November and Early December 2022: Winter on Its Way! (Part Two)

Please see Part One of this post for pictures and videos from November 7th through November 18th!

Week of November 21st

Sagine prepared snack on Monday morning ahead of a very short week at CMC!

Yazan laced rainbow beads while WIllow explored the Sandpaper and Continent Globes.

Vera helped to fold Children's House West's clean laundry.

Hannah, Sagine and Kyri took color coordination to the next level with their Pink Ladies Sound Game!

Week of November 28th

Avriel wiped his face with a washcloth, watered plants (and perhaps the Children's House West fountain), and matched objects to Sandpaper Letters based on the objects' initial sounds.

Hannah practiced letters alongside a little drawing.

Isla worked with a simple set of matching puzzles, glued decorations on rings of paper, explored a new paining activity, and wrote the names of some small objects using a Large Movable Alphabet.

James arranged the Red Rods from shortest to longest in a unique triangular formation and also practiced some letter shapes on a graph chalk board.

Jasper poured beans from one large pitcher to another, took on two Cylinder Blocks on a table, and carried a small glass of water on a tray around the Children's House West line.

Kyri cleaned up a spill during a water pouring exercise using a small, matching sponge.

Lawrence joined Children's House East for the first time and tried his hands at snipping strips of paper (our introductory scissor work) and the Pink Tower.

Lincoln mastered our Earth puzzle.

Mia built strength and poise through the use of our clay, rolling pin, and cookie cutters.

Rizwan returned from a break to complete his 5th Birthday Walk and contribute to Golden Bead Operations (below he is setting up his small number cards by decimal category).

Rizwan also spearheaded a prolific period of writing in December with tales of his Thanksgiving travels. In this video, he is finishing up a caption for one of his birthday walk photos, "This is with I and Dad and my uncles David and Joe."

Roshan completed a complex drawing in chalk, a simple clay tree, a walk through the Red Rod Maze, and a cleaning of our full-length mirror with vinegar water.

Sage used our Sandpaper Letter stamps (my best guess is that he's written his own name backwards, then made his best attempts at "Jasper" and "Mommy" and was starting in on "Daddy") and then cut out a snowflake for our wall.

Sagine worked with our set of water colors.

Vera practiced forming letters in chalk.

Wally focused on recording a Stamp Game Division problem.

Willow focused on cleaning her little grey slippers.

Yazan completed his 4th Birthday Walk.

Zane matched Sandpaper Letters to the initial sounds of the names of the little objects of an Object Box (the carved wooden box in the center of the mat).

Week of December 5th

Avriel and Isla explored the Geometry Cabinet triangle tray (the names of these triangles are right-angle scalene, obtuse-angle scalene, acute-angle isosceles, right-angle scalene (the one in Avi's hand), obtuse-angle isosceles, and acute-angle scalene).

Dane helped Anna wheel a cart of clean dishes back to Children's House East during Before Care.

Hannah continued her journey towards fluent numeracy by recording some math facts after using one of our Subtraction Charts!

James improvised a fantastic costume outdoors, explored the Geometric Solids, wrote the names of small objects using a Large Movable Alphabet, and posed at the center of his Red Rod Maze!

Jasper traced his way around a cursive Sandpaper Letter 'e'. In fully-implemented Montessori Children's Houses, the most common name of the letter in Jasper's hands is the initial sound in elephant and empty, the "short" vowel sound (as opposed to the fifth letter of the alphabet). In general, we name the Sandpaper Letters with the most common sound they represent in English words, not with their names in the alphabet.

Jiraiya flipped through a basket of puzzle pieces to construct vehicle pictures.

KK transferred wheat berries (seeds) from one small glass pitcher to another.

Kiki matched the inital sounds of object names to Sandpaper Letters and then wrote out the names of objects with just three letters/sounds.

Rizwan chose to make a totally unique copy of some common words in our classroom (in my years as an educator, I've never observed a child make a copy like this before Rizwan but as soon as I realized what he'd done it made all the sense in the world to me). By the way, if you're in the market for art supplies for your children, I can highly recommend all Faber-Castell products.

