Blog

Hemlock Class

Fall is officially here. There are so many fun subjects for us to explore in the classroom related to this season. The classroom works have changed and we added polishing to our Practical Life area this month. First the children learned to polish a mirror, then wood and next is silver polish. We started this month off with the study of apples. Apple art, apple puzzles, apple counting and so much more lined the classroom shelves. Parts of an apple, apple dissecting and apple tasting and the “Apple tree” song were just part of our circle activities.

Next we dove into the world of bats. The history of bats and types of bats, their foods and habitats and environments as well as the parts of a bat have been filling our classroom with a bat buzz (or we could call it echolocation).

Next we take a look at spiders. How are they different from insects? We will learn what kind of arachnids exist and which ones live around us. Do you know the “Itsy bitsy spider” song? Now you can learn it from your child. On Thursdays the Hemlock class will start to bring in either Yoga or Science experiments during our circle time. Fridays remain our “Show and Tell” days where every child can bring one object from home to present and talk about in class during circle time. Should you forget to bring something, we will make sure to ask each child to come up and share a little “Tell”. Some children are not big on sharing and that is ok as well!

The Nature Walk on Tuesday am and Thursday pm will now include new students and you will be notified on Pro Care in case your child is going. Sometimes a student is absent or does not want to go. Then a present child can fill the spot and we will not have time to let you know before the walk but since everyone is usually ready for Washington’s outside play time anyways, appropriate clothes are usually no issue. Most children have a water bottle to refresh here, too.

Alongside all these fall lessons we are getting ready for our Halloween fun day by learning the “Witches Brew” song as well as the “Five little Pumpkins sitting on a gate” song. On the day of Halloween the children can come in costumes. The two classrooms will meet on the playground to share a big circle for songs and a costume parade. Then when we are back in our individual classrooms, we will share a spooky snack and have some more class appropriate fun! It is all organized and taken care of by the teachers. It would be nice if your child wears a bathroom friendly costume. FYI our school is free of any type of guns! Please be mindful with masks, some children scare easy (it also hinders their safe outside play).

One more housekeeping item:  we conduct regular Fire and Earthquake Drills as per DSHS regulation. That means we are leaving the building asap, rain or shine and if your child does not have indoor shoes in school, they are outside in true fall fashion with very wet and dirty socks.

So please remember to refresh their extra clothes as soon as laundry comes home. Thank you!

Hopefully we will have more nice weather so the children get to enjoy our outside toys a little longer.

All the Hemlock teachers are looking forward to meeting with you for our upcoming conferences, thank you for signing up and making time in your busy schedules!

Buckeye Class

This October we introduced easel painting which has been very popular with the children. Once the children are finished with their paintings, they lay them out to dry then clean up the easel with a sponge so that it is all clean for the next child to use.

On Indigenous People’s Day we discussed how Christopher Columbus thought he had found his way to India and that is why some people call Indigenous Americans Indians, but he was wrong! He was in what we now call America, which had already been occupied by Indigenous people. We celebrate the people who were here before us.

As we settle into autumn a bit more, we learn about the parts of an apple as well as the life cycle of an apple and had an apple tasting where everyone was offered different types of apples to taste! Spiders and pumpkins have also been big topics lately. We learned about the parts of a spider and parts of a pumpkin. We dissected and carved a pumpkin at circle and had the opportunity to try pumpkin seeds.

We have been singing lots of Halloween themed songs this month. A favorite song is the five little pumpkins:

Five little pumpkins sitting on a gate

the first one said oh my it’s getting late

the second one said there are bats in the air

the third one said but we don’t care

the fourth one said let’s run and run and run

the fifth one said isn’t Halloween fun?

then wooooo went the wind

and out went the lights

and the five little pumpkins rolled out of sight

During this song we have a child turn out the lights and the teacher rolls five little pumpkins to the children. This is very exciting for the everyone.

We are continuing are nature walks twice a week. Lately we have noticed many different kinds of mushrooms along the trails.

Hemlock

A warm welcome to the 2023 – 2024 Hemlock community. We hope
Everyone had a great summer with their families and we are very excited to see new and returning children. We enjoyed all of our new families during meet and greet day. It is great on our side to know about your precious ones and concerns. We are very happy to be part of their developmental years. Please let us know anything different or new happening in your child’s life. This can help us better
respond to your child’s individual needs. No piece of information is too small, anything you would like to tell us, we are here to hear. Children have all done a fabulous job in the first month by adjusting to the new environment. It is great to see children walking through the door on their own by each day. They are doing it beautifully. Our returning children help our newcomers to settle down at ease
which fulfills the envision of a multi age group.

