What we do all day

Thought you might like to see what sorts of things we do all day. I have to say there's quite the variety!

Looking up and coloring flags

Getting really good at that tricky trinomial cube

Practicing a puzzle map of the world

Cutting and pasting to make snowflakes

Learning how to pin fabrics together

Fetching different flags (they wanted to have ALL of them)

Cutting and arranging flowers in vases with our new stand

Cracking the code of the decanomial square

Practicing colors and learning how to use a screwdriver

Building tippy towers with the knobless cylidners

Keeping our new bird feeder full

Washing and drying dishes

Peeling and cutting carrots

Mixing colors to see what they make

Learning the different categories of numbers up the 1000!

Taming tricky botany puzzles (left: parts of a flower, right: parts of a tree)

Peeling and slicing hardboiled eggs

Ok, so we still need some work with getting just the peel off!

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.

Buckling down

There was work galore happening this morning, and really focused, challenging work.

I was so amazed this morning when I brought in the tray for food work and after setting everything out found that I could sit down and observe the children work for a little while. I thought I'd get maybe a minute or two, but I got closer to 10 minutes of uninterrupted observation. This is what we're striving for in our classroom; children who can make choices and work on those activities independently. A couple of girls were playing a game with the pink tower, an older boy was setting up the farm while a younger child observed him, two children were walking carefully on the line. Every where I looked children were engaged in activities or walking to the shelves with purpose.

It's great to be able to watch these children mature and settle down in to the routine, especially the older ones. Some have never stayed for the afternoon, or have napped during that work cycle so having an extra two hours every day has really exploded their abilities. M is one of those who has always gone home after the morning work cycle, this is her first year staying all afternoon. She just turned 5 in November and over the past month has discovered she can read. It started with the little slips we have for clean up jobs at the end of the day and went from there. This morning I watched M use the moveable alphabet with a friend to write little commands (like "sit on a mat"), read them and act them out. Now that's awesome progress, not only being able to read the words but really interpret them as well. 

Below is the work of another Kindergartener. T traced each country from the puzzle map of Europe, colored them in, labeled them and then wrote the name of the country on a separate piece of paper. Not a bad way to practice and learn capital letters!

Another example was with another M girl. We've always known she was very artistic and musical, she takes piano and her older sister plays the violin so there's a lot of formal music education as well. The other day though I heard her playing Christmas songs on our melody harp--from memory! We have little cards that slide in under the strings of the instrument so the children learn which string to pluck, but I'm not ever sure that we have the songs she was playing. Anyways I asked M if she'd like to learn how to play little songs on the bells, she was a little hesitant, telling me that she didn't know how to read regular music. But after talking to me, walking away, coming back again she finally decided that in the afternoon she wanted to learn some more work with the bells. Together we labeled the bells, learned the parts of the staff and the placement of the notes. M was really in to it and was even more proud when she realized that she had had the most presentations on the bells of any of the other kindergartners.  Ok, so we're not supposed promote competition like that but it really was an accomplishment she could be proud of since she puts so much work in to her music.

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!

Making a book

So this actually occurred yesterday but I got distracted by the chicken pox and forgot to write about it. Please note that I will only be using the first letter of the students name for confidentially, while still trying to keep the story a personal experience (aka. not just calling the girl, 'her' or 'she' through the whole story).

L made a book.

Parts of a Horse puzzle from Montessori Services
(we use most of the same parts for making books)

Yep, an actual book. Well, ok it was 6 or 7 pages of printer paper stapled together, but it's still a book. And she illustrated it herself. L is one of youngest students, this is her second year in the Children's house but she's still only three years old and hasn't started too much of the academic materials yet. So it was a big deal when the head teacher invited her to make a book on the parts of a horse. Boy was she excited. First they took out the laminated cards with the different parts of the horse colored on each one and went over the names. Then L got to pick her favorite one and color that part in on her own, blank copies of the horse. Horse, body, mane, tail, forelegs, hind legs, neck, forehead, ears, she colored them all.

Next came the exciting part--stapling! With her book bound she 'read' it to me, stumbling over just a few of those parts. Hey, it's hard to remember which of the legs are which! And I think L carried that book around the rest of the afternoon she was so excited. She finally moved on to a new work when I promised that I would help her remember to get it into her blue bag on Friday to go home and show mom.

Today I caught her checking on it still in her bin, and showing it off to a few friends. I'd have to say that she's still pretty proud of herself for completing such a big kid work.

My bin, your bin, we all have a bin

My bin, your bin, we all have a bin...for work! Most Montessori schools have bins for the children to keep their 'work' (art projects, writing strips, handmade books, etc.). At our school the children bring this work home at the end of the week in their blue bags. They all get super excited for 'blue bag day' and often there are tears if a child forgets to bring the bag back and so cannot take their work home.

Because we like to review what the children are bringing home, to see how they're progressing and what they are interested in, a teacher fills up the bags right away in the morning. This week it was my job and I have to admit I found some of the most interesting items in the children's bins. Some flower petals, a broken pencil, hoarded colored pencils, hair ties, and a sweater (which just barely fit in the plastic bin).

