April 1 to 31.2004
Sony Science Education Program for Children
The Sony Science Education Program for Children has just completed negotiations to finalize the schedule for the National Report Presentation Meeting and the regional report presentation meetings with the various hosting schools, including Hasuda Minami Junior High School, Edosaki Elementary School, Kariya Minami Junior High School and Konkohkibi Elementary School.
The various schools are now working out the details of the programs of events for the meetings. The Konkohkibi Elementary School has selected October 15 as the date for its presentation meeting.
The national and regional report presentation meetings will be held according to the following schedule.
National Report Presentation Meeting: November 26, 2004 at Hasuda Minami Junior High School (Saitama Prefecture)
* The SSTA board of directors meeting will be held there on the preceding day.
Awardment Qualifying Schools Report Presentation Meetings
Oct. 15 (Friday), 2004: Kariya Minami Junior High School (Aichi Prefecture)
November 19 (Friday): Edosaki Elementary School (Ibaraki Prefecture)
Encouragement Awardment Schools Report Presentation Meetings
September 10 (Friday): Iijima Minami Elementary School (Akita Prefecture)
* The SSTA board of directors meeting will be held there on the preceding day.
October 15 (Friday): Konkohkibi Elementary School (Okayama Prefecture)
* The SSTA board of directors meeting will be held there on the preceding day.
The Sony Foundation for Education also provides support to schools that choose to hold their own independent report presentation meetings.
September 30 (Thursday): Yoshida Elementary School (Shimane Prefecture)
October 15 (Friday): Mikawadai Elementary School (Fukushima Prefecture)
Sony Science Teachers Association
The number of training programs scheduled by the Theme-Development Workshop has increased to five with the submission of four more programs in addition to the Saitama chapter program scheduled for May. The four new training programs will be held in August.
- Saitama Chapter (May 16)
Science Classroom Management Workshop II: Dedicated to Fostering Children with an Appreciation for the Sciences - Fukushima Chapter (August 2 to 4)
- Enhancing the Teacher's "Sense of Wonder" as a Way to Better Foster Children With an Appreciation for the Sciences
- Ishikawa Chapter (August 3 and 4)
Field Research on Existing Techniques for Evaluation of the Frameworks for Structuring Class Instruction and a Look at Specific Class Teaching Scenarios - Kumamoto Chapter (August 9 to 11)
Research on the Development of Curricula for Learning About Living Things and Skills to Enable Children to Make Things by Hand. - Hyogo Chapter (August 10 to 12)
Teachers Bettering Their Vocational Skills Through Fieldwork and Applying the Results to Classroom Learning.
The SSTA expects several more training programs to be submitted in the coming weeks.
Sony Preschool Education Program for Children
- The detailed schedule for the report presentation meeting being held July 2, 2004 at the Moiwa nursery school (Sapporo City, Hokkaido) has been finalized and a notice posted on the Sony Foundation for Education website. This is one of the five schools (nursery schools and kindergartens) that received the Advanced Project Awardment in 2003.
The report presentation meetings held by the schools that qualified for the Advanced Project Awardment will use presentations on nursery school education, research reports, symposiums and commemorative lectures as vehicles for making the achievements of their projects available for reference by teachers at other nursery schools and kindergartens nationwide. - The nursery schools and kindergartens in the metropolitan Tokyo region are planning to share their achievements with all schools submitting projects, and thereby stimulate in depth discussion of the key issues. The schedule for holding the study sessions for the schools has recently been finalized
IT Communication
- The full schedule of activities for the Sony Foundation for Education programs for 2004 has just been added to the events calendar. Visitors will, of course, find the events covered in greater detail in the sections of the website where the individual programs post information on their various activities.
- In a new development, the Foundation is happy to announce that the Mail Magazine service, temporarily suspended last August, is now back in service. The first issue of the relaunched Mail Magazine provides a detailed overview of the various activities scheduled for 2004 and the new features made available with the changes recently made to the Foundation website.