We started our school year by learning each other’s names by welcome songs and classroom rules and why they are important. We are striving to be the kindest persons which is our first rule followed by walking feet, inside voices, respecting others’ work, and work cycle. We learnt circle rules of sitting criss-cross, hands in our lap, listening ears. We also learnt to carry a mat, tray, and chair. We celebrated World Peace Day on September 21st by lighting candles and singing peace songs with Buckeye friends. We conducted our first fire drill and discussed the safety protocols to be followed. We played finger games and songs. It was a great opportunity to meet you and explain the Montessori methodology on curriculum night.

Travis, Carlitos and Shourya celebrated their birthdays. We wish them a very happy birthday. As Montessori classrooms emphasize independence, please send age-appropriate shoes and have your child’s name in bags, dresses and water bottles. As the weather gets cooler, children may need appropriate clothes. Once
again thank you for choosing Creative Montessori and trusting us with your loved
ones. Looking forward to having a great school year.

“The education of even a small child, therefore, does not aim at preparing
him or her for school but for life.”

———–Dr. Maria Montessori.

Buckeye

September 2023
What a busy month! We hope you all are settling nicely into your own individual family routines. In class, the children are learning to put on their own coats and shoes, wash their hands, and to set-up and clean-up their own snacks/lunches. They experience such joy when they can accomplish these tasks on their own. This you can reinforce at home.

Joining our class this September, we welcomed eleven new children. This is an exciting time for our returning children who naturally and effortlessly take on more of a leadership role. We have spent time talking through our classroom rules. These focus on respecting others and their own space and maintaining a calm and peaceful classroom.  Through traditional Montessori “grace and courtesy” practices we learn to treat others with respect, kindness, and thoughtfulness.

Circle time is filled with music, singing, stories, role-playing, and show-and-tell.  We utilize the book The Peace Rose, by Alicia Olson, to illustrate a problem-solving tactic where we pass a rose for a turn to speak.

We have also talked about identifying and handling our emotions. When a child feels calm/happy, they may ask for a “love light” to be pinned to their shirt. The love light is the love that lives inside us that is bright when we are calm/happy and dim when we feel sad.
In recognition of the United Nation’s International Day of Peace, we gathered with the Hemlock class to sing “Light a Candle for Peace” in unison with other schools all around the world. This holiday has perfect timing as we prepare to learn all about our “peace virtues” in the days to come.

Our practical Life area is especially popular at the beginning of the year as children work on controlled movements, care for self and care for their environment. They are busy choosing work that is new, exciting, and challenging.

The popular nature walks in St. Edward State Park have begun! Each child will have a chance to walk every other week. This outdoor education helps to tie in nature concepts in our indoor classroom.
Birthdays are an exciting time for your child to celebrate their birth and share pictures from each year of their life during our circle. They will take home a small model of the earth including the four elements that are the foundations of life. It is impressive to see all that your children absorb in these first few weeks.

We are looking forward to what the rest of the year brings!

Hemlock Class

Can’t believe that we have come to the end of the year.

This month was all about bugs, flowers, and gardening. Our April showers brought us beautiful May flowers all around our school.

In the beginning of the month, we finished up learning about butterflies, and moved on to other insects, their importance to us and the environment, and their role in the plant world. We still have our caterpillars in our classroom and it has been a wonderful learning opportunity to witness their metamorphosis. Each morning the children come in curious to see if a butterfly has hatched. The excitement was high when this finally started happening! The children learned some interesting facts about ladybugs , ants, worms and bees.

Besides insects the children learned about the life-cycle of a bean and they planted their own bean seeds took care of them took it home. We looked in-depth at flowers some got to dissect their own flowers to see the parts of a flower.

 It has been wonderful to see the children so engaged in our spring units. They clearly enjoy learning about nature and our natural world, and they love helping out in our vegetable garden! They were happy to plant seeds and plants in our garden, water them and see them grow. They also enjoy eating the lettuce leaves. We continued the message that was emphasized in April, especially around Earth Day, that we need to take care of nature and should be kind to all creatures that we share our planet with.

Bread cutting and orange squeezing are the hits of the classroom.

They have been enjoying sing along music, movement with rhythm sticks and yoga and practicing calm breathing.

Our children have converted into beautiful butterflies and are ready to make a season finale. Thanks for all the understanding and cooperation from your side to make this beautiful journey.

Buckeye Class

What a wonderful, warm turn the weather has taken this May! With all this warm weather, we have been spending more time outside. We have opened up outside for worktime where the children may take work outside and work at the outdoor tables or on the outdoor rugs.

