Montessori Moments

{this moment} - A Friday ritual. Two single photos - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember.

It's Raining...

Addition with the Number Rods

 It's is a wet, windy and wild fall day. Outside my window right now the wind is blowing the leaves off the trees and I am thinking about how I won't get to the massive pile of raking here at Quinpool until the end of November.  I really hope old man winter doesn't show up until mid to late December this year.  Last year I think we raked 45 bags and there was still a big spring clean up that needed to happen even after all that fall raking!  I truly love this time of year and I am struggling with not being able to get out and clean up and put the garden to bed.  There always seems to be more to do than there is ever time for and I am learning to make my peace with that.  So, while it is not the best day today outside it is certainly cosy and fun inside! 

I get a lot of questions about Maple Tree.  Lots of them being how to manage to get so much done?  We work really hard to balance out our Montessori materials and working environment with other early learning materials that we set up to be Montessori inspired.  For instance, because we are heading into Halloween this weekend we like to  add things like sorting spiders and transfering eyeballs to our practical life work shelves.  We think it is important to change things up a bit while still making it Montessori.  The children really love these kind of surprises on the shelf.  Don't get me wrong, there is still the traditional work materials out that are well loved and so very important but adding a little seasonal fun it a good thing. 

Sewing Pumpkins

Burlap Sewing

Red Lentils and Rice in the Sensory Table.  I wonder what kinds of surprises are being uncovered?

Even the light table seems a bit spooky!

Our Friendly Neighborhood Spiderman Dealing with Some Spiders!

Eyeball Transfer Work

Making a Pink Reader to take home

Hard at work on a metal Inset.

Reading list with letter search and find.

This Montessori Moment

From Cork Street

 {this moment} - A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember.

From Quinpool Campus

This Week at Maple Tree

 There is so much great work happening in the classrooms right now.  I am grateful for the pictures the staff are sending me and their notes about the working days as I am recovering from surgery.  Four more weeks, and I am counting the days until I am back in the classroom!  For now, I am happy to focus on other aspects of my work like our new website which I am working on in my down time.  More about that in the next couple of weeks.  I am also enjoying some time to read.  I never seem to get to read and I have a long list of articles, blogs and books I want to get through.  Some for work, and some for personal enjoyment.   Anyway enough about me, here are some snippets from both campuses this week.

Color sorting with glass beads and Binomial Cube work
The Binomial Cube is one of those incredible Montessori materials that introduces early math concepts to the child.   Like all other Montessori Materials it is presented when the child is in a Sensitive period for this work.  The cube is composed of 8 wooden blocks which fit together in a binomial pattern, representing the cube of two numbers, (a + b), or tens plus units.  All the blocks fit into a natural wood box.
Each box contains colour coded blocks;

One red cube a³, One blue cube b³
Three red and black blocks “a²b”
Three blue and black blocks “ab²”
The algebraic expression represented is :
(a + b)³ = (a + b)(a + b)(a + b) = a³+3a²b+3ab²+b³  

Of Course the child does not  get into the complex math problem with the Binomial Cube until much later with Elementary Math.  But it is definitely implied in the way that it is presented to the child as a complex puzzle.  Have you ever noticed how some children are really good at complex puzzles?  It's food for thought!

Short Bead Stair 

  More Math work with the short Bead Stair.  This child is practicing building the short Bead Stair and as an extension she is coloring a math sheet with the sort bead stair in the correct order.  In Math each Bead Chain is represented in a different color.  If you ask me is just makes perfect sense.  Everything in Montessori makes perfect sense and is so well thought out.  Maria Montessori was a truly brilliant woman!

Extensions Exploring Board Stair and Pink Tower

Teen Bead Hanger

 This week at Cork Street the children have extended their art work with more plasticine at the art table.  I understand they are making beautiful fall trees.  They are really beautiful and you know how I feel about clay in the hands of a child.  It is nothing short of brilliant from a sensory experience to an artful experience.

My friend here is really advanced with his language work and he is working with the Phonetic Farm.  Grammar symbols have been introduced and he is building his sentences using, articles, nouns, adjectives and verbs.  How wonderful is that!

More Short Bead Stair work.

Today at Cork Street

We've got pumpkins on the brain right now.  It's hard to believe that we are only a few weeks away from Halloween and all the excitement that comes with that.  We have a fun little project set up at the art table this week.  The children are using plasticine to make their own jack-o-lantern.  I love using plasticine it makes me think of Barbara Reid.  There is a great tutorial on Plasticine and how to use it on her site and I recommend having a look.  Not only does plasticine come in a variety of colors but it lends it's self to a lovely sensory experience for the children.  The children really love to explore 

the clay and it also seems to create a quiet space or time for the child.  Using plasticine isn't easy.  It requires a lot of hand strength and so I see it as a wonderful extension of our art shelf and a continuation of work to prepare the hand as Dr. Montessori would say.

