Greetings from Australia

October 12, 2012

Dear room three teachers and children.
I hope you are having a great start to the school year and that you had a fabulous thanksgiving weekend. I heard that the leaves are starting to change colours and that is is very beautilful. In Australia now it is spring time and it starting to warm up. But we did have a really cold day this week and it snowed!!!! It snowed up in the Adelaide Hills in Mt. Lofty. There is usually no snow in the Spring time and they hardly ever get snow here. Everyone was very shocked at it was the big news this week.

At kindy this week we have been drawing Mrs. Meredith pictures, the children are very interested in learning more about what you are doing in your classroom. I read them a book about Canada and they loved seeing all the pictures of activities we do in the snow.

Last week we were on school holidays and I got to go on a really exciting trip to the very north part of Australia called the Northern Terriorty. In the north it is very very hot. I took a plane to Darwin with my partner Evan. We were so lucky that his came for a visit all the way from Canada and we all traveled together. We had a camper van which is a home on wheels, we traveld around to all the beautilful parks there and went hiking, walking, swimming and on a few boat rides. I wanted to share some of my pictures with you.

I am really looking foward to meeting all of you in a few months. What have you been learning about at school? What are your favourite things to do? Did you have a nice thanksgiving holiday with your family?

 I hope you enjoy the pictures and I will send you another letter soon with the children's drawings.

Have a grreat weekend,
Ms. Leventhal

 These are the other two kindy teachers. The one on the left is Helen and on the one right is Tess.

 At kindy the children love to play with the parachute. I have learned lots of new games from Helen and look forward to playing parachute with you too.



These pictures are from a trip to the Gorge wildlife park where we saw many interesting animals.

These pictures are from our trip to the Northern Territory. We had so much fun exploring all the beautiful nature. 

 This is me trekking to Jim Jim waterfalls.

 This is where we got to swim after our really big trek.

 We went to Katherine Gorge, we had to climb up rocks really high to get a good view. It was so hot but I made it to the top. This is me about mid way taking a break.

 Some beautiful waterfalls at Buley rock hole.

 A walk through Litchfeild park. You can't go anywhere without some water to stay hydrated in the hot heat !

A jumping crocodile. 

I hope you enjoyed the pictures, I look forward to seeing some pictures from Canada.

Welcome to Kindergarten

Dear Room Three,
Welcome to Kindergarten at Inglewood Heights,  you have a very fabulous teacher Mrs. Meredith. As I am sure you already know Mrs. Meredith is from Australia and she is staying in Canada for one year at Inglewood. My name is Ms. Leventhal and I am teaching at Mrs. Meredith's kindergarten all the way in Australia. I wanted to introduce myself to you as I will be coming back in the winter just after Christmas holidays to be your teacher.

Australia is a beautiful country with so many interesting animals like kangaroos and koalas. It is spring time in Australia now and all the plants and flowers are growing.

I am looking forward to hearing all about the great things you are doing with Mrs. Meredith.

In the picture  above I am holding Clover. He is a 15 week old bunny that was staying with me for the weekend. We borrowed him from the nature education center and he will come to Kindergarten with me so the children can learn all about how to care for animals. I really love animals and miss my dog Crouton very much who is back at home in Canada. He is a small white dog called a Coton de Tulear. I am including a picture of him for you to see.


Have a great start to the school year.


Love,
Ms. Leventhal 

A kangaroo Mummy with it's baby Joey in the pouch.

This is Crouton, hes very fluffy. Here we are at our pumpkin patch last fall.

Dear room three children and teachers,
I wanted to wish everyone a terrific summer!!!! I heard you are having a celebartion for all the chidlren going to grade one that will be lots of fun. I am so proud of all of you going to grade one or senior kindergarten. I also hear you are going to the zoo this week. You might even see some Australian animals there. Last year we saw all the Kangaroos.

Below are some pictures from our houseboat trip we took a few weeks ago with some other teachers who are here in Australia on exchange. They come from Reunion Island which is near Madagascar, America, and Canada. We all had a great time together along the Murray River. 

