EY ES NEWS

EY World Book Day Celebration
Written by Ms. Ruby

There is no better way to kick off this month than to reopen our world to the wonders of books. We embraced the theme "You are a Reader" to promote the joy of reading to our little ones. We strode our way through a week-long celebration that allowed us to achieve our objectives for this worldwide event. Each class adopted a book and discussed the exciting weave of events. DEAR time was also a hit, as students allocated some time in their reading nooks and immersed themselves in the depth of the story. Of course, we couldn't do away with our artistic skills as we transformed our doors into the front cover of our chosen book. Another momentous scene was when the Elementary School (ES) and Grade 11 students spent uninterrupted time with our precious early years. It was apparently a beautiful sight and a time to look back on. The event culminated with a short gathering where our little bookworms showcased their stories on stage. It gave us chills to watch the EY children’s milestones as they confidently narrated, read, and portrayed some characters in the story. What's more fascinating is when they struggled to pronounce but confidently named the book title and author. Indeed, the World Book Day event was a successful March for the love of books and reading!

Adopt-a-book door decoration

Infant Chinese Language

Written by Ms. Bi Qin

Welcome to the Infant class!

This term, our little ones have learned many interesting things. They have not only learned about common fruits and vegetables, such as apples, tomatoes, pumpkins, and carrots, but have also become familiar with vocabulary related to sight, hearing, touch, and smell.

We learn through play, in a Chinese-speaking environment. Learning is our focus. In this process, the infants learn to recognize different types of fruits and vegetables by listening to the teacher introduce them in Chinese. Meanwhile, they further understand the characteristics of fruits and vegetables through touching, smelling, and tasting.

We believe that these activities not only improve the infants' language abilities but also help them better understand the world around them. In this process, we emphasise letting the infants feel the beauty of the Chinese language, allowing them to learn and grow in a relaxed environment.

Nursery Physical Education

Written by Ms. Sherly

In PE this term, the Nursery children continue to work on fundamental movement skills, such as running, jumping, hopping, and galloping. They also develop their balance and coordination skills by copying animal movements. Some variations of the movements are; fluttering like a butterfly, hopping like a frog, waddling like a duck, and galloping like a horse. Wonderful work, Nursery! Keep up the excellent efforts!

Pre-K Music

Written by Ms. Nathania

Pre-K students are exploring more percussion instruments. SWA’s unlimited number of percussion instruments help the students to be able to explore and experience more of the pitch and unpitched percussion instruments. Each one of them is unique and different. The students learn to also appreciate differences and uniqueness in each instrument to be able to treat each one of them differently.

Knowing rhythmical patterns and playing each pattern in specific timing. Music is a lot about order and patterns. Knowing and identifying them make the students understand that playing music is so much more than just playing musical instruments together. It is about teamwork, concentration, patience, and resilience. 

Kindergarten 1 Chinese Language

Written by Ms. Bi Qin

Welcome to K1 class! This term, our children have learned a lot of interesting knowledge. They have not only learned basic strokes and related Chinese characters but also studied numbers and animals. 

During the activity of searching for butterflies outdoors, the children observed the butterflies in a lifelike environment and learned to express the colour and quantity of the butterflies they saw in Chinese. This not only deepened their language ability but also allowed them to experience the beauty of nature. 

When learning numbers, the children put together Chinese characters 1-10 in order to form a dinosaur pattern. Through this fun activity, the children not only learned numbers but also exercised their imagination and creativity.

We believe that under the teaching philosophy of learning through play and playing while learning, children can learn more happily and master knowledge more easily.

Kindergarten 2 Literacy

Written by Ms. Diane

The Kindergarten 2 students had an exciting time as they explored the world of poetry through the use of rhyming words. The class was filled with excitement and energy as the children worked on creating their very own poems. 

The students’ exposure to Jolly Phonics helped them tremendously in crafting their ideas into words. With the aid of the phonic sounds they had learnt, the students were able to manipulate the words and sounds in their poems to create rhyming couplets. 

