Finishing Touches

New student orientation is less than one week away and my classroom is finally coming together. Though there is still plenty more to do (including some things I know won't be done in time for the start of the school year), I'm beginning to feel that the room is ready to welcome the newest children at our school.

Most of the first couple of weeks will be spent getting the children used to completing a cycle of activity (including taking out a work, using it properly, then returning it to the shelf for the next person). I'm also going to be doing a lot of grace and courtesy lessons, such as how to roll a mat, how to move a chair, etc. Oh, and how to wash your hands at the sink. That's probably one of the more important lessons! Actually, the fact that I know how a set of completed hand towels for my students to use may be what has finally made my room feel more complete. If nothing else they will be able to wash their hands!

Washcloths magically sewn in to hand drying towels.
I can now sleep knowing I can teach the children how to wash their hands!

The 'work' of eating

Today I had an interesting conversation with one of the Children's House students. We were eating in the classroom since it was raining outside. The children where clustered around a few of our larger tables put together so we could enjoy a family style lunch. They all seemed really happy with the arrangement. chatting with one another and actually staying in their seats. It's much more comfortable and easier to stay in your chair when your feet can actually touch the ground. Our outdoor picnic tables are definitely not child sized and I think that's contributed to a lot of the problems at lunch. So even though eating in the classroom itself should have been an exciting new novelty, they took to it quickly.

Anyways the children were asking if we were going to play outside for recess and I said no, we were going to have indoor play today. One of them asked "Where?" and before I could answer another student spoke up "In the classroom!" They all giggled at that and I laughed with them, then said we were going to play in the day care room because the classroom wasn't for playing; it was for working. "And for lunch!" one of the kids interjected excitedly. "Well yes," I answerd. "But eating lunch is a type of work."

And it's true.

At our school we don't view lunch as something that just needs to happen every day. Instead it's another work for the child to accomplish. They need to remember all the steps such as: washing hands, getting their lunch box, setting out their napkin and eating their protein first. They're expected to manage their food and containers themselves. Whenever a child can't open something themselves we always have them ask another friend for help before coming to a teacher. They're also spending time practicing mastering silverware. I think yogurt seems to be one of the hardest things to learn how to eat! It's tricky, one minute it's solid on your spoon, then it drips off like a liquid!

We teachers also try to model good table manners. Staying seated properly at the table, not speaking with your mouth full (a really hard one when you're trying to manage the whole group and eat your lunch at the same time!). We encourage the children in conversation, their usual favorite topic is who has the same food as who. It's pretty entertaining how excited they get when they have carrots and someone else does too; like they never imagined anyone else could have had that 'rare' food!

Really noticeable today too was the after lunch clean up. Each child was not only responsible for packing up their lunch containers, but also sweeping up all the crumbs under their chair. We also provide a bucket of soapy water in case anyone has an especially messy time eating.

So, all in all eating a meal really is 'work' for the child. Real, purposeful work that is applicable in their lives and is helping them grow up to be competent adults.

All the things we can do

Such a busy day in our classroom...though I can't think of a day that isn't busy so let's just say the energy was a bit higher than normal. Not that the children were out of control, but they were quite busy and a bit louder than normal. Want to know just how busy a Montessori classroom is? Well come and and follow me through my morning work today!

It starts out pretty quiet, I'm still filling up the tubs of water for dish washing when the first children come in. A few more little chores preparing the classroom and L comes up and asks if she can do a horse book. I let her know that we don't have any more of the paper for that animal, but we have lots of turtle pictures for her to color the parts. She eagerly goes to set up the turtle cards at a table while I greet a few more children and when she's done we go over the different parts. By the way does anyone know how you actually pronounce 'carapace'? I sit with her for a bit as she colors all the parts in, a different part on each page. Then we review them and I write the names underneath. L finishes her book and I reminder her how to bind it using a hole punch and some string.

During all of this I've shaken probably 7 or 8 hands, gotten a bar of soap for soap grating, suggested work to 3 or 4 children, sent M back to clean up his work (several times), and knotted the thread on two different needles. Someone has broken a glass over by the dishwashing and I keep the crowd back while another teacher sweeps it up. We have a brief meeting for a child to show the whole classroom the paper wasp nest her mom found before resuming work.

G comes over to show me her very first pillow that she's sewn, and E comes and asks for a story. I tell him I'd rather practice sounds with him and he goes to get some sandpaper letters. He traces f, t and b while I hurry to think up words with that sound in them. He thinks it's hilarious if he can trace it before I can think of a word. When I say that I'm finally out of words and ask which sound he wants to make into a book. He chooses b and while he gets the paper I chat with I, the three year old I've asked to sit by me since she was just bothering her older sister rather than choosing her own work. E comes back with the paper and I send him off to get a pencil holder and some colors. Meanwhile I tells me that she wants to do bead stringing so I send her off. E and I come up with four b words to put in his book (ball, brother, bucket, and something else that I forget).

