We held our annual Halloween event after school on Monday.  SELC members and friends dressed in amazing costumes this year. We had a crazy nurse, Mario and Luigi, Jasmine, Rapunzel, Minne Mouse, Harry Potter, ghosts, witches and more. We started with a scavenger hunt and trick or treat. Next we played pass the balloon and chose the best costume. We ended with apple bobbing. The students' smiles at the end of the party were a delight to see.



Ms Fuji answered questions for the scavenger hunt.

Last week I had the pleasure of spending the morning with students and teachers from St Stephen's Catholic College. We visited Ishizuka Elementary School and played speaking games with the Year 5 and 6 students.  It was wonderful to see students from the three schools talking to each other and sharing the things they enjoy.



We also enjoyed the tea ceremony with members of the tea ceremony club serving us tea and delicious sweets. 

The Year 3 Product reviews are on display in the English Room. Each student wrote about a product they use. They had to give general information and also the positive and negative points of the product with a final recommendation. The students wrote interesting reviews and are improving their skills. 

During LL lessons in June and July the Year 1 students made a question and interviewed their classmates. Next, they wrote short sentences and finally they presented their findings to the class. Everyone spoke and listened well. It was interesting to learn what colors, characters, sports, food and other things are popular with the students. 

Here is some of the Year 1 work on display around the English Room.

The Year 1 students made posters about their field trip to the EcoPro 2018 in December. The students worked in groups to make sentences about their day and what they saw.
Their posters are interesting and colorful. 




For part of their English homework over the winter vacation the students wrote and drew about one day in the vacation. The students can use the past tense and other sentences now. Their diaries are fun to read and the students enjoy reading their classmates' work. 
 

Five students traveled to Oyama to attend the southern Tochigi area speech contest on Friday. They have been working on their speeches for the last few months. The students spoke about automatic driving cars, discrimination, dreams for the future and society.  They wrote their speeches with help from teachers and practiced hard to remember them. It was a pleasure to see them do their best at the contest.

We ended the first semester with a 3 hint quiz contest. The students used many of the words they learned this semester to describe the person and what they are doing. The students said their hints smoothly and most were able to understand the information and guess the person in the picture correctly. They are becoming faster to make sentences and understand in English. 

We finished our short presentations in LL today. The students worked in pairs to make a question and interviewed their classmates.  Some questions included, What color do you like? and What subject do you like? The pairs then made sentences about the data they had collected and presented their question and the top 3 findings to the class. The students were able to use the words and sentences we have been learning in their presentations and did a wonderful job.

The Year 1 students already know how to say many words in English.  During LL today, they helped each other to rearrange the letters to make words from the textbook.  The words today were feelings often used with "How are you?".  The next challenge is to remember how to spell them!

Our Year 1 students enjoyed their final LL activity this week. They played a review board game that included many of the phrases and English questions we studied this year. I hope they will have many more chances to use their English skills in the future.