Kabuki

This week we've been focusing on Kabuki Theater. We watched some youtube videos of Kabuki productions and learned all about the history, styles, and costumes used. We also made our own Kabuki warrior masks which the kids are going to wear during their play.

They decided they wanted to do a jidai-mono style kabuki play (meaning historical) about the 47 ronin. This was a great idea, and they spent the morning learning about the story of the 47 ronin and writing the script for their play. They have adapted the story, but are going to put the real story in the program they're making to hand out at the show.

I can't believe that we've almost finished our unit on Japan! Next week is supposed to be our week off from classes, but I think we're going to have some art projects to finish in order to have everything ready for Japanese Night. I'm really going to make an effort for this to be the exception though. I think we all really need the week off since they've worked through the summer. Hopefully, it will be easier to maintain 3 weeks on, 1 week off when we're working with the curriculum from MBTP. Of course it's not that weeks off are really off...we'll still have piano, JET, and art and PE for Zoë.

I'm a little concerned about our schedule starting next week, but I'm sure we'll fall into a plan. I just don't think there's anyway we're going to have everything done by noon. They usually end up surprising me at how fast they can finish things though, so maybe I'll be wrong.