During this F has wandered over and I ask if he'd like to work with me. He eagerly nods and rushes off, coming back with a box of constructive triangles. I ask him to set it up at a mat,and go back to M (the boy I already reminded earlier) to keep putting away his work. Then F and I gather at his mat and put the different triangles together. We go over the different parts of the triangle (base, vertex, midpoint, altitude or height) and I try to trick him with little commands like 'point to a midpoint' 'where's another midpoint?' 'trace the base'. He thinks it's kind of fun, but I can tell he's more interested in working with me rather than the actual lesson so we don't spend too much time. I let him clean up, going to remind M yet again to keep cleaning up his work. Granted he did have a lot of pieces to put away since he did the decanomial square, but this was still about an hour long process. Oh well.

Decanomial Square

Free for a little bit I wander over to the dishwashing area, moving some of the 'cleaned' dishes into the plastic bin that we'll haul to the dishwasher later. I remind a few children that we don't wait for snack and shoo them off to find a work. I write a few names on paintings at the easel and rinse the colors out. Having white paint probably isn't the best idea but it's the one we have the most left of (big surprise) and the children really do like using the colored paper so we've kept it out.

I spot S just putting a work away and ask her if she'll help me fix a work. I show her how the vegetable cards are all mismatched and she goes to grab a mat while I carry the tray. After changing her mind about what mat she wants S unrolls the chosen one by her sisters work and we take out the cards and begin to match them. I really like these cards, though they're more like wooden tablets than cards. However they have a large card that sits in the bottom of the tray and then two sets of smaller ones that match one top. One set has the whole vegetable, while the second set has it cut up so you can see the inside. S did really well with it, I only had to cue her for a few of the names and she easily matched the inside pictures with the pictures of the whole vegetables. I think her mom does a lot of cooking from scratch at home.

Meanwhile I had noticed a couple of girls who seemed joined at the hip...well maybe joined at the hand. Any time they were walking around they were holding hands, one usually pulling the other to a work. And they were working, but I had seen that most of their activity was becoming just silly and off task. So I asked the two of them to work separately for a bit. M went off without a complaint, but G immediately began to complain and exclaim 'I can't work by myself'. I shrugged my shoulders and said that I actually wanted her to take a break so I could hear her read. She hesitated a moment and as I dug in the pile of easy readers G began to say "but I don't like those books!". Then I pulled out one with a train. She went silent, turned it in my hand so she could see the cover and read the title aloud. "I want to read that one!" she stated gleefully and we chose a quite place to read.

I sat next to her as she read, occasionally helping out with an atypically spelled word but she read fairly fluently. A few of the younger children drifted over, I think some of them have a sixth sense for when a story is being read. G finished just as it was time for French so I had her put the book back and went to gather the other children. We were out in the hallway, all lined up when I realized that the French teacher hadn't shown up for the day. Oops. I apologized to the go-homer children and sent them back in to work. After about 15 minutes when I noticed none of them had really chosen any work I gathered them up again and we did a grace and courtesy lesson on how to observe. We've had some problems with this in our class as some children have developed the bad habit of leaning on the table for the work they're watching, or talking to the person while they're working. So myself and one of the slightly older students demonstrated how to stand quietly, with hands behind our back while observing another child work. Then they all got to try it themselves before being dismissed to get dressed to go home. When they all had a chance to try I went and joined them in the coat room, zipping zippers, helping find hands and mittens, and sending them out to put on boots.

And that was just the MORNING. Let no child go home and say that they did 'nothing' as school.

Trust me, a lot was going on in this building
Don't let the quiet fool you!

Yum, it's snack time!

It was cornbread today for snack today, yum! Ok, I'm just guessing that it tastes good because the children devour it so quickly that I have yet to be able to try any. I'm taking that as a good sign though.

You know what else is good about cornbread though? The crumbs. Yep, that messy part of it actually works perfect with the grace and courtesy lesson my fellow teacher gave today. It was called: "How to have snack". Yes, that is an actual lesson in a Montessori classroom. Along with how to blow your nose, shake hands, introduce a friend, etc. And I will admit that the children probably get the most excited about the snack one.

If you think about it, having snack can be a really long process, even if it's already prepared in individual servings. Some schools simply put out a big bowl or two of whatever is for snack and then use a chalkboard or dry erase board to help the children get the appropriate amount. At our school though we portion out the snack of the day in dixie cups so it's ready to go and doesn't take as much time. However the full cycle of activity is quite long.

Now imagine that you're hungry, and decide that you want to have snack. But before you even get to snack you  need to wash your hands...with soap.
And if there's a line you need to wait in it. Oh, and if there are already 2 children having snack, you need to wait your turn for that too. Then, and only then are you actually ready to pick a snack and sit down. Unless of course you want a drink of water. Then you need to pour yourself a glass from the small pitcher on the hutch and carry it to the table. Ah, refreshing.


But even when you finish eating snack isn't over, oh no. There's crumbs to be swept up, water spills to be sponged dry, and that darn chair to push in. Then you can wash your dishes. Oh, and if there's a line you might have to wait (again!). Scrub that water glass, rinse away the bubbles and place it in the rack to dry. Whew! Now it's time to go back to work...wait...wasn't it a lot of work just to have snack.

Apparently not for some kids, since they decide to have snack twice, even though they are only supposed to have one. Oops!