We also started gardening! We pulled weeds and tilled the garden in the backyard, dug up hyacinth bulbs, and planted them along the edge of the garden. We also dug up and planted some potatoes. We planted seeds in egg cartons and have been growing seeds inside. This included: sweet pea flowers, sugar snap peas, lettuce, squash, pumpkin, spinach, tomato, cucumber, basil, carrot, and asparagus. Those have now been planted in our garden. One morning was dedicated to a gardening party! Half the children were planting seedlings in the garden and half the children were working outside folding laundry, eating snack, and working with other Montessori materials.

Ladybug larva arrived for us in the mail, and we have been observing the exciting change from larva to pupa to ladybug. We have also learned about the parts of a ladybug just as well as their lifecycle.

Some exciting materials that have been introduced in May were, pouring water for friends and “tea for two”. After the children serve each other, they wash, dry, and put away their dishes at the washing station.

At circle we have learned a little bit about daffodils by dissecting them and labeling each part. This has continued while the children play outside and find flowers and can name the parts. Another popular outside activity lately has been looking for bugs outside.

Hello Hemlock families,

Welcome to the April edition. As spring jolts, we could see the life shoots up around us. Hope you all had a wonderful spring break. Children are settled with their routine and explore new friendships and
keep the old ones too. Envision of Dr. Maria Montessori that older children are taking care of younger children and help them in their work and routines are unfolding in our classroom.

We wrapped up our Birds unit with how they are endangered and ways to protect them. We talked about what birds eat, the natural and man-made food. Children enjoyed making bird feeders of their own. Children showed enthusiasm to learn about the animals belonging to different continents.

We talked about spring, the difference between bulbs and seeds, the animals and their babies, why spring is the right time for animals to have babies, where do animals give birth to their baby parts of a flower by dissecting Daffodil. We also discussed Earth Day and the importance of protecting our planet.

We learnt the parts of bean seed and germination, and children were excited to plant their own seeds. Gardening is a huge success and children enjoyed preparing the soil and planting. Gardening can heighten all senses in children and develop their fine motor skills. It brings responsibility in children’s life and teaches basic science and math. Each of us is a flower growing in life’s garden. Carrot cutting and foam making works are huge hit. Children were excited to work on
Mother’s Day project.

“ The child has a different relation to his environment from ours…. The
child absorbs it. The things he sees are not just remembered; they form
part of his soul. He incarnates in himself all in the world about him that
his eyes see and his ears hear.”

-Maria Montessori

Buckeye Class

In the month of April we continued our unit on Washington State, and talked (and sung!) a lot about mountains. We learned about how mountains are formed, looked at pictures of our state’s mountain ranges and learned the names of a few. The children were able to make a booklet with the names and pictures of 8 different mountains, and learned a little about the distinction between mountains and volcanoes, as well as the parts of a volcano. Did you know Washington is home to 5 active volcanoes – Mounts Adams, Baker, Glacier Peak, Rainier, and St. Helen’s?! The children saw a picture sequence of the last eruption of Mount St. Helen’s on May 18, 1980, and during circle witnessed a Volcano Eruption (a baking soda and vinegar science experiment).

We learned about the biomes in Washington State, its animals and plant life. We discussed what we see on our nature walks and viewed a variety of pictures. We also learned about plants we eat, their parts, and what foods they bring us. For example, asparagus is a stem, carrot a root, broccoli a flower, spinach a leaf, corn a seed, and tomatoes a fruit.

The children had fun during our egg hunt on the Friday before spring break. After coming back from break we started with the Washington coast, marine life, and the tides. It was interesting to learn that the moon’s gravity causes the earth to have high and low tides. For earth day we collected trash during our nature walks and talked about what we can do every day to help and be kind to our environment and the earth. We explained what it means to reuse, reduce, and recycle.  We will end our unit this month with learning about Washington’s first people and Lewis and Clark’s journey west.

Together with the children we have started preparing our outside garden and will soon start planting. We are ready for spring to really take off and are eager for the nicer weather to arrive!

Buckeye Class:

Spring has finally arrived!

Thank you all for taking the time out to attend conferences. We really enjoyed sharing  with you what your child is up to in class. Seeing their individual growth in kindness, confidence and academics made it fun to share!

We began our month working on a practical life skill, slicing. Food preparation is such a fun and valuable skill as children truly love being able to do things for themselves. During work time the children had opportunities to slice up a cucumber, eat it, and clean up after themselves. More food to come later!

In science we found out that matter is anything that takes up space and that matter can be a solid, a liquid or a gas, depending on its qualities. We were able to observe a liquid (ex: water) taking on the shape of its container, while a solid (ex: frozen water) does not. Air, on the other hand, fills all available space. A SINK/FLOAT work was introduced explaining what it means to be more dense or less dense than water. We look forward to conducting some more hands-on science experiments.

