Happy Thanksgiving!

Dear Class,

HAPPY THANKSGIVING! What are you thankful for?

This week, I have been telling the children here all about Thanksgiving.

We played "Pin the Bow Tie on the Turkey."

 We made turkeys by tracing our hands!

Love,

Mrs. Heflin

A Song for You...

Hello Class,

Two students in my class asked if they could sing a song for you. They have been learning this song for about a week now and have gotten pretty good at it.

The words in the song are:

My football team wears black and blue,

black and blue.

My football team wears black and blue, 

black and blue.

See them play. Hear me cheer.

We will get first place this year.

My football team wears black and blue.

Love,

Mrs. Heflin

The West Lake

Hello Class,

Last weekend, I went to see the West Lake with my friend, Vicki.

We saw a large dragon boat!

We climbed the stairs of a pagoda! A pagoda is a tall tower. It has a roof at each floor level that curves up at the edges. There were A LOT of stairs!

We saw beautiful and very detailed wood carvings. The carvings told a traditional Chinese story.

From the top of the pagoda, we could see all of Hangzhou!

When the sun set on West Lake, it was very beautiful. 

For dinner, we had wonton soup and dumplings! Yummy!

Love,

Mrs. Heflin

Home, Home on the Range

Hello class,

Last week, I taught a sixth grade class to sing "Home, Home on the Range." Do you know that song? There were 87 students in this class. I thought you might like to see a video of the class singing the song.

Here are the students learning the movement for the word "home."

After singing, the class worked in groups and played a game of charades. They are fantastic actors!

Love,

Mrs. Heflin

Brown Bear, Brown Bear

Hello Class,

This week, my classes read Brown Bear, Brown Bear by Bill Martin. This book has many repeating phrases! The students really enjoyed learning how to say some colors and animals in English. I think almost everyone loves animals!

Each student drew his or her own animal. Then, each student presented his or her creation to the class. It was a lot of fun!

Here we are, working on our drawings.

This boy drew a gold duck.

This girl drew a blue jellyfish.

And this boy drew a black unicorn!

Love, 

Mrs. Heflin

Things are Different in China

Good afternoon, Class!

It looks like you had so much fun at your stuffed animal party!  I’m so proud of you all! I hear you will be working toward a game party next. What a fun idea.  It always makes me happy to see your smiling faces.

Mrs. Salisbury tells me that you would like to learn some Chinese words. Here are a few that you can practice:

•        Hello = Ni hao (knee how)
•        Thank you = Xie xie (shay shay)
•        one = yi (like the letter E)
•        two = er (like the letter R)
•        three = san (like sahn) 

The Chinese people do not celebrate Thanksgiving or Christmas. I’m planning a lesson about Thanksgiving right now so that they can learn more about it. Part of my job is to share American culture with the students. I will not be at the school on Christmas, so I won’t have the chance to share that holiday with them.

I am so excited to hear that you are beginning to write sentences! How exciting! I can’t wait to read some of them. 

Here are two things that are very different in China:

The writing is very different. The Chinese people use characters to represent their words. But, guess what? You can't stretch them out if you don't already know them. I don't know how to read anything in China!

In China, if it's your birthday, you do not get gifts from your friends; you give gifts to your friends. The girl in the black sweater gave me a piece of chocolate for her birthday!

It has finally started to get cold here, but we haven’t had any snow yet. I hope you are all keeping warm!

Love,

Mrs. Heflin

Mrs. Heflin, We won "Teacher vs. Class" and wanted to share a picture with you. We got to have a stuffed animal party today...what a great way to kick off our Friday! The thing we are going for next is a game party. We can't wait to bring our favorite games to Kindergarten and play them with our friends. Here is the picture of us with our furry friends.

Mrs. Heflin, Thank you for the information you gave us and all the cool pictures. Ms. Harrington happened to be in our classroom when we were reading your blog so she got to see what you were doing too. The kiddos had a few more questions for you...They want to know a few Chinese words and were also curious if the Chinese people celebrate Thanksgiving and Christmas. We have been crazy busy lately! We now have 8 popcorn words (have, is are the newest)and will get 3 new ones next week (we, my, like). You would be very impressed with the Kindergartners as they are starting to write sentences in their journals...with capitals at the beginning and punctuation! I will post some pictures later. We are going to begin repeating phrase structure in Writing Workshop next week and we just finished opposite books and yummy/yucky. Each Reading Mastery group is also reading words with some of the groups reading sentences. Yahoo! The weather has changed here and we are now experiencing SNOW! I am sure you know what that means...SNOW CLOTHES. Like I said before, have we mentioned how much we miss you?! :) We will keep in touch...Hugs to you! The Bury Bunch

Home Visit

Hello Class,

I was invited to go on a home visit with one of my students this weekend. I had a wonderful time!