Have a wonderful summer and I look forward to writing you more when school starts in September.


Love
Ms. Leventhal

Thank you

Dear Room Three,
I wanted to thank you and Mrs. Meredith for sending me such some of your work to see. I really loved seeing your beautiful drawing and writing and seeing all the things you love to do at Kindergarten. I am going to show all the children at my Kindy your lovely work. I am so proud of all of you. You each did a terffiic job. I miss you all lots and wanted to wish you a great final month of school. Here in Australia , we had the first day of winter on June 1. There is no snow here in winter, it is very nice out. We had a great weekend touring around the McLaren Vale area. Below is a picute of me and a cute little cat I met there. He was really friendly.
Have a terrific day!!!
Love,
Ms. Leventhal

                                                             Butterfly for Laura.

           Shadow and Brown Sugar.

  Our Writing Centre.

Our Drama Centre.

                                             

                                              

So many ?

Hi Emily: We now have 27 students in our class.
Nathan: I like to play music and dance.
Max and Harry P: I love making.  I like to crochet.  We have a crochet club after school here.  I also like making great things to make our room beautiful and fun.
Georgia S: I don't have any dolls left from when I was a little girl like you but I do have one teddy bear that is older than Ms. Leventhal.
Charoletter and Lewis: I just made new play dough this morning for our classroom.  It is very bright green. Yes we do have writing tables and we write letter also Lila and Isabella.  Nathan the class is going great we are having so much fun learning all about your country Australia.  Yes Ivy I do like cats.  I have two cats.  There names are Shadow and Brown sugar.  I will try to send a picture.
Felix we have one little boy in our class that loves to make airplanes and would probably do nothing else if we just let him make airplanes all day.
His name is Bekir. Sophia I think I would be affair of a shark.  Do you like sharks? Some Canadian animals are Beavers, Moose, Snowy owl.
There are so many.  Here is a good link to see more Canadian animals.http://www.canadiangeographic.ca/kids/animal-facts/animals.asp
Nathan I like mushy girly movies.  (yuk Ah!)  Angus I will try to post some pictures of our class for you.  Yes Laura we have lots of butterflies, in fact just last there were so many out that it seemed unusual for this time of year.  I also love butterflies.  I have butterfly car seat covers and a beautiful butterfly necklace and earrings and a beautiful stain glass butterfly that hangs in my window.  Well it was so nice to share with you all.  Please take good care of your dear teacher from Canada.  She is very special to us and we miss her dearly.  You all give her a big Angle hug for me please.  Love Ms. Dutton.  :)

Dear Room Three

Dear Room Three,
I hope you are having a nice Friday afternoon with Mrs. Meredith, Mrs. D and Ms. Dutton. Yesterday at Kindy I was showing the children pictures of our classroom and some of the great things you were working on just before I left. Like our giant Christmas tree or the menorah we made. They liked to see the pictures of our trip to the farm. Do you remember that trip? We went on a tractor ride through the scary forest and went in the corn maze. They loved to see all the leaves changing beautiful colours. After I showed them the pictures they had some questions for you. They are hoping that you will write back so they can learn about Kindy in Canada. Here are all their questions:
- How many people are in your class? (Emily)
- What do you like to play? ( Nathan)
- Do you like making? ( Max, Harry P)
- Do you like to play with dolls? Georgia S
- Do you have playdough ( Charoletter R and Lewis)
- Is it cold there? What is the weather like?
- Do you have wiring tables and write letters? ( Lila and Isabella)
- How is the class going? ( Nathan)
- Do you like cats? ( Ivy)
- Do you ever make stunt paper airplanes ( Felix)
- Do you like sharks? What animals do you have in Canada? ( Sophia)
- What movies do you like to watch? ( Nathan)
- What does your classroom look like? Can you send us some pictures? (Angus)
- Do you have butterflies ( Laura)

I know there are lots of questions but hopefully you can write us  back on the blog and I can share with all the boys and girls at Kindy in Australia. I miss you lots. Have a great weekend.
Love Ms. Leventhal