We discussed the water cycle being the constant movement of water and an appreciation for the availability of water.

This month we started a lengthy unit study of our own beautiful state of Washington. We begin with a cosmic view that ties everything together, leading with the universe and ending with the city we live in. Using paper maps, puzzle maps and models of the earth, a picture is painted of where we are in the world.   (Universe, galaxy, planet, continent, country, state, and city)

We learned all about different biomes in Washington state including their unique and specific climates, animals and flora and fauna. We have also been talking about the state symbols like the bird, flower, gem, fruit etc.… Because our state fruit is the apple, a little apple tasting experiment was conducted.

Kids have been working hard on a spring themed project that will come home in April.

Thank you to Mrs. Leach who shared with the class some of the traditional activities she has enjoyed during the celebration of St. Patrick’s Day including parades, story telling and spreading love.

We can’t wait to dig into plants and gardening!

Hemlock Class Newsletter for March

A big Thank you to all of you for meeting with us for conferences. It is an important time to connect. We learn a lot from you about your child and can inform you about our daily activities in class as we do not have time to do so during drop off and pick up! Thank you again for partnering with us in making your child/children successful!.

Spring is in the air and things are changing. New friendships are forming for a lot of children and how to navigate them is another skill to figure out. We keep our eyes and ears open inside as well as on the playground but appreciate your input, too. ProCare works great for quick messages.

The month of March is our Unit month in class and we are diving deep into -Birds-So far we covered birds in general: beaks, feathers, claws, nest building, egg laying etc. Then we looked closer at different types of water birds, birds of prey from the PNW and tropical birds. We also explore birds that do not fly and birds we see in our area. The children learn lots of bird related songs, make bird puzzles, parts of bird books and read Library books about the subject and some children even write and draw their own! It is very impressive how much detailed information the children remember and all of them have a favorite bird! In practical life the children can create their own nests, feed chicks and write with feathers and feel feathers in different ways. There is dry pouring with bird seeds and gluing of bird pictures available. In other classroom areas we have bird memory as a favorite and matching birds to each other or their homes. Every week a new activity is added 🙂

The time change made some children a bit tired but overall seems to have no effect on our learning. The children started with their Spring project since time flies by and there are several steps to prepare it 🙂 It will come home for Spring Break.

Thank you all for sending in snacks and water bottles as having snack with a friend is an exciting social time during class.

St. Patrick’s Day was celebrated with stories and lots of children wearing green. On the same day we had to say Good Bye to our friend Irfa from the afternoon class. Her family is moving to Canada and we will miss her dearly! We wish her all the best!

Hemlock Class:

This month we started teaching peace as we began the peace curriculum where we talked about what inner peace means and ways to find that inner peace. We call it a love light. The children were shown different breathing techniques to calm themselves down. The virtue of class peace bottles was discussed, which involve Red- truth, orange- personal best, yellow- peace, green – friendship, blue- kind words, purple-joy. We keep reminding children about these virtues. February was also all about celebrating: the Chinese and Lunar New Year, Valentine’s Day, and President’s Day. The children learned about the meaning of these celebrations and were able to fine-tune their art skills by creating different arts and crafts. Valentine’s Day is always a highlight for the children, and they enjoyed decorating their own Valentine’s bags to hold the cards that their fellow students brought to give out. Distributing the cards into the bags of each child is something the kids always look forward to. We also had a simple snack of watermelon, cantaloupe, and muskmelon cut in heart shape and cherry tomatoes filled with cream cheese and spring onion (put together to look like a tulip flower). We continue to work on how to treat each other with respect, try to be helpful to each other, and enjoy doing things as a group.

We are starting our next unit about birds. Soon your child will be sharing some fun facts about birds.

Buckeye Class:

We started February off by talking about safety at circle. This included understanding that firefighters are not scary and that people should trust them. We learned about what smoke detectors do, and not to touch hot things. Lastly, we discussed how to walk safely in parking lots, streets, driveways and neighborhoods. We also had guest night. This is one of our favorite and most popular events at our school. There were many children who brought their guests and showed them what they do at school. For Valentine’s Day we decorated bags for our valentines, then made cards for our parents. We learned about what love is and where Valentine’s Day came from. On Valentine’s Day, the children passed out their valentines and ate a small plate of fruits. We also introduced land and water forms. We learned about peninsula/gulf, strait/isthmus, cape/bay, archipelago/system of lakes, and island/lake. The children have had the opportunity to pour water into our land and water form models and place objects like fish, trees, people, bridges, and animals around them. Another holiday we learned about is Carnival. Carnival is a fun festival of merrymaking; people dress up in costumes, participate in parades, and decorate floats. There is music everywhere, which makes people dance and sing in the streets, young and old alike. It is pre-dominantly a Roman Catholic festival, the last “hurrah” before the beginning of the season of lent (a period of fasting and reflection) which ends on Easter. Ms. Ross showed pictures of popular Carnival destinations around the world: the famous carnival in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Mardi Gras festivities in New Orleans, elaborate costumes and masks in Venice, Italy, and of her home town in Maastricht, the Netherlands, where people celebrate for three days and even most stores, schools, and businesses are closed during this time. On our nature walks, we are beginning to see a few early signs of spring including trees budding! We will wrap up the month with talking about the presidents on our coins and a few other presidents.