The children were fully engaged and invested in their writing as they used their imagination to come up with creative pieces about the moon, which is based on the book “Papa, Please Get The Moon For Me” by Eric Carle. 

In the next few weeks, the K2 students will write their own autobiography. They will also look into the stories of other people. This will be a wonderful learning experience for the students as they gain confidence in their writing abilities.

ES World Book Day Celebration

Written by Ms. Lia

This year we celebrate World Book Day in a series of events from 1st-3rd March. 

Ms. Young Mi Lee and Jaeyi Kim came to our first event, Author Visit, on March 1st and shared their amazing experiences to Grade 4-5 students. They intrigued the students on how to become a writer– becoming a writer through collaboration with publisher, editor, illustrator, and even translators. Having a community that can share ideas, overcome challenges to open opportunities is also important. 

It doesn't matter how you start to become one, just feel happy with the writing process. They showed us that writers do not only work on producing books, but also require versatile talents. One should be able to switch gears to become editor, produce articles, be a correspondent, have a newspaper reporter’s work, or even be a debater! 

The house games were held in the library the next day. There was the “Paperback game”, where students voted for the real first sentence of each novel after hearing the blurb read from the back of the book. “Call my bluff: dictionary version”, was fun as students called out the bluff/fake word definitions. “Bring Me” challenge, tested everyone’s knowledge of library areas as they searched for the book using the clues given. Lastly, every house worked together to create a book in the “Meet the Author” game. 

SWA students and teachers immersed themselves through the library games– all shelves visited, library books touched, read, discussed, and new books created. A wonderful book day celebration indeed. 

Bring me: Game

On the last day, we had author Ms Shoba Chugani, who came for a visit and had book signing. Ms Shoba has published 6 children books and 2 books on early childhood education.

She was introduced her 2 books to our Grade 1-3 students, Hermy’s New Home and Janggan Dragon Kite. She explained on how the idea came from to become a story. Storytelling one of her book, Hermy’s New Home, and having exercise on how to produce a character in a story. Everyone is happy working in a group give Hermy another character. Some of students come forward to show their new Hermy’s adventure!

Book fair from March 1st to 3rd, 2023 and Reading Bingo

SWA Library Team would like to thank the English Department, teachers, students, parents, and staff for their wonderful participation. 

ES Talent Show

Written by Mr. Marc

Over 25 students participated in this term’s ES Talent Show on 23 February. The event offered students an opportunity to share their singing, drawing, and dancing skills with peers, parents, and SWA staff. 

Congratulations to the 1st Place winner Madeline, who sang a touching rendition of “Lost Boy” by Ruth B. In 2nd place was The Slaying Stars consisting of Grade 3 talented singers Malika, Jeslyn, and Edith. They sang “Dandelions” also by Ruth B. In 3rd place, the Grade 4 Rock Band, “Ghost Riders”, gave a rousing performance of the song “Seven Nation Army” by the White Stripes. 

Here are some photos and videos from the event:

Grade 1 Indonesian Language 

Written by Ms. Junita

Grade 1 students were learning about weather. They compared the meaning of “mendung”-“berawan” and “gerimis”-”hujan”. They identified what people usually do according to the weather. At the end of the term, they made a Weather Minibook. In the book, they should talk about the weather and activities that they usually do.

Grade 2 Physical Education

Written by Mr. Dominic

The focus of this term for Grade 2 was for them to be able to work together as a unit and as a team when playing sports and also to learn how to handle defeat and winning in a game. For most of their early years, they have been playing individual games and games that rarely have a winner and loser. This term, they learned how to use strategy, teamwork, and learn how to be a good winner and loser. They played games like capture the flag, dodgeball, and flag tag, to showcase their ability to come up with different strategies to win the game. They also learned how to deal with their emotions when it comes to winning and losing a game. They were able to come up with great strategies and were able to deal with losing, how to bounce back, and also how to win gracefully. 

Grade 3 Music

Written by Ms. Nathania

Grade 3 is playing more notes with their recorders. They have so far mastered the 5 notes played by the right hand, and are moving on to more notes on the left hand part. It could be quite challenging to make sure the holes are perfectly covered, and it needs patience to finally get it right. Recorder is an instrument that requires precision and helps the students to pay attention to details as well as play the notes properly. 

