NEWSLETTERS
2019-01
January Newsletter Room 302 Saturday, January 19th, 2019
Dear Parents,
Happy New Year to you all!
First of all, I would like to thank you for the generous gifts I received at the end of the first semester. Thank you so much for your love and support. I am blessed by having all of your children in my classroom but you have blessed me even more!
In Japan, many children and adults start the new year by doing calligraphy writing. We write a typical phrase in Japanese characters (kanji) such as the animal of the year (boar or pig this year), “new spring” (新春), “new year” (新年), “spring” (春), etc. We call it “Oshu-ji” meaning learning letters in Japanese. We have a couple of black stones used to make Sumi ink to write with. Children love making the ink and writing the letters. When we do Oshu-ji, we talk about having good posture and making the brush stand straight so that they can write letters dynamically. It is such a blessing for me to be able to share things with my students that I learned when I was a child and to have them appreciate and enjoy them very much.
Whether children or adults, we all experience conflict, arguments and hurt feelings sometimes, don’t we? We have been practicing “Peace Week” as a class, lately. We call it “Peace Week” because we have read a book called “Peace Week” which has many examples of things we could say and do during a week, and we have been practicing it. For example, we’ve been practicing that when someone says something mean to us, we say something positive back to the person, instead of continuing the cycle of “meanness”. The other day, one child (A) complained that another student (B) commented that the picture she drew was “weird.” We discussed what would be a peaceful thing that child A could say to make this situation more positive. Student A said to student B, “You draw beautifully and I like your pictures.” This comment made student B think about her original comment and she actually changed what she said about student A’s picture and made a more positive comment. I thought they did such a beautiful job on practicing Peace! Practicing Peace is not easy but we will continue to practice what we learned from Peace Week. Please encourage your child to practice these lessons at home as well!
We celebrate Hinamatsuri, or “Doll Festival” in Japan during the month of March. At Simpson United Methodist Church in Arvada, CO, they have a Hinamatsuri event on March 2nd and 3rd this year. They will display many Japanese dolls, sell Japanese food, and perform Japanese cultural events on their stage. I play Taiko (Japanese drum) and the taiko group I am part of will be performing on Saturday, March 2nd between 2:30 and 3 PM. If you are interested in experiencing a glimpse of Japanese culture, please come and join us. We would love to have you there. Please let me know if you and your child would like to come and I will share the event details.
Your child might have already shared this with you, but our friend, Winston Kim and his family are moving to Wisconsin this weekend and last Friday was his last day at Lincoln. He has been such a great friend to everyone in our class and we are sad to see him and his family move. Winston, you will be greatly missed!
Thank you very much for your support always. Please let me know if you have any questions or concerns.
Sincerely,
Atsuko O’Keefe