Hemlock Class

We welcome all of you in the new year. January is the month of transition, the reflection of the past, and looking forward to the future. We are happy to see the children back in the routine. We can see their excitement to be in the classroom and with each other. It motivates the teachers too. We are happy to know that they were able to remember the classroom rules.

We started the month with our planet Earth. We learned the position of Earth in Space and how it is divided as land and water using our Sand Paper globe. Using a colored globe, we learned the seven continents’ names. We also learned that Earth is flattened as Western and Eastern hemispheres for our convenience and where all continents fit in the hemispheres.

We are learning the different landforms and excited to learn and identify the landforms in our map. They were happy to make
landform books. We read a book about Martin Luther King Junior and his speech about “I have a dream” and his contribution towards equal rights for everyone.

The Montessori curriculum emphasizes peace in the world. We provided eligible tools to foster self-awareness in children. We learned how to calm our bodies and feel the love within us. We learned our Outer self, Middle self and Inner self-using a Matryoshka Doll. We did an activity about a circle of self-awareness. We will continue our peace education in February too. We celebrated Leon’s 6th, Aiyana’s 5th , Harris’s 5th , Sienne’s 3rd and Chloe’s
5th birthdays

“An educational method which cultivates and protects the inner activities
of the child is not a question which concerns merely the school or the teachers, it
is a universal question.” – Dr. Maria Montessori.

Buckeye Classroom:

We hope all of you had a wonderful start to the New Year! The winter season is a great time of learning in the classroom, and often leaps of progress happen during these months. The first week after returning from winter break, we talked about what a year is, and how it is divided in months, weeks and days. We discussed the calendar and the different seasons. The children were able to concretely experience this by working with a long chain with 364 beads, divided by 12 silver beads, and laying down month and season cards. Some of the older children were excited to make labels with their birthday and find the particular bead for this date on the chain.
We continued that week with learning about the South Pole, Antarctica, and the best-known animal from the southern continent – the Penguin. Several children made a “Parts of a Penguin” booklet, which you may have seen coming home. Somehow in the colder months we must think about the colder parts of our world, because later the children also learned about the North Pole, the arctic tundra, and the animals that live there. We put out three-part nomenclature cards (pictures and labels) with miniature animals, igloos, and Eskimos, and this soon became a favorite work of many children.
What would January be without snowflakes? We learned about water molecules, freezing water vapors, ice crystals, and that the ice crystals that make up snowflakes are symmetrical (or patterned) and that snowflakes are always six-sided.
January has been a fun and busy month of learning! We also learned about Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and about his dream that one day everyone would be treated as equals and live in a society where black people and white people would live together in harmony. The children enjoyed singing the song “Freedom, Freedom, Let It Ring” during circle (to the tune of “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star”):
“Freedom, freedom, let it ring.
Let it ring, said Dr. King.
Let it ring from North to South.
Let it ring from house to house.
Let it ring for everyone,
All across the whole nation.

Let it ring for black and white,
Let it ring both day and night.
Let it ring for young and old,
Forever may its song ring bold.
Freedom, freedom, let it ring.
Let it ring, said Dr. King.”
Hemlock Class

We welcome all of you in the new year. January is the month of transition, the reflection of the past, and looking forward to the future. We are happy to see the children back in the routine. We can see their excitement to be in the classroom and with each other. It motivates the teachers too. We are happy to know that they were able to remember the classroom rules.

We started the month with our planet Earth. We learned the position of Earth in Space and how it is divided as land and water using our Sand Paper globe. Using a colored globe, we learned the seven continents’ names. We also learned that Earth is flattened as Western and Eastern hemispheres for our convenience and where all continents fit in the hemispheres.

We are learning the different landforms and excited to learn and identify the landforms in our map. They were happy to make
landform books. We read a book about Martin Luther King Junior and his speech about “I have a dream” and his contribution towards equal rights for everyone.