This is Cedric. He is in one of my 4th grade classes.  He and his family invited me to their home.

First, we went to dinner. We had so much food! We ate famous Beijing Roasted Duck. 

After dinner, we went for dessert. Cedric is on the right, his brother, Larry, is on the left, and their mother is in the middle.

We also went to a fruit market. They had many fruits that I have never seen before there!

This fruit is called a Chinese Dragon Fruit, and it is delicious!

The next day, we had lunch at Cedric's aunt's house. She cooked a lot of food!

After lunch, we went shopping! The family bought me some tea, a scarf, and a Chinese fan. 

The family also asked me to dress up in some traditional Chinese clothes. That head dress was very heavy! I attracted a large crowd while wearing this.  There were so many people taking my picture! 

Here is a picture of the family all together. 

After shopping, we went to the West Lake. It is a famous attraction in Hangzhou. This is Larry standing by the lake.

It was a lot of fun to spend a day with a Chinese family. The Chinese people are so friendly and generous. I'm glad to call them my new friends!

Love,

Mrs. Heflin

Halloween in China

Hello Class,

China does not celebrate Halloween like we do. However, it is becoming more and more popular here. The school encouraged students to wear costumes for part of their school day. The students even got to go trick-or-treating at their teachers' offices. They had so much fun! I taught my two classes about Halloween and asked them to make their own Jack-o-lanterns with paper. I also played a scary video for them to watch. 

Class 1 with their Jack-o-lanterns. 

This class is a little louder than my other class. ;) Can you tell?

Class 2 with their Jack-lanters.

A girl with her Jack-o-lantern.

This boy named himself Ranger. Here he is with his Jack-o-lantern.

Tonight, I am going to visit the home of a student in my class named Cedric. His family invited me to stay with them for one night to see how a family in China lives! I will be sure to take pictures to share with you. I am excited to see what a Chinese home is like!

Love,

Mrs. Heflin

Questions Answered

Hello class,

It looks like you had a wonderful Halloween! I loved seeing all of your costumes; you all looked fantastic!!

I would like to answer your questions:

1.)            Have you made new friends? I have made new friends! My closest friend here calls herself Vicki. Everyone in the school gives themselves an English name. Remember, English is the language that we speak. Here, people speak Chinese. Vicki’s real name is Chen (you say it like chin). I have also made friends with some of the other English language teachers: Alice, Monica, and Iris. The people in China are very friendly, so it’s not difficult to make new friends.

This is my friend, Alice, teaching 2nd grade.

2.)            What have you done that is exciting? I have done many exciting things here! I have taken a ride on a subway, tried new foods, and met a lot of new people. The most exciting thing, though, is exploring my new city. There are so many people everywhere, and a lot of exciting things are happening all the time. Just last night, I was walking back to my school, and I saw over 100 people dancing in the street! It’s a very busy place! 

This is Hangzhou.

3.)            What is the weather like in China? The weather is still warm!  It is starting to get chilly at night, but it’s not cold at all. I’ve been told that this city rarely gets snow. There is a lot of pollution in the city because there are so many people.

4.)            What is your favorite food there? I really like the dumplings and fried rice! Yummy!

5.)            Which foods are strange? The strangest foods I have seen are chicken feet, pig feet, dried fish and tiny quail eggs.

Chicken feet - Eek!

See the tiny quail eggs?  They are brown with dark brown spots. They are yummy!

6.)            How long was your flight to China? Was it good and what did you do? The flight to China was long! I spent over 20 hours traveling. That is almost one full day! I took 3 different airplanes to get here. My longest flight was 12 hours.  The flight was nice. I spent my time sleeping, eating, and watching movies. On the plane, each person has his or her own screen to watch. The screen is mounted on the chair of the person who sits in front of you. You can choose from about 20 movies and TV shows to watch. Each person has his or her own headphones so that you only listen to your screen.

You can watch TV on the plane.

You get to eat meals on the plane.

Please feel free to share this web address with parents so that they can see our blog too! They can even leave comments if they would like. :-)

Love, 
Mrs. Heflin