Fall activities

So while most of the activities in a Montessori classroom stay constant (the pink tower is ALWAYS out!), and others are modified to keep the children interested (like adding a rolling pin to go with the modeling clay), we still like to do some seasonal or holiday activities.

This week I introduced pumpkin scrubbing. It wasn't something I had planned (a parent brought in a bunch of small, decorative gourds for our upcoming festival) but boy have the children loved it! The first day I put it out none of them really noticed it on the shelf. So when I kept seeing one of the younger three year olds wandering I invited him to be the first one to try it out. I had to change up a few things mid-presentation (that's a big no-no there!) but I wasn't quiet willing to deal with the gallons of water that were going to end up on the floor if I used the bowl and pitcher I had originally intended to....No idea what I was thinking there. While I try not to be bothered by it when the children spill or make a big mess, that doesn't mean I need to ENCOURAGE it!

So after outfitting J with the proper equipment I proceeded to watch as all the other children gathered around, now eager to try the new work (of course!) and eagerly asking if they could be next.

Well J did keep saying yes, but then he kept scrubbing. And scrubbing, and scrubbing. And then it was time to go home. There were about 10 little pumpkin gourds scattered around the classroom and no too much water on the floor. Now that's such a nice change from the aimless wandering he was doing earlier in the day!

I was a little concerned that he was going to repeat that again today; good for him, but frustrating for the other children. But M beat him to it! When she gets an idea in her head she's bound and determined to follow through and after seeing her keep her eye on the work yesterday I wasn't too surprised that that was the first thing she rushed to do!

So she scrubbed pumpkins for about half an hour and emptied the basket of them. C came up to me, all concerned that there were no pumpkins for her to scrub. So, I invited her to grab the basket and go with another teacher to fetch more from the back hallway. I might have made a bit of a mistake there since she went back at least once, possibly twice for even MORE pumpkins!

Basically at the end of the day I needed to use the dishes trolley in order to haul all the clean pumpkins out of the classroom. And I have to say I'm quite impressed by all the places they thought to put them!

Construction

Don't let anyone tell you there's such a thing as a word that's too big for a three year old!

"I gotta tell Teacher Alex!" S hollered as he came pounding the door, lunch box swinging wildly as his dad dodged out of the way. He looked up at me with those giant brown eyes, mouth open with awe.

"There's an excabator out there! There's two ekabators! And they're MOVING!" The sheer excitement of the situation seemed to be too much for him to even get the words out and yet he had to tell me so fast that it took a second to even register what he was saying.

"Yes there is an excavator out there. What's it doing?"

"The ekabator's digging the dirt! I'm gonna tell F." And with that he pounded off to let his brother know about the excavator. You know, in case he had somehow missed the GIANT YELLOW MOVING machine in the front yard.

And who know there were so many ways to say excavator?

One month

Tomorrow marks the official end of one month of school...and I won't get to be there for it :( While I'm at home recovering from strep throat the kids will be there with a substitute teacher. And you know what, I'm not too worried. Today I really saw how much progress we've made over the course of that month.

J and little C spent almost all morning following M around. She invited them to watch her arrange flowers, then she and J built the pink tower together while C went off and made his first bird book (mostly) independently. Meanwhile S asked to learn about the geometric solids and before I could even answer O offered to teach him! So they spent about 15 or 20 minutes building rocket ships and discovering other ways the bases of the solids fit together.

Meanwhile have no idea what big C did most of the morning. I just know that every time I looked up she was happily working away diligently at something. Fastening buttons, cutting paper, playing with clay. She still likes to come over and tell me what she's doing but she's become such an independent worker that I'm really proud of her.

And then there was K. K who doesn't speak much english but is finally showing that he has a lot of comprehension of what we're saying. K who had to change his pants at least 10 times the first day of school but hasn't had an accident the past 3 days of school. K took out two activiites completely independently and even returned one of them to the shelf without a reminder! He knew that he needed to finish cleaning up the grain he spilled before it could be put back and did such a good job (with a little helping encouragement) that I could finally introduce water pouring to him. That was when I found out that he did know the words wet and dry. So now thanks to that one presentation he's got several new activities to try-

• Putting on an apron, including snapping it
• Actually pouring water
• Wiping up a spill with a cloth
• Hanging said cloth up on the drying pack WITH a clothespin
• Rolling an oilcloth (ok, this one he already knew but needs more practice!

And how do I know all these things? Because today I could actually sit and observe to take all this one. I gave 4 or 5 new presentations and was barely interrupted during them for an 'emergency'. Yet I still had time to sit on my stool and take notes. It was wonderful to see them all settled in to the routine and busy working both alone and with each other.

So here's hoping that they're at least half as good tomorrow!

Please let some of these good things happen tomorrow!

Some weeks there's just too much..

...and those are the weeks I don't feel like blogging. So here's a little rundown of the week and hopefully that will earn me some forgivness for posting late.

Monday-

The week didn't start out too, bad; two children gone (one out sick, the other just because she never comes Mondays). So I got to focus on K, who continued to wet his pants several times despite being sent to the bathroom nearly every half hour. And J, who still refuses to wait to touch materials AND insists on playing with them at the shelf...I think that's a pet peeve of mine actually, very frustrating. Add in a little bit of the usual Monday messes (finding out I forgot to order our food work groceries the week before and had no silverware for lunch) and it was an all right day. So I enjoyed a night of training of the dog and having movie night with my friends. Then Tuesday started.

