we do everyday and what time we do them at. In the afternoon we will do a summer art activity.

Tuesday

P1 & P2 will continue working on our class picture dictionary and P3 will work on phonics and writing activities.

Wednesday

Today we will play with numbers and letters. In the afternoon children will choose a learning centre of their choice.

Thursday

This morning P3 students will take another look at rhymes. In the afternoon children will choose from a variety of science, math and art learning centres to work at with their peers.

Friday

Today we will practise sounding out letters and words to accompany our drawings and go outside for PE class. In Japanese class students will learn about Toki no kinenbi.

Planting Sweet Potatoes: June 1st, 2010

Skye — Sat, 05 Jun 2010 03:02:19 +0000

This Week at TIP: May 31st, 2010

Skye — Sun, 30 May 2010 21:18:07 +0000

We have another busy week planned for TIP students this week. P1 & P2 are almost finished working on our class picture dictionary as they review the phonics they have learned this year. P3 have been learning about time and this week will think about what time of the day they do different things. They will also do some work on rhymes and continue working on independent and shared reading as well as writing neatly.
Last week students did very well with our sketching lesson! This week will review how to correctly use a magnifying glass as we explore outdoors, and then try and sketch some things up close. We will also do a number of other art activities this week. We will
recreate our own creative version of the book We’re all going on a Lion Hunt, as well as some animal drawings and paintings.
We hope you all have a great week! And please remember, Click Clack, Front and Back!

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Monday
This morning we will do some phonics activities. P3 will also review time. We will then read We’re Going on a Lion Hunt and do a lion drawing activity.

Tuesday This morning P1 & P2 will review sounds letters make and work on our class picture dictionary. P3 will play some phonics games and continue working on their reading and writing. We will reread We’re Going on a Lion Hunt and use different art materials to recreate our own version of the book.

Wednesday
This morning P3 will read One, Two, buckle my shoe and do some rhyme activities. We will collect some things from the forest and investigate them with magnifying glasses. We will then review sketching and try sketching some of the things we found.

Thursday
Today we will review some of the work we have done this year and choose our favourite pieces. In the afternoon children will choose from a variety of science, math and art learning centres to work at with their peers.

Friday

Today we will play some games outside for PE and draw and write a story in our story-writing book (journals).

This Week at TIP: May 24th, 2010

Skye — Mon, 24 May 2010 01:58:10 +0000

All the beautiful spring weather that we’ve been having has given us more time enjoy outdoor play and activities. In the afternoons last week, the children really enjoyed going outside and choosing an independent learning centre of their choice. Among the popular choices were sand play (building an environment for small plastic animals and insects), water play and magnetic fishing, and drawing on the concrete with colourful chalk designs.

With just over four weeks of school left, we continue to be very busy. P1 & P2 are working had reviewing letters and letter sounds they have learned this year as they work on making a class picture dictionary. Headstart children have started to feel more comfortable in the classroom and with our English learning environment. P3 students are continuing to review letter and letter sounds, with a focus this week being on the blends sh, ch, and th.

Everyday at preschool your children are learning to fit in and follow rules, make new friends, and learn how to deal with their emotions and respond in various social situations. This week we will be talking ‘dangerous’ situations and also how we can be ‘problem solvers’ in our own classroom.

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Monday

During unit of inquiry time today we will play animal go fish, have imaginary play in our class barn, and do some activities with magnifying glasses. We will also take a look at the story A bad case of tattle tongue.

Tuesday

This morning P1 & P2 will work on our class picture dictionary and play some maths games. P3 will review the blend sh and look at ch. They will also introduced to clocks through the story A very busy spider.

Wednesday

Today P1 & P2 will continue to review sounds letters make and keep working on our class picture dictionary. P3 will look at the blend th and make their own clocks to practise telling the time. In the afternoon we will do some drawing and sketching activities.

Thursday

Today we will reread A bad case of tattle tongue and do a listening comprehension drawing activity. In the afternoon we will sing some songs and make music with our bodies.

Friday

Today we will have an emergency evacuation drill.

This Week at TIP: May 17th, 2010

Skye — Tue, 18 May 2010 13:24:36 +0000

All the beautiful spring weather that we’ve been having has given us more time to get outdoors and enjoy the season. The children have all enjoyed searching for and gathering insects, chasing frogs around the school yard, blowing dandelions and making crowns and bracelets from flowers. We were also lucky to be visited by Jeff, from English Adventure last week, and learn about maps, directions, and how to use a compass.
This week at TIP we will read a popular children’s book, The Rainbow Fish, in Japanese. We will then use children’s knowledge of the story and imagination to retell the story in English through the pictures, and create some colourful rainbow fish to decorate our classroom with.
On Friday we received another new pet for our class. It is a Larva and we will talk about what it needs and how we can care for it as it develops into a full size beetle. In response to children’s inquiries about barns, this week, we will also build a barn that children can use for imaginary play. We are also hoping to learn how to correctly use a magnifying glass and do some activities with these in afternoon learning centres.

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Monday

Today we will take a look at our new pet and discuss how we can best care for it. In Japanese class, P1 & P2 will read a translated version of The Rainbow Fish.

Tuesday

This morning P1 & P2 will work on our class picture dictionary. P3 will review the 3 ways to read a book; Read the pictures, read the words, and retell a familiar story. We will then ‘Read the pictures’ of The Rainbow Fish to familiarise ourselves with the book, build vocabulary and use our imaginations. We will all start work on making our own rainbow fish in art.

Wednesday

Today we will finish making our rainbow fish.

Thursday

Today we will continue our letter sound and writing work and make our classroom barn. In the afternoon we will learn how to use a magnifying glass, and choose from an independent learning centre to work at.

Friday

This morning we will go outside for PE class, and then draw a picture and write in our storybooks (journals).