Blog

Mrs. Carroll’s Class: Five Fall Senses

Posted on by Cindy Carroll

A chill to the air, the first fire in the fireplace, the smell of pumpkin spice. It’s finally fall!

This week your children experienced autumn, not just as a date on the calendar, but as an opportunity to use our sense of smell to really savor the season. The smells of cooking applesauce, spices, and newly fallen leaves brought smiles and created lasting memories.

Maria Montessori believed there is a sensitive period for developing the senses. Although the senses are an integral part of our lives, children during the early years have the greatest potential to develop and retrieve them. It is precisely this idea that demonstrates the purpose of Sensorial materials in the Montessori classroom. The Sensorial materials are powerful tools, which allow children to become aware of their unconscious impressions and bring these impressions into conscious awareness. Additionally, they enable your children to create a basis of order in their mind, allowing for intelligent exploration of their environment.

Please use this link to sign up for your Parent/Teacher Conference. We look forward to sharing your child’s many accomplishments.

Mrs. Carroll’s Conferences

Enjoy the week!

Cindy & Sharlene

Where it All Began

Posted on by Ashley O'Connell

“We shall walk together on this path of life, for all things are a part of the universe, and are connected with each other to form one whole unity. This idea helps the mind of the child to become fixed, to stop wandering in an aimless quest for knowledge. He is satisfied, having found the universal centre of himself with all things.” -Maria Montessori, To Educate the Human Potential

This week, the third year students told the first of Maria Montessori’s Five Great Lessons, the creation of the universe. The third years have been working so hard for the past few weeks, preparing and practicing, to give this lesson to the younger students. Even though the third years told us they were nervous about being the “teachers” and presenting this lesson to the class, they leaned into the discomfort and did an outstanding job. What an amazing thing to witness! They should all be so proud of themselves, as are we.

Last week, we enjoyed a day out of the classroom at Blue Jay Orchards! Since we had so many leftover apples from our trip, we made some delicious treats as a class to share this week. On Tuesday we made applesauce and on Thursday we made apple crisp. The children enjoyed peeling and slicing the apples for these tasty fall snacks.

Mrs. Doyle’s Class: Five Fall Senses

Posted on by Michelle Handibode

A chill to the air, the first fire in the fireplace, the smell of pumpkin spice. It’s finally fall!

This week your children experienced autumn, not just as a date on the calendar, but as an opportunity to use our sense of smell to really savor the season. The smells of cooking applesauce, spices, and newly fallen leaves brought smiles and created lasting memories.

Maria Montessori believed there is a sensitive period for developing the senses. Although the senses are an integral part of our lives, children during the early years have the greatest potential to develop and retrieve them. It is precisely this idea that demonstrates the purpose of Sensorial materials in the Montessori classroom. The Sensorial materials are powerful tools, which allow children to become aware of their unconscious impressions and bring these impressions into conscious awareness. Additionally, they enable your children to create a basis of order in their mind, allowing for intelligent exploration of their environment.

Please use this link to sign up for your Parent/Teacher Conference. We look forward to sharing your child’s many accomplishments.

Mrs. Doyle’s Conferences

Wishing everyone a peaceful week,

Michelle & Jeannine

Mrs. Lopes Class: The Five Senses

Posted on by Amanda Lopes

A chill to the air, the first fire in the fireplace, the smell of pumpkin spice. It’s finally fall!

This week your children experienced autumn, not just as a date on the calendar, but as an opportunity to use our sense of smell to really savor the season. The smells of cooking applesauce, spices, and newly fallen leaves brought smiles and created lasting memories.

Maria Montessori believed there is a sensitive period for developing the senses. Although the senses are an integral part of our lives, children during the early years have the greatest potential to develop and retrieve them. It is precisely this idea that demonstrates the purpose of Sensorial materials in the Montessori classroom. The Sensorial materials are powerful tools, which allow children to become aware of their unconscious impressions and bring these impressions into conscious awareness. Additionally, they enable your children to create a basis of order in their mind, allowing for intelligent exploration of their environment.