The Montessori curriculum emphasizes peace in the world. We provided eligible tools to foster self-awareness in children. We learned how to calm our bodies and feel the love within us. We learned our Outer self, Middle self and Inner self-using a Matryoshka Doll. We did an activity about a circle of self-awareness. We will continue our peace education in February too. We celebrated Leon’s 6th, Aiyana’s 5th , Harris’s 5th , Sienne’s 3rd and Chloe’s
5th birthdays

“An educational method which cultivates and protects the inner activities
of the child is not a question which concerns merely the school or the teachers, it
is a universal question.” – Dr. Maria Montessori.

Buckeye Classroom:

We hope all of you had a wonderful start to the New Year! The winter season is a great time of learning in the classroom, and often leaps of progress happen during these months. The first week after returning from winter break, we talked about what a year is, and how it is divided in months, weeks and days. We discussed the calendar and the different seasons. The children were able to concretely experience this by working with a long chain with 364 beads, divided by 12 silver beads, and laying down month and season cards. Some of the older children were excited to make labels with their birthday and find the particular bead for this date on the chain.
We continued that week with learning about the South Pole, Antarctica, and the best-known animal from the southern continent – the Penguin. Several children made a “Parts of a Penguin” booklet, which you may have seen coming home. Somehow in the colder months we must think about the colder parts of our world, because later the children also learned about the North Pole, the arctic tundra, and the animals that live there. We put out three-part nomenclature cards (pictures and labels) with miniature animals, igloos, and Eskimos, and this soon became a favorite work of many children.
What would January be without snowflakes? We learned about water molecules, freezing water vapors, ice crystals, and that the ice crystals that make up snowflakes are symmetrical (or patterned) and that snowflakes are always six-sided.
January has been a fun and busy month of learning! We also learned about Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and about his dream that one day everyone would be treated as equals and live in a society where black people and white people would live together in harmony. The children enjoyed singing the song “Freedom, Freedom, Let It Ring” during circle (to the tune of “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star”):
“Freedom, freedom, let it ring.
Let it ring, said Dr. King.
Let it ring from North to South.
Let it ring from house to house.
Let it ring for everyone,
All across the whole nation.

Let it ring for black and white,
Let it ring both day and night.
Let it ring for young and old,
Forever may its song ring bold.
Freedom, freedom, let it ring.
Let it ring, said Dr. King.”

After this topic we moved a bit deeper into peace and harmony with activities on Peaceful Meditations. This covered learning about positive and negative emotions, breath awareness, making silence, a love light that represents the love within us, and an introduction to meditation and self-awareness (Mind in a Jar). There are several new items for the children to explore on our Peace Shelf, such as the Peace Basket, the Peace Rose, the Love Lights, and the Circles of Self-awareness.
We continued with learning about Lunar New Year, and several children enjoyed making Chinese Lanterns. We want to thank Martha Tran (Martin and Lana’s mom) for sharing stories and information on Lunar New Year during our circle time. The children are very excited when a special guest comes to visit! We encourage all parents (and grandparents) to share any special gifts, talents, or information they have with our classroom!
We also thank those of you who came to Kindergarten Information night. The Kindergarten year in a Montessori classroom gives the child an experience like no other. Not only do they get to be a leader and a mentor, they also develop skills they have been practicing for a couple of years here. The Kindergartners continue to grow socially and emotionally while still in a safe and nurturing environment where they know everyone, staff included, and everyone knows and loves each child.

After this topic we moved a bit deeper into peace and harmony with activities on Peaceful Meditations. This covered learning about positive and negative emotions, breath awareness, making silence, a love light that represents the love within us, and an introduction to meditation and self-awareness (Mind in a Jar). There are several new items for the children to explore on our Peace Shelf, such as the Peace Basket, the Peace Rose, the Love Lights, and the Circles of Self-awareness.
We continued with learning about Lunar New Year, and several children enjoyed making Chinese Lanterns. We want to thank Martha Tran (Martin and Lana’s mom) for sharing stories and information on Lunar New Year during our circle time. The children are very excited when a special guest comes to visit! We encourage all parents (and grandparents) to share any special gifts, talents, or information they have with our classroom!
We also thank those of you who came to Kindergarten Information night. The Kindergarten year in a Montessori classroom gives the child an experience like no other. Not only do they get to be a leader and a mentor, they also develop skills they have been practicing for a couple of years here. The Kindergartners continue to grow socially and emotionally while still in a safe and nurturing environment where they know everyone, staff included, and everyone knows and loves each child.

