Spring time

Flowers have been a big part of our classroom recently.  There are windows all along the east side of our room and recently all of the Cherry trees were in bloom.  They looked like snow all over the trees.  This was a flower work - I got this idea from online.  You take tissue paper squares and fold them over the end of a pencil and then glue them on paper to make flowers.  It is very cute.    Here are some the children did...

We have many bugs (and other critters) in our room now.  Our Ootheca (praying mantis egg case) just hatched.  We have hundreds of baby praying mantises now.  It hatched during circle when I was walking around showing the Ootheca.  It happened so fast.   We are now feeding them aphids.   We will let most of them go and keep a few to watch grow.   We have bullfrog tadpoles.  One has his hind and forelegs now.  The children are very excited about that.  We have the mealworms, red wrigglers, and just recently let go the ladybugs.  Another latest addition are the silkworms.  They are eating the Mulberry leaves like crazy.  

Another work I put out was Moon sand with a Spring twist.   I added cut up egg cartons, small fake flowers, bugs, etc. to make a garden.  The children would put the moonsand in the carton, like dirt and add the flowers and make a garden in the sand.  It was a popular work.    

It's almost time for conferences so the next few weeks will be busy!

Shell Sand Pouring

During my internship I created this work.  Actually my two sons created this work.  I was working on my synthesis and they happened to be in the same room playing with shells.  At one point I looked over and one of them was pouring sand back and forth between two shells.  It was such an "ah-ha" moment!  A new pouring work.  We tried it in class and it was a hit.  It helps to find the right shells.  The two shells shown here worked well for the pouring.  It teaches the child to be more delicate and careful with their pouring.  

Forest combined with Geology

I tried to create works for my synthesis in all or most areas of the classroom.  My son, Max, was way into Geology at the time and his interest was contagious.  So I wanted to make a forest geology work.  This is a matching work.   In the first picture, in the back row -  is a bottled stick with tree sap, next to that is a piece of a tree, and next to that is pine needles.  You match these to their fossilized counterparts (amber, fossilized wood, and a plant fossil).   Another option was a container of maple syrup for the sap (see next photo).   I would love to do something with a petrified forest sometime!  Oh well, this makes for a good segue into fossils.

Alien Bug

I found this bug in my driveway, the poor fellow was already deceased.  The only other bug I have found this big was a Locust.  This was not a Locust.  I took it to school to show the children and many of them commented on how smelly it was.  Sure enough I looked online and it is a Jerusalem Cricket.   It's not really a cricket.  They live in the dirt and eat plant roots.  They are smelly (so it's not from the decay) and have strong mandibles for eating roots and digging.   They drum their abdomens against the ground as a mating call.  Way Cool!  The children are very interested in bugs and insects in our class.  They include our classroom critters, the mealworms and the red wrigglers, in our good morning song - it's very sweet.  They always remind me if I forget to sing good morning to the bugs.  It's nice to see them not squeamish as I remember being as a child.  That's why I think it's important for me to model respectfulness and not be squeamish (though with spiders that is harder for me!).  I am not happy with the quality of the photo of the Jerusalem Cricket - will try and take another picture during the day time.

On another note we are starting to talk about Antarctica in class.  We have been talking about how it is the coldest and windiest continent.  Amazingly it is also the driest.  The reason there is so much snow is that the snow stays - it doesn't melt.  So soon, during circle, we are going to watch shaved ice (no access to snow here in our part of California) melt and show ice that is kept cold stays the same.    Brrrrr.

Build a Forest

 
At our school we just got back from winter break.  The children were so excited to be back and kept very busy all week.  It was hard to break the work cycle for recess.  There was so much concentration going on.  We are studying Asia in the classroom right now so I went a little crazy at Cost Plus getting Asian items.  There is a 50% off sale for some items of which I got various instruments and trinkets.  Cost Plus had a beautiful Indian umbrella (not on sale) which was not too expensive that we have put over the snack table - it looks great.   I brought from home a Chinese paper lantern which we put near our cultural shelves.    I am going to bring in Asian animals and various spices from Asia for matching works.   When I was a kid we had a Japanese exchange student who gave us a kimono and geta shoes.   A friend recently gave me the socks that can be worn with the geta shoes, so I brought those in for the children to try.  So no time to do forest works yet.  We do have the lifecycle of the mealworm (our current classroom critters) out right now, so I think the next work will be a parts of the Tenebrio beetle book.

This work pictured is one of my forest synthesis works.  It is a combination of a diorama and math work.  I used a spinner toy one of my children got from a fast food restaurant, removed whatever stickers or pictures were on it and replaced them with stickies with numbers on them.  In a basket are objects you would find in a forest - trees, animals, rocks, hikers, etc. - I picked animals and trees that you might find in a North American pine forest.  The blue you see is blue felt that acts as a stream.  The child starts with an empty tray.  They spin the spinner and whatever number appears they then pick that many forest items out of the basket and put on the tray, they are building a forest.  For a point of interest I put the number 0 on the spinner.  Of course you could do all kinds of variations for this work!  Happy Building!    

Add one more for the Auditory sense!

It seems as if there are never enough auditory sense works for the Sensorial area (other than the sound cylinders and the expensive bells).  It's easily neglected.   "Forest Sound Bingo" was a work I created for matching the sound to the picture using bingo chips (actually I "borrowed" the chips from my kids' Connect Four game).  I found various forest sounds (animals, insects, storms, etc.) from the internet and put them on a CD.  I then made different bingo cards with pictures of the animals.  While making the CD I had iTunes pause a few seconds between sounds and also repeat the sound to give the children extra time to find the match.  This is another work I have not put out yet this year, but have in the past.  The kids enjoyed this work.  At the time I did not have headphones, so the one thing I had to watch out for was that the sound was never up too loud as to bother other's working nearby.   This year we have a new CD player with four headphone jacks - I can't wait to try it with the Forest bingo game!  Happy Holidays!  I hope to use some of this time off to create more works.  

First Post

I am a former computer programmer but for as long as I can remember have always wanted to be a preschool teacher.   Therefore, using the computer comes natural to me.  I find myself using the computer immensely to help with my development as a teacher and can't imagine life without it.  So blogging seemed like a next step!  I am in my second year as being a head teacher at the school where I teach.  I have been working at the school for 5 years and had the great luck of doing my internship with a phenomenal Montessori teacher, Leslie Barron.  She always inspires me and amazes me and I value all that she has taught me, and is still teaching me!   

Another passion of mine is creating Montessori works.  I hope to post photos and describe works that I have created.  Hopefully they will help someone else out in the Internet - give them an idea or spark their own creation.    

So, here goes for my first work.  During my intern my synthesis was on Forests.  I have fond memories of doing forest hikes with my father.  He truly loved the outdoors.   This was a big part of the reason I picked forests.  One of my synthesis works is called "Forest Guess Who".  I took a Guess Who game,  took out the cartoon people and put pictures of forest animals and plants.  You can do this for two of the game boards or you can do it for one game board and laminate a copy of the pictures on cards.   Anyway, it's really just like the Guess Who game except with a different theme.  When I play it with the children I say things like "Is it a plant or an animal?",  "Is it big or small?", "Does it have fur?", etc. .  The children enjoy this work.  Another twist I have added is to put the children's and teacher's pictures in the slots and play "Guess Who" with the classroom.  I have not added it to my class this year but really want to, I think it's a nice way for the children to feel connected with each other and to feel included.