Freesia School August 2015 Newsletter Update
India celebrated the 69th Independence Day on August 15th and on the same day Freesia School hosted the inauguration of its new school building. Freesia school has moved into a new location. ABC Freesia moved out of the previous school building as the building owner was selling the property. The new school is large enough to add an additional classroom for the next academic year. The Founder of Building Blocks School, opened the school to its students with a ribbon cutting and lighting of the lamp ceremony. K5 children participated in the opening ceremony.
Attendance and Nutrition
No. of students enrolled: 107
Total number of meals served this month: 2,886
No. of school days: 18
No. of Students Enrolled (Day): 92
Average attendance: 85
Attendance in %: 92
No. of Students Enrolled (ASP): 15
Total breakfasts served: 1,526
Total lunches served: 1,360
Total number meals served since opening at Freesia: 85,517
Total ABC-BB School partnership meals since opening: 234,644
Curriculum
Math
This month K4 learned, one on one correspondence. Activities included snow man, pairs, matching game, where is thumbkin, find a friend, copy cat towers, set the table, anything you can do, one brush for every jar.
This month K5 learned to write correct numbers in the box from 1-10.
English
With jolly songs, actions and with the help of images, K4 learned sounds of letters c, k, e, r, h, n, m, d, g, o, l ,u, b and f. They also learned jolly phonic aspects, environmental sounds, instrumental sounds, body percussion, rhythm and rhyme.
K5 reviewed jolly sounds of letters learned from the previous months. They started on learning – blending, segmenting, reading high frequency words like can, here, are, there, up, they, had, like, my, no, hear, what, my, why, some and where. They also learned CVC words and tricky words like go, no, so, my, one, by, like, have, live, give, only, old and little
Local Language Kannada:
This month K4 learned Kannada letters o, oo, ru, ruu, ye, yee by writing them on slate and book.
This month K5 learned Kannada letters ka, kaa, ga, gaa, na, cha, chaa, ja, jaa, naa, ta, taa, da, daa by writing in their class work note books
Social Science
This month they learned about – my body, body parts, I grow and change, my five senses and my neighborhood with story board pieces
K5 students learned about – physical features of desert, plateaus, mountains, number of states in India and national symbols of India.
Value Education
In value education they learned “Being different with a story of Dog and the Donkey”, “Love nature – The Mango tree and the Fig tree”, “Learning to obey – Story of a Girl who did not obey”, “Caring for yourself – Take care of your food”, “Being kind with the story of Ant and Dove” and “Love for your country”.
K3 Program
In circle time, children learned how to greet others and how to reply to others. They learned to identify the colors – red, blue and green and identify shapes – circle, square and triangle.
Children learned to sing rhymes – “Chubby Cheeks, Johnny-Johnny, Head and Shoulders Knees and Toes, Teddy Bear Teddy Bear”. Again this month, children were introduced to the Classroom rules, School’s name and Teacher’s name. Being
Courteous was the theme of the month for character development. Line formations like slanting line, wavy line, standing line and sleeping line were again repeated this month. Community helpers like the Fire man and Police man was talked about and children were shown charts to relate to the topic. To improve the fine motor skills following activities were done to strengthen – rolling play dough, sorting, pouring the rice, threading beads, clipping cloth pegs, pressing the tweezers and lifting objects with tongs. Stories with moral meanings were read – Hetty and the Lion, I am a little Teapot and Twinkle-Twinkle little star.
Physical Education
Children are encouraged to play in our outdoor playground. Every day, 15 minutes of physical activity is included in the schedule.
Hygiene
Hand washes are mandatory before and after food, after using the restroom and after playtime. Our newly enrolled K3 children are learning the 7 steps to hand wash.
Nutrition
Well balanced nutritious meals were prepared and served every day. Children were fed breakfast and lunch on all working days. Delicious meals were prepared and served with love every day at our Freesia School! A total of 2,886 meals were served this month.
After School Program (ASP)
This program helps our graduate students in the evening with their homework which they bring back from their respective schools. This program is a supportive program which assists our previous graduates to keep up with their school work and Home work. We have 15 graduates from grade I and II of previous years coming for this program. This month the program ran for 15 days with a total attendance of 196 children attending this program.
Teacher Training
Building Blocks Teachers training with Ms. Sue Griffith, Meher and Selvi was held on 24th of Aug, Monday at Azalea School. The training was based on morning message, on phase one phonics and Early Year Foundation Stage (EYFS)
Pictures from the School Inauguration
Special Thanks to the staff that supports Freesia at our Implementation Partner, Building Blocks, and also to all Infrastructure Funding Partners, AlphaBet Club donors and volunteers, Rotary Club Amsterdam International and Wilde Ganzen.