Springtime in Deauville

It’s been a particularly wet and cold winter here in Deauville, more so than years in the past, so it has been very nice to have the sun come out recently. The first really nice day that we’ve had here since about November (where it’s been sunny and not too cold) was last Wednesday, and I celebrated it by going to the beach and spending time outdoors. I’m very excited for more days like that to come and for summer to finally get here!

With the kids, we’ve been learning about springtime by singing songs like “The Eensy Weensy Spider” and “Mr. Sun,” as well as some songs that have springtime animals in them like butterflies, ladybugs, bluebirds, frogs, etc. We practice our weather every day and it’s been nice to have the kids finally be able to say “it’s sunny and warm” rather than “it’s cloudy and cold!”

Another springtime lesson that I’ve done with the kids is prepositions with Easter eggs. Each student has an Easter egg that they made, and I (or another student) can tell them where to put the egg. For example, I can say “put the egg on your head” or “put the egg between your pencil case and your hand.” It’s a fun game and they get really into it, and you can use a lot of vocabulary when playing, like body parts and school materials.

Since it’s springtime, another thing that we’ve been learning about is The Very Hungry Caterpillar and all the different types of food that are in that story. We play flashcard games, like where I’ll scatter the flashcards of food around the room and say “point to the strawberries,” or hand them out to the students and ask them to raise it up if they have it, or put all of the flashcards on the board and have them memorize them and then have them close their eyes and take one away. Then they have to say what’s missing. The book is fairly popular in France as well and most of the children are already familiar with the story, and they like when I read to them, so it’s very fun.

Thanks for reading! Until next time!