Please use this link to sign up for your  Parent/Teacher Conference. We look forward to sharing your child’s many accomplishments.

Mrs. Lopes’ Conferences

Best,

Mrs. Lopes and Ms. Vigue

Upper Elementary: Togetherness

Posted on by Brian Comstock

This week we celebrated two October birthdays at our monthly birthday breakfast. The students look forward to this monthly celebration and parents and siblings are always welcome to join us.

Lately the students have been working in teams to complete activities in class. Some of those activities included making a poster for one of the kingdoms of life, designing game boards based on books they read, or creating slideshows about their personal interests.  This is a tight-knit group of students and they have a great time learning and interacting together!  We hope you can stop in Friday morning, October 18, for the opening of our cafe at 8:00 AM!

Mrs. Lopes Class: The Three Period Lesson

Posted on by Amanda Lopes

When we introduce new concepts or materials to the children, we often do so using a three-period lesson. This is an important tenet of Montessori education and it helps to move the child from basic understanding of a concept to mastery.

Period One is the introduction stage. In this stage we are isolating new vocabulary to the children. For example, if we are introducing the color tablets, we would say, “this is blue.”  Repeating that statement and allowing the child to manipulate the blue color tablet are crucial during this stage.

Period Two is all about association and recognition. It is often a separate lesson. We do not ask the children to remember the vocabulary or recall the concept.  We are simply reinforcing the concept taught in Period One. We use words such as “show me the blue tablet” or “can you place the blue tablet on your lap?”

Period Three is the recall stage and the first time we ask the child to remember the concept independently. We ask them “what is this” when showing them the blue color tablet. We are careful not to begin Period Three until we know they are ready for success.

Every time a child masters a new concept it paves the way to move towards another one.

Beginning this week, our Primary teachers will be collaborating on the weekly blogs. Therefore, the written content will be similar each week.  Pictures for each classroom blog will be specific to your child’s classroom. Each Primary class follows a like curriculum and by aligning our classroom blogs, we can consistently communicate highlights in the Primary classrooms. More so, this platform is a wonderful way to share the beauty and wonder of the Montessori philosophy and materials with all of you.

Have a great week!
Mrs. Lopes and Ms. Vigue

Upper Elementary: Mix It Up

Posted on by Brian Comstock

There has been a variety of activity in and outside the classroom lately. The soccer team began the week with a victory over The Southport School. They showed great teamwork and sportsmanship throughout and should be proud of their efforts! A few students completed their endangered animal research and are ready to share with the class. We started rotating our daily outdoor recess between the field, playground, and outdoor classroom areas to mix things up. The students enjoy alternating between the different spaces. We prepared three cinnamon swirl breads as a practice run for the Happe Cafe. This was a great lesson in measurement and following directions. As you can see from the photos, although each group used the same recipe, the breads turned out differently. On Friday, they will share the bread with faculty and staff to promote the cafe. Our grand opening is planned for the morning of October 18. We hope you can stop in to support their efforts!

Lower Elementary: Going Out and Playing In

Posted on by Karen Sankey

 

“When the child goes out, it is the world itself that offers itself to him. Let us take the child out to show him real things instead of making objects which represent ideas and closing them in cupboards (From Childhood to Adolescence – Maria Montessori).”

An important part of Montessori education is letting children experience the wonders of our world. Taking outings increases independence and creates opportunities for the children to bond with one another and make lasting memories. We enjoyed our first field trip of the year today. It was a beautiful fall day and we filled our bags with delicious apples. Next week, the children will cook with some of the apples we picked.

Earlier this week we had a rainy day indoor recess. We observed the children peacefully enjoying activities together in small and large groups. It was heartwarming to see some of the older children teaching younger ones how to use the materials from our game cabinet. Playing inside gives the children the opportunity to spend quality time with classmates they don’t usually work with during the morning work cycle.