“The hands are the instruments of man’s intelligence,” and “The human hand allows the mind to reveal itself." ~Dr. Maria Montessori

 More hand work by way of Metal Insets in the classroom today.  You can see that this child is using a specific Metal Inset tray to do her work.   Some children don't use this kind of tray.  This tray specifically allows the child to focus on the task of tracing the line around the metal inset and allows for success with the work.  Some children can become very frustrated when their metal inset is sliding round on them on the tray while they focus on tracing.  Metal Inset work is the start of preparing the hand for writing.  I send dozens of these home during the year and I have heard the complaint, "all she does is metal insets".  Thing is, metal insets are super important.

Metal insets help with development of hand eye coordination.  It helps the child to gain mastery over control of small movements and lets them develop control of a pencil (pressure, and steadiness).  In the grand picture it also helps the child to develop a geometric sense and stimulate artistic sensibilities that lead to an ability to plan a design.  

  

Short Bead Stair work

Montessori Moment

{this moment} - A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember. 

The Leaves are Falling!

We have jumped with great enthusiasm into fall and all that it brings with it.  Our classrooms are bustling with curious children and teachers brimming with ideas.  So many in fact, I'm not sure we will be able to get to everything.  We started off with Leaf rubbings at our Art Tables and have been expanding on parts of the leaf with the children.  Our Botany cabinet is seeing lots of action and we are able to extend our wok in this area with some of our older children.  Texturally the leaves are beautiful and each one is different.  From a sensorial perspective this work is very exciting and appeals to our senses.  There is something very quiet and gentle that happens when you connect with things from our natural environment.  Then we add art materials, simple ones,  like newsprint and beeswax crayons for rubbing work.  I watched in awe last week as many children made rubbings over and over again in many colors.  Each child was excited about how each one turned out and the differences from leaf to leaf.

Our next art project the following week was about making leaf impressions using paint and rollers.

Painted Leaf Impression

We had the children paint the underside of their leaf and press it out on paper to reveal yet again another beautiful leaf impression.  Paint is a lot of fun to work with and the children really enjoy experimenting with different materials and mediums at the art table.

Today, I came with an extra art activity.  I've been waiting on some liquid water colour paint to come in at 4Cats art Studio.  Do you know about this Amazing art Studio?  Do you know that they have a room dedicated for splatter art?  I really don't have enough good things to say about the art program there.  I love it!  My own daughter takes art lessons there and has learned about so many artists.  Anyway, I have come to know the owner Nichola Precious very well since she opened her studio and I have been buying some of my art supplies from her.  I want her to do well and I want to support local business.  She is doing some amazing work and great than that she is teaching children about art!

Liquid Water Color is really fun to work with.  The color is so vibrant.  I used ours full strength as I was looking for intense color.  The children were surprised that a little paint goes a very long way.  So you have the softness of the leaves and the softness of water color paint and some new paint brushes combined with gentle strokes outwards over the leaf and you get the most beautiful leaf impression.

Children have a natural tendency to press hard but today I showed them how to apply paint with soft hands and gentleness.  It was a very lovely experience and it prompted lots of wonderful and curious conversation at our table this morning.

 For this project you need, liquid water color paint, water color paper (Super important as it absorbs the paint different from regular paper) Assortment of Leaves and paint brushes. Such a simple project with stunning results!  Yay!  Fall is here!  These would make beautiful note cards if you took them to be scanned and printed!!  Great gift for a grandparent...

Catching Up On Some Camping!

 So we came off a two week trip Camping last Friday!  I meant to post these sooner but it has been so busy ending our Preschool year and backing up the train for Summer programming and the start of our camps.  Our first session of Summer programming was Camping. This was a super fun two weeks of exploring our natural world and some great new parks.  In addition to setting up my massive tent we also built a teepee and made a fake camp fire.

We enjoyed some really fun art activities and lots of smores!

 I found that making these egg cartons into collection boxes for natural treasures was perfect.  The children were each given one when we arrives at Frog pond.  we then sent them off into the woods to find the items on their carton.  We've done this scavenger hunt before and I never get tired of it.  Neither do the children.  Each child got to take their tiny treasures home.  Hopefully the boxes will get reused for other nature hunts!

I loves watching the children and hearing their thoughts about what they were observing.

We had snack at the dingle and a play at the play ground!

Oh, the freedom to run!

The serious collector!

Taking the time to choose.

I can't believe we are taking a bus Ms. Michelle!!

 When we came back to the school and after we had lunch we used the objects from our nature collections to make Sun prints.  I love Sun Print paper.

 Because it is light activated you must be careful not to expose the paper to light before you plan to use it.

 After a couple of minutes we soaked the paper in cool water to reveal our images.

 Then we hung them to dry.  So beautiful.  Such quiet and peaceful work!

 We also made a collection of branches and leaves and flowers to paint with instead of brushes.

 That effect was fun!  It was  a great opportunity to do some colour mixing as well.

These Paintings are Beautiful

 We also, used some of our natural objects to make impressions in clay.

 Later the following week we used Liquid Water Colour paint to make these beautiful paintings.

 I loves watching the children saturate the paper with Water Colour paint.

 The children were so meticulous about taking their leaves off so carefully so as not to disturb the paint.

We took a ferry to Dartmouth and another bus.  Best day ever!