Expedition Earth – Japan

Konnichiwa! We had a great adventure in Japan this week as we went through our Geography Curriculum! I’m so glad I took the time to get it all together, it’s really paying off and the kids are having a great time learning about our world!

Here are some of the highlights of the week:

Of course we stamped our passports and greeted each other!

I’ve found it useful to review all the continents and oceans daily, then we review all of the countries for the continent, this might not work as well once we’re on country 31, but for now each day we’ll review the countries for Asia: China, S. Korea, and Japan. And yes, my preschooler is doing it!

We studied our animals of Japan when they were done writing all the fact sentences they each picked their favorite animal to show you:

After that we classified our animals, I did some re-organization of our wall to make room for the over abundance of mammals! I hope they all fit on the wall, after looking at it closer, I doubt they will, I’m going to have to enlarge it at some point considering there are 186 animals in the unit! If you missed the animal supplement, make sure to click here to get it!

We made origami, the blue one is a pig, the red one is a carp fish, and the green one is a pelican, you know… incase you were curious ;o)

We learned about the Itsukushima Torii Shrine, then made our own out of play-doh!

We worked on our lapbook components for Japan:

We made Japanese Karesansui Mini Sand Gardens:

Here is the Teeny tot “becoming one with the sand.”

We made colorful carp necklaces from A Trip Around the World.

Of course we ended our week with a night out to sushi! We were thankful to find a place that offered one of the rooms where you sit on the floor. It was a bit hard controlling the Teeny Tot in this environment, but everyone seemed to have a great time!

Here are some more of the things we learned about this week some of which will sadly only exist in our memories now:

• Completed our Mapping Worksheet
• We learned about oceans this week as part of our ecosystem study
• Learned the Japan song
• Prayed for the people of Japan
• Learned how to say hello in Japanese
• Learned about the flag and colored our worksheet
• Learned about Children in Japan
• Made Colorful Carp, Karesansui Mini Sand Gardens, origami & the Itsukushima Torii Shrine
• Completed our Japan Lapbook component
• Enjoyed an evening out to sushi!
• And Stamped our passports!

Click here if you’d like to follow along with our Expedition Earth Geography Curriculum Journey!