McDonalds Crowded All the Time

So if you ever are in traffic or at a restaurant and think why it is so crowded.  Just take a look at this picture.  This is the third floor of a McDonalds and every single seat was taken.  Sometimes the amount of people in China is so overwhelming.  It's amazing people can all live together and survive.  I was just trying to get an ice cream.  It was a hot day.

60 Years

So China celebrated it's 60th Birthday for Communism.  China has come so far since 1949.  She has been through so much turmoil.  She has transformed indeed.  Today she sits as a strong force in the world.  The Middle Kingdom has once again returned and traders from far and wide come to her gates to glean from her.  I watched the CCTV program of Tienamen Square.  Very interesting as China showed off her military strength.  Thousands of troops and tanks rolled past the president.  I felt a strange sense of pride for China and found myself missing my own country and the patriotism celebrated on our birthday of independence.  My hope is that the people of China will taste more freedoms these next 60 years of China's history. 

Fall Festival

On October 30th the school had a Fall Festival.  My class dressed up so cute.  We had several traditional Korean dresses, a vampire, a wizard, a pirate, an angel and a flower fairy.  The schoolI had organized the Festival as the committee chair and was very grateful when it was all over.  I was supposed to be Captain Lady McRay, but everyone thought I was a gypsy.  Just can't get away from gypsiness. 

October 15

My Creative Students

I have a poster of Albert Einstein on my front door.  It says, “Imagination is more important than knowledge.”  This is what I try to encourage in my classroom.  These students are very creative when given the freedom to be so.  In reading we worked on one Reader’s Theater play of the Emperor’s New Clothes.  They designed their own costumes out of paper.  Every unit I try to do a reader’s theater play.  This second unit we’ve been working on Where the Wild Things Are.  They love reading and acting it out.  Today they spontaeneously asked if they could make invitations to some other classes.  I loved their initiative and independent endeavor so I went with the flow and to encourage their creativity.  It is so neat to see a claws working together and doing something they think is fun. 

October 12 Making the Planets

Making the Planets

I’ve been having so much fun with my students.  We have been studying space.  Each student was assigned a planet and we made paper mache planets.  I did this last year, too.  The children love making their own planet.  Today they were painting their planets and saying, “We are planet artists.”  I’ve been playing Dvorak’s Symphony Number 9 when the students work on space stuff.  I don’t tell them it’s Dvorak I tell them it’s the space song.  When they start working they ask, “Can we listen to the space song?”