Attention to the beat and the rhythm is important to help the students play the music correctly. And while doing that, they also have to make sure that the fingers are covering the holes properly to create proper sound coming out from the recorder.

Grade 4 Science

Written by Ms. Shirley 

Heat Transfer 

The grade 4 students turn the heat on with their lesson on heat transfer. 

A better way to learn the lesson is through hands-on experiments.

Grade 5 Chinese Language

Written by Chinese Team

为了庆祝中国传统节日——春节，五年级的同学们不仅表演了歌舞和乐器演奏“卖汤圆”，还兴致勃勃地亲手制作了汤圆。在这轻松喜悦的气氛中，大家更加感受到了春节到来，一家人其乐融融的团圆美满之意。

To celebrate the traditional Chinese festival - Spring Festival, the fifth grade students not only performed songs, dances, and musical instruments - "selling glutinous rice balls", but also enthusiastically made glutinous rice balls by themselves in Chinese culture class. In this relaxed and joyful atmosphere, everyone feels even more the arrival of the Spring Festival and the meaning of happy family reunion.

在学习了“老师，谢谢您”这一单元内容时，同学们还为老师制作了“感谢卡”。在这小小的卡片中，不但包含着对老师浓浓的爱意与感恩，也体现了孩子们的成长与收获。

While learning the content of the unit "Thank you, teacher", the students also made a "thank you card" for the teacher. In this small card, it’s not only contains deep love and gratitude to the teacher, but also reflects the growth and achievements of the children.

《一日三餐》和《外出就餐》是中文口语练习的课程，学生们将学习中餐、西餐、韩国料理等方面的知识，并认识如何正确的使用人民币进行购物消费。

       在学完这门课后，学生们将参加一项有趣的活动——点菜练习。这项活动旨在帮助学生们巩固他们所学到的知识，并提供一个口语练习的机会。

       在活动开始前，每个学生将制作一份自己的菜单，包括中餐和西餐的菜肴。学生们可以在网上搜索菜谱，并选择自己喜欢的菜肴，也可以自己设计新的菜肴。在菜单上，学生们需要列出菜名、价格和服务员推荐的菜肴。

       活动中，学生们将分成小组，并轮流担任服务员和顾客。服务员需要向顾客介绍菜单，帮助顾客点菜，并提供服务。顾客需要仔细阅读菜单，选择自己喜欢的菜肴，并用代币付款。

       在点菜过程中，学生们需要遵循餐桌礼仪，例如说“请”、“谢谢”、“对不起”等常用礼貌用语。

活动结束后，学生们将进行反思，回顾自己在活动中的表现和体会。通过这项活动，学生们将更加深入地理解不同的饮食的文化和如何用人民币购物，提高他们的沟通技能，也增强了他们的中文交流的自信心。。

"Three Meals a Day" and "eating Out" are courses for practicing spoken Chinese. Students will learn about Chinese, Western, Korean cuisines, and how to correctly use RMB for shopping and consumption.

After completing the course, students will participate in a fun activity - ordering practice. The activity aims to help students consolidate their knowledge and provide an opportunity for oral practice.

Before the activity begins, each student will create their own menu, including dishes from Chinese and Western cuisines. Students can search for recipes online and choose their favourite dishes, or they can design new dishes themselves. On the menu, students need to list the dish names, prices, and dishes recommended by the waiter.

During the activity, students will be divided into groups and take turns as waiters and customers. Waiters need to introduce the menu to customers, help customers order, and provide service. Customers need to carefully read the menu, choose their favourite dishes, and pay with tokens.

During the ordering process, students need to follow table manners, such as using common polite expressions like "please," "thank you," "sorry," etc.

After the activity, students will reflect on their performance and experience. Through this activity, students will have a deeper understanding of different culinary cultures, how to use RMB for shopping, and improve their communication skills, as well as increase their confidence in Chinese communication.