Classroom Review

Hemlock Class:

What a busy few weeks we had. Everything had to happen after Thanksgiving but before the break. We brushed up on our knowledge of different holidays of the season like Kwanzaa with the different meanings of the colored candles and homemade gifts for meetings with friends and family as well as Hanukkah with the miracle of the oil lasting for 8 days and nights. We used a Shamash candle to light up the eight candles on the menorah and the Children learned how to play the dreidel game, too. Then we delved a little into German Christmas traditions with Advent wreath, Advent calendar, Christmas markets and Saint Nicholaus story and traditions. We smelled a “Raeuchermaennchen”, tasted “Lebkuchen” and learned to sing “Oh Tannenbaum”. As for Christmas the American way, we learned about the reason for the season as well as lots of Christmas songs (“Rudolph the red nosed reindeer’, ‘Frosty the snowman’, ‘12 Days of Christmas’ just to name a few). We looked at the parts of a poinsettia and learned about its history and origin. Did you know the red leaves are called bracts?

The children were very busy crafting a surprise for you and making their own ornaments to help decorate our classroom tree and they are eager to bring them home!

Thanks to everyone who sent in a book for our book exchange! It is nice to give something and also to receive/chose something different as well. On our last day in the classroom, we enjoyed a nice treat with all our classmates. The plate was filled with a watermelon slice shaped as a Christmas tree and a carrot cake present under it and Santa (strawberry with whip) on the side. The children were able to make their own carrot bread the day before! Busy days:-)

Thank you to all for the thoughtful and wonderful gifts for us teachers! They are much appreciated and will be cherished throughout the break.

We wish all our families a happy and healthy holiday season and are looking forward to seeing everybody again in 2023! Have a lovely break!

Buckeye Class:

Hopefully all had a great Thanksgiving break. We ended the month of November with a bit of a history of Thanksgiving.

We had a short and very busy month here at school, as I’m positive you did at home. It was fun to hear about all the holiday activities that the children were getting to experience at home with their families.

We have been focused on the “peace virtues” including truth, personal best, peace, friendship, kind words and joy.

In the classroom, the children were very busy creating a holiday gift for you.

We also spent a bit of circle time talking about Christmas around the world and which traditions each continent celebrates, including their similarities. I think they enjoyed the fact that the Australian Santa is a surfer and that instead of stockings, in Europe, the children get goodies in their shoes.

This included the traditional Christian story, Hanukkah, Kwanza, and Saint Nicolas Day (Sinterklaas), including a special gift.

Color mixing in the practical life area was a popular thing.

Children worked hard on their Christmas gift for you! (Many steps)

It is fun to see your children leading the show and tell circle and the joy they get in executing this leadership role.

Other jobs they enjoy include setting out the lunch name tags, deciding on weather and discussing the calendar.

An abundance of Christmas ornaments have come home, for sure, and other seasonal art works.

The book exchange was a big hit.

We introduced the balance beam, living vs. non-living and the dreidel game.

Christmas music boxes were offered to quiet tables at lunch, and that was a popular and exciting thing.

Holiday songs included:

Rudolph, Frosty the Snowman, I’m a little Snowman Short and Fat, Jingle Bells, Santa Claus is Coming to Town and I Have a Little Dreidel.

Looking forward to the new year!

Hemlock Class

In the Hemlock Room, It is such a pleasure to see children settling into their routine, more readily engaging in new works. We started off this month by learning about corn, parts of a corn and how corn grows. We talked about turkeys and Parts of a turkey. They are enjoying making a Parts of a Corn and Turkey books. Tweezing kernels off an ear of Indian corn has become the favorite.  They are even going to use the kernels to make their paper corn.

We discussed about why some animals are busy preparing a hibernaculum to take a long deep sleep called hibernation. They were excited to learn why they take a deep sleep.

The story about Early pilgrims, why did they move out of their country, their journey in the Mayflower, and their life in a new country. We also talked about what are we thankful for.

The children happily participated in preparing cornbread and learned to make butter to enjoy in class.  As a part of the Thanksgiving tradition we had a Happy Thanksgiving meal with the children and recited the child’s Thanksgiving poem, which they practiced for quite some time.

New works like metal polishing, rice grinding, cinnamon grinding have been shown.  Many new thanksgiving theme songs and poems have been introduced.

We have been practicing some brain gym exercises and different breathing exercise to calm ourselves down.

Buckeye Class

This November we had our first conferences of the year.  It was wonderful getting to speak with most parents in person about your children and get a feel for how the children are doing from the parent’s perspective.

At circle we are talking about the peace bottles.  Each colored bottle represents a different virtue of peace.

         Red – Truth

         Orange – Personal Best

         Yellow – Peace

         Green – Friendship

         Blue – Kind Words

         Purple – Joy

Each day we focused on a different virtue and throughout the school year, if a conflict arises, we can think back to our peace bottles and remember to honor the virtues. We also brought out the peace rose.  The peace rose is something we keep on the shelf and the children can take it out if they need to have a conversation with another child to resolve a conflict.  The children take turns talking as they pass the rose back and forth.