Probably more interesting though wasn't the items themselves, but the stories they told. One younger students pin was packed absolutely full of beautiful artwork. None of which she had drawn herself, but she has a very loving older sister who loves to draw pictures for her and give them as gits. Actually finding gifts in other children's bins isn't uncommon, and it's usually best to ask if you find a piece of paper with a different child's name on it in a different bin.

I also found a bin nearly entirely empty except for a couple of scribbled drawing an a thick, stapled stack of writing strips. The strips had some really well formed cursive letters on them, completely contrary to the half-hearted scribbles of the coloring work. I would have guessed this was a younger child's bin, with the letters being  a gift from an older student, but unfortunately that's not the case. This is the bin of a student who was just on the edge of being old enough for kindergarten this year. She should have lots of beginning math and writing work filling her bin right now. Unfortunately the scribbles are more her usual style right now. The only reason the nice letters are in there, is because her mom came to observe and the little girl wanted to show off some for her. It's just frustrating because looking at the letters she has written she's more than capable of doing the more advanced work...the problem is she's not interested in focusing to learn MORE letters or even practice her numbers to get beyond these basics. We'll just have to find something to inspire her with.

Anyways, while we can learn a lot from what the children choose to put in their bin, there's always the aspects of school that can't go home. Like the help I get when it's time to hang all those blue bags back on the right hooks. I have so many children ready to help me that I can't hardly fill the bags quickly enough to keep up. I grab a bin, scan the work quick and dump it in the blue bag. One child looks at the little picture on the bin (which matches the picture near the hooks) and brings the filled bag in the coat room to hang up. Meanwhile another child returns the empty bin and helps me find them next one, which I can hopefully empty before the first child returns. Meanwhile there's still a crowd of children wanted to help put blue bags away. It's a pretty exciting process since it only happens once a week.

And I have to admit, they're pretty good about getting them on the right hook, or at least coming back to tell me they forgot who they were looking for!

Sometimes work really is just a lot of work

"276, 277, 278, 279....."
"What comes after 79?"
"70, 10?"
"Sort of. Do you remember what we call it when we have 7 tens and add 1 more 10?"
"80!"

This was my afternoon conversation with one of the older students in the class. He was counting one of the long bead chains which are the cubes of a number in physical form. Still with me? Yeah, I wasn't there the first time either, and we actually don't tell the children this fact until the elementary years. I'll put some more pictures at the bottom of the post if you're interested in just how they work.

But on with the story.

In the ideal world the boy counting the chain would have immediately started counting "281, 282, 283..." etc. etc. Instead this happened-

"280, 290, 300..." Hmm...doesn't sound quite right does it? Obviously he has the concept of the numbers 1 to 10, and knows that these numbers repeat, but he hasn't fully understood it yet. The head teacher and I were discussing the matter and think that one of the preparatory materials for this work was actually making it harder for him to count linearly. Oops.

Especially in the math area of the classroom, early activities lay the basis for later ones. In this case the child had done a lot of work with the thousand chain. This chain has a thousand beads on it, bound together in sections of 10. The children are supposed to count the beads, and place the correctly numbered arrow at the end of each section of 10. This student had quickly realized that all the arrows he needed to place ended in 0 and that he just needed to put the first number in order. A pretty good shortcut, and one we wanted him to figure out eventually but it's making it really hard for him to do the 9 chain as the sections now each have 9 beads in them instead of 10 and the pattern of arrows is much harder to recognize. This means that he now needs to actually count each individual bead, an exercise he skipped earlier when learning how to do the thousand chain.

Now an activity that was super simple for him, has suddenly become a lot more work. And not work in the Montessori sense of the word. In a Montessori environment the activities of the child are generally refereed to as work. This is because the job of the child is to build up themselves into the adult they will become. The term work is used as a sign of respect for what the child is doing and is not meant to seem as though we are submitting them to drudgery as a adult might think when we say the child is doing work. To the child work is purposeful and fulfilling; they enjoy it.

Unfortunately, nothing ever works flawlessly, and even with all the preparation materials in a Montessori classroom you run into stumbling blocks like this one. So I spent about half an hour gently coaching him on how to count linearly. Together we made it up to 250 and will tackle the chain again tomorrow. Hopefully the work will make the shift from drudgery to purposeful.

Some more explanation of the bead chains for anyone interested-

The chains come in two different types, short and long, and there is one of each type for the numbers 1 to 10.  Below is an example of the short 5 chain-

The short chain shows the number squared. So since this is the 5 chain there are 25 beads total, separated into sets of 5. The square in the upper right is bound together and helps to subtly introduce the idea that this chain is the square of a number. The long chains on the other hand show the cube of a number (125 in the case of the 5 chain) and instead of a square the end of the chain is symbolized by a cube, such as in the photo below.

So yeah, there's a lot going on in these chains. However, when the children take them out in the environment they are simply counting the beads and placing the arrow with the correct number next to it. The idea of squares and cubes are supposed to be passively absorbed and pulled out again later when the child is introduced to this concepts in their elementary years.