Plum Garden / 梅园书栈

梅园报晓 Plum Garden News—No.27
April 27 – May 1
Kindergarten / First grade

Up coming events and important dates

5/5      Regional Parks Botanic Garden Field Trip.
5/12    Berkeley Fire Department visit and Demonstration at Shu Ren.
5/14    Berkeley Ballet Theater Field Trip, The Seasons Performance.
5/19    PTA Meeting.
5/25    Memorial Day. School Closed.

Greeting Parents,

Regarding our inquiry of native California plants, the kindergarten and first grade’s Regional Park Botanic Garden field trip is coming up. We will discover the most popular native plants in the Botanic Garden and we will learn about different kinds of species. We will also learn why the native plants are vital to our environment. On Tuesday May 5, we will be leaving Shu Ren at 9:30 A.M. and arrive at the Tilden Park’s botanical garden at 10:00 A.M. The docent will give the children an hour tour in the garden. Please arrive to school no later than 8:45 A.M. Here are a few reminders for the field trip
* Comfortable clothes (Please dress your child in layers)
* Comfortable shoes (Good for hiking)
* Sun block (Please help your child apply it before the trip)
* Hat
* Lunch (Heating up needs to be done at home and the lunch needs to be packed in a bag with handles of some sort)
* Water
We will be back at Shu Ren at 1:00P.M. The children will have English lessons following the field trip. Please no gum, candy, toys, and money allowed during the trip. Thanks!

For this weeks’ inquiry, we will learn about:
•    Why native plants are important to their originated environment
原生种植物对原生地带的重要性

From our last trip to Oakland Chinatown, we still have $30 remaining. I would like to let you know that I have used it to order two storybooks in Chinese (Grandfather Tree and The Lucky Grain of Corn) for the Plum Garden’s inquiries of the plant theme. The grand total of the two books plus shipping and handling is $34.12. Thank you all for your contributions.

The Plum Garden weekly subject planners are listed below.

Language: This week, we will continue to learn lesson 6: Playing games / 游戏. In this lesson, we will continue to learn verbs and adjectives. The children will use verbs and adjectives in their writing sentences. I am also introducing the radical to the children. The children will learn how to recognize the radical characters. The radical is systematization of Chinese character. It represents apart of each word and it classifies related characters. We will continue to learn opposite words. Such as 上下(up and down), 高低(high and low), 高矮(tall and short), 里外(in and out), 快慢(fast and slow), 软硬(soft and hard), 长短(long and short), 前后(front and back), 冷热(hot and cold), 水火(water and fire), 直弯(straight and curly), 多少(a lot and a few), and 粗细(thick and skinny). We will recite Tang poem “游子吟.” The children will also learn new vocabularies from our weekly inquiry: “Native plants are important to their originated environment / 原生种植物对原生地带的重要性”

Math: This week, we will be wrapping up the “分与合 / Separation and combination.” We will review the entire section. Wednesday, we will start a new Geometry section “方盒，圆罐和球形 / Cube, cylindrical, and ball shape” This is a very short section. The children will learn that three-dimensional cube, cylindrical, cone, and ball shapes are the extension forms of squares, triangles, and circles. Since we have learned how to recycle and classify our trash, we will use recycling objects to learn shapes. Such as rectangle and square boxes, cans, balls, and paper cones etc… We will use the Chinese traditional puzzle tool called Tan grams to learn the most common shapes and how to use it to shape objects.

Science and Life Science: Last week, we concluded the Mung beans growing processes. The results out have shown us.
1. Outdoor Mung Beans
* Direct sunlight
* Has grown shorter
* Leaves are green
2. Indoor Mung Beans
* Indoors light
* Has grown taller
* Leaves are a dark green color
3. Mung Beans in the box
* No light source at all
* Has grown the tallest
* Leaves are yellow

Some of the children’s strawberry plants are fructifying. We will continue to observe their growing processes. This week, we will summarize the celery and carnation flower experiments. We have blocked a couple of our sunflower’s leaves to see how the sun is affecting the leaf color. We will learn about chlorophyll (叶绿素) and how a plant goes through the process of photosynthesis (行光合作用). Also as result, the no light source contacts of Mung beans have shown us there is no chlorophyll in leaves.

Art: We will use old magazines, flyers, and catalogs to make a flower collage. I will be introducing Art Nouveau flower designs to the children and inspire the children to design their own flower patterns. We will put the design patterns on a three-dimensional object.

Social Studies and PSE: The children will continue to learn how green they are and the 4R concepts. (Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, and Raw) The children will learn and know about the carnation– the official flower of Mother’s Day in addition finding particular significance in many other cultures worldwide. We will also discover the native plants that we can see in Berkeley or our community, such as the California Poppy (加州罂粟), Coulter’s Lupine (羽扇豆也叫鲁冰花), and California Blue-Eyed Grass (加州蓝睛草). We will learn how the native plants are vital to our environment and to the animals’ habituations.

Singing: We will continue to sing “Knowing the parts of the plant/ 认识植物的身体.” Mother’s day is coming up in two weeks. We will learn how to sing “世上只有妈妈好 and 游子吟” to celebrate the Mother’s Day.

谢谢! Thank you! ☺
Kai Laoshi