Another circle topic this month was thankfulness.  We asked the children about what they are thankful for in their lives and they later got the chance to write it on a small leaf and hang it on our “thankfulness tree”.

We will also be having a thanksgiving feast at the end of the month.  We read the book Stone Soup which is about a community of people adding things they like to a soup so they can all enjoy it. Each child gets the opportunity to bring in a vegetable of their choice to add to our own stone soup that we will cook and eat together.  We also made butter by putting heavy whipping cream in a jar and shaking it.

We are continuing the nature walks that we began last month.  Every child is able to go on a nature walk every other week.  It is exciting to see how the forest changes as the weather gets colder.

Classroom Review

Buckeye Class:

This month we’ve been embracing fall (although the weather on most days still felt like summer!) The children learned about seasons, what happens to the trees, why leaves change colors, and why they eventually fall off.

During circle time on Indigenous Peoples Day we discussed what this day means, and learned a little bit about the European explorers, the mapmakers, the spice traders and the Native Americans.

After this, we moved on to zoology and explaining the difference between vertebrates (animals with a backbone) and invertebrates (without a backbone). The children had the opportunity to sort a variety of animals into the respective categories. We learned about spiders (invertebrates!), their body parts, and looked at many different kinds of spiders. Your child might have brought home a “My Parts of a Spider Book”. We also stressed the message that spiders are our friends and that we treat all living creatures with kindness and respect. We have started learning about all things pumpkin, and several fun pumpkin activities have been brought in. Towards the end of the month Ms. Govindaraj from the Hemlock classroom will talk to us about the Hindu festival of Diwali, and we will end the month with bats, owls, Dias de los Muertos, and – of course – Halloween! On the day of Halloween your child is welcome to come to school in a costume, if they wish (no weapons or scary costumes, please).

Two circle time songs the children especially enjoyed this month are “Way up high in the apple tree (five red apples smile down at me)” and “Five little pumpkins (sitting on a gate)”:

Way up high in an apple tree

Way up high in an apple tree,

5 red apples smiled down at me.

I shook that tree as hard as I could,

Down came an apple! Mmm, mmm… it was good!

Way up high in that apple tree,

4 red apples smiled down at me.

   3 red apples…

      2 red apples…

         1 red apple…

Way up high in that apple tree,

No more apples smiled down at me.

I shook that tree as hard as I could,

Down came no apples! They’re gone for good!

Way up high in that apple tree,

No more apples left for me.

_________________________________________

Five little pumpkins 

Five little pumpkins sitting on a gate

 The first one said, “Oh, my it’s getting late”

 The second one said, “There are witches in the air”

 The third one said, “But we don’t care”

 The fourth one said, “Let’s run and run and run”

 The fifth one said, “We’re ready for some fun”

 Then “Ooh” went the wind and out went the lights

 And the five little pumpkins rolled out of sight

Hello Hemlock families,

           Welcome to the October month news edition. We enjoyed every bit of the extended summer. Like the outside weather, our classroom is packed with laughter. Children come around with classroom routines and getting to know each other. We, teachers get to know the new children. It is great to see the older children help the younger ones with the classroom rules and work. We could see Dr. Maria Montessori’s envision of the mixed age group being fulfilled.

We started this month with apples which are our state fruit and went on with spiders and pumpkins which can be seen in every other grocery store. We learned the parts of an apple and pumpkin by dissecting them. We learned the life cycle of them too. We talked about the different types of apples and enjoyed the mindful eating of apple slices. We learned about the oxidation of apples and why apples float in the water by experiments. We enjoyed carving the pumpkin and made a Jack-O-Lantern. Children were excited to nail the pumpkin. Children learned about the life cycle and parts of a spider. They were thrilled to see the exoskeleton of a big spider.

They also watched the growth of the spider by an experiment. To our surprise, there was a huge spider web in our back window with a spider in the middle. Children searched every place in the playground for a spider web. They made parts of a pumpkin, spider and apple books. We talked about gourds as they share a common family with pumpkins and Day of the dead and how Halloween started.

Way up in the apple tree, itsy bitsy spider, 5 little pumpkins and witches brew were hit songs among them. We look forward to seeing the children dressed up in their Halloween costumes. We had a chance to explore our rainy-day playthings because of the bad air quality. Ms. Govindaraj enlightened us about Diwali, a celebration from India and one that she celebrates each year.

 We can’t wait to see you all in the conferences on November 3rd and 4th morning and November 18th for PM children. We are closed on November 11th Friday for Veterans Day and November 24th and 25th for Thanksgiving.

“Early childhood education is the key to the betterment of the society.”

————–Dr. Maria Montessori.