Tuesday-

Everyone was back on Tuesday. S was back, still recovering a bit from his cold and spent the entire day whimpering, whining and on the verge of tears. Well, except for the time he spent avoiding the classroom and garnering sympathy from the staff in the hallway while he pretended to need to use the bathroom 6 times in 3 hours.... And whenever he was in the classroom he flat our refused to work on anything, even his favorite bead stringing and kept crying if I moved more than 3 feet from him. I did finally let him go lay on a cot for a while, only to see him spinning circles on it and throwing puzzle pieces...so that wasn't really helpful.

Oh, and to top this all of little I was also crying her head off. She misses mom, she was tired, she didn't want to do anything, she didn't want snack. So after about 10 minutes of letting her whimper and trying to find something for her to do I gave up. Yep, that's what I said: I gave up. I told her that when she was done crying I would love to spend some time with her but that I didn't want to be by her while she was crying.

So she kept screaming and hiccuping for nearly 40 minutes. I'd go over to her every now and then and repeat my offer but she usually just started screaming louder so I mainly let her be. Finally she calmed down enough that I let her stand by me and watch me do some work (trying to find something she might want to try) and I finally got her interested in dusting the classroom with C.

And then we had a fire drill. Not our first one of the year but still. So, S screeched and jump right up in to my arms and I calmly carried him out while praying little I wouldn't start up crying again because S is pretty big for a three year old and I wasn't sure I could carry both of them. Luckily she seems to go a bit more to the side of being silently shell-shocked by the fire alarm. Anyways we all made it outside and then of course they were distracted the rest of work time so it was a huge relief to go out to recess. Then I realized it wasn't even Wednesday.

And meanwhile K still had a giant grain spill that he had been cleaning up all morning. Literally, all morning....

Wednesday-

It felt like a repeat of Tuesday (sans the fire drill). S and I both crying most of the morning and not letting me get more than a few feet from them while all the other children are desperate for some new presentations. I actually had to put an end to S going out in to the hallway to use the bathroom because he would simply go out and sit in one of the chairs for 20 minutes...yeah not why we're at school buddy sorry. Of course when I broke the news to him that he was at school to be in the classroom that started a whole new wave of crying. So the morning felt like being in a loop. K even dumped out all the grain again, though at a different table (so you know, I would have different shelves to sweep under).

And so did nap time. J has been refusing to stay on his cot much less sleep for the past 3 weeks. He's gone from being my most consistent napper to the one who keeps me so busy that I can't even leave his side to hush another child or he'll be doing circles around the room. Even bribery with a favorite story book made no impact. Sigh.

And it kept hitting me that it was only Wednesday...

Thursday-

Not quite as much as a loop as Wednesday luckily. S was still constantly on the verge of tears and constantly asking if he could lay on his cot or go to the bathroom. I made it very clear that there would be no cot until nap time and myself and the hallway staff teamed up to make sure that he went directly to the bathroom and came back. No stops to sit and loll around in the waiting chair, no sidetracking to visit his brother, etc.

I was a little nervous about little I because the first thing I see in the morning is a note from her mother saying how she is leaving for a trip and this is the first time ever that I has been away from her; GASP! Ok, ok, I do get that it is a big deal but still...I is almost 3, that just boggles my mind!

And actually I was the happiest she had been all week. I pin that on the consistency of coming to school for a few days in a row. She talked about how her grandma was picking her up and momma was going on a girls trip. So I made sure to give her a presentation right away (before she could ramp up any tears) and between me and M (who's taken her under her wing) little I was pretty happy all day. Constantly asking "When it's the clean-up song we go outside? Momma's gonna pick me up?" but pretty good compared to her usual standard.

J still bounced all around on his cot all nap time and hardly anyone else slept so I had a group of 6 crowded in our little play space afterwards....and then I got home and realized that my exhaustion wasn't all from the kids: I was definitely getting a cold, no matter how hard I wanted to deny it. And I still hadn't swept up all the grain K had dumped out again earlier in the day.

Friday-

Friday was the day I needed after the rest of the week. 4 children were gone--4! It was so nice! Me and my stuffy nose and scratchy throat were so thankful to be able to talk quietly and move slowly all day. K was gone so the grain stayed in the cup (though another child had a pretty big water spill but at least that will eventually clean itself up!) I was gone and with only 6 other children S seemed to feel like he could finally spend enough time with me (and had finally quit asking to lay on his cot!)

I tried to get through as many presentations as possible to make up for being so busy the rest of the week so now those children have some new things to practice.

Then nap time rolled around. J was up to his usual antics but I knew I had to crack down on one of the other children who has also been getting some bad habits at nap and just told him that I couldn't sit with him today. J said ok, lay quiet for maybe 2 minutes then wandered over to sit with me. Every time he did I waited until he squirmed enough to be completely off my lap then sent him back to his cot. Finally he got quiet, his head hanging off the edge of his cot and fingers playing with the dirt on the floor.

Then we got up and I found out why he'd been so still...and laying on his stomach.

"J, the back of your pants look wet, do you need to change them?" Blank look. "Let's go change them."

I'm proud to say that I was smart enough to be prepared with gloves and all my supplies before helping him take of his pants but....let's just say I now feel like I am prepared for just about any other bodily function mess this year.

And that's how the week ended.

Is it vacation yet?