Roshan spent more time honing his skills as an artist.

Sage carefully mimicked my plant cleaning strategies using the Care of Plants tray while Sagine observed with equal intensity.

After many of the succulents had been carefully cleaned, Wally built and engaged some of our Children's House East afternoon crew in a Jungle-themed Sound Game. This turned out to be quite tricky because each child needed to memorize the common names of each of the different succulents on display—for example, the tall plant in front of Rizwan's arm may or may not be called Mother-in-law's Tongue!

Sage also wrote this beautiful piece concerning his family's cat, Bunoru! We prioritize fluid, phonetic writing early on in each child's literacy journey at CMC. Above, Sage wrote, "Bunoru eats tuna. She is the toughest cat. If you roar at her, she will attack!" I have made a copy (lower right) of Sage's writing in the Small Movable Alphabet (across the top) to serve as a model for him in making his own copy to paper.

Isla, Sagine, and Willow played with our new ribbon rings and Anna caught the action in a unique slow-motion video.

TJ and Wally went on a reading tear using most of our Classified Card sets.

Here's a great example of two emergent/novice readers exploring different strategies for reading common but nonetheless irregularly spelled words.

Vera engaged two Practical Life area staples: the collections of containers for opening and closing practice and the set of handwashing materials.

Yazan worked with the Spindle Box and a set of stones (matching the numbers on the box to the quantity of stones in each compartment) while Lincoln observed happily.

Zane explored the contours and challenges of the North America Puzzle Map!

Week of December 12th

Our last week of the School Year Session in 2022 was an especially busy one both on the children's parts and in photo and video creation among our staff! Here: Jiraiya worked with two Cylinder Blocks; Lawrence carried a Cylinder Block; Lincoln and Kyri worked with Number and Counters; Wally, Sage, and TJ engaged our country flag reading work; Rizwan did Stamp Game addition; KK built the Pink Tower; and a Sound Game was left out awaiting players.

Isla engaged a box of Constructive Triangles and a box of small objects and label cards.

James took his turn writing the names of a set of objects using the Large Movable Alphabet and then explored the process of table scrubbing.

Jasper explored a tiny music box and a material we've named the silicone semi-circles.

I worked with a large group to reintroduce the country flag work.

The lesson inspired a lot of collaboration and independent focus throughout the week!

KK worked to match cylinders with their place in their block and then rolled up a tiny mat used for stamping.

Kiki piled Golden Beads onto a tray in order to better understand and manipulate the categories of the decimal system!

She then turned to the much more mundane but no less challenging work of rolling plastic bags alongside Zane.

Lincoln drew with our rock crayons and then bound spindles with rubber bands in preparation for placing them in the Spindle Box.

Mia modeled use of a lacing frame for some younger children and then read a few pages from our Anna Hibiscus series.

Roshan carefully stretched out the thousand chain while I held the other end and Wally looked on.

Later that day, Rizwan helped Roshan finish his count of the chain!

Roshan illustrated the "magic e" principal beautifully by writing the word hide!

And then allowed Wally to supervise his reading of a CMC classic: Freight Train by Donald Crews.

Another week, another Metal Inset Rainbow Star for Sage!

Vera, Zane, and James smile proudly after matching the shapes of the Geometry Cabinet to a set of coordinating cards.

Sagine seemed to have a relaxing 5th Birthday week with lots of snack and lots of time in the reading area!

Vera worked on her flower arranging skills and traced the Sandpaper Letters 'i' (as in inside), 'f' (as in fan).

Willow sent a marble down the Children's House West Brown Stairs; used the carpet sweeper while Zane looked on; and traced three short vowels in a box of red sand!

Meanwhile, Yazan hung out with Wally in the Peace Cube, joined Kyri's team during Golden Beads Operations, held hands in the nap room with his long-time buddy Roshan, and worked the patterns of the perennial favorite, the "triangle puzzle."

I hope each of you is having a peaceful and relaxing Winter Break. We're looking forward to returning in 2023 with updates on Break Session Care, our building, and growth as a program.