Children are immersed in many types of language work throughout the day. The Movable Alphabet is a Montessori material that children are first introduced to in Lower School but it continues to be beneficial for both emerging and competent spellers in Lower Elementary.

Many opportunities are provided for children to practice their reading skills. They read to each other at different times throughout the week and also spend time reading silently, learning to be still and focused.

We enjoyed hearing our first book talks today as children enthusiastically shared books they read over the summer with their classmates. Listeners had the opportunity to ask questions and share positive feedback after each book talk.

We spend focused, silent time writing each week. During Writer’s Workshop, we wrote “Small Moment” stories with lots of details after hearing one read aloud. Ask your child about “Night of the Veggie Monster.”

We have had a great week. We enjoyed making and eating applesauce with the apples picked last week. Thank you to Mrs. Carroll for the apple peeler/slicer and to Mrs. Thomas for the slow cooker. Each child peeled, sliced, and added a carefully selected apple to the mix and the results were delicious!

Children take comfort in knowing what the day has in store for them. Many students start their day by checking out the schedule to see which enrichment classes they have.

Sometimes students benefit from using a timer to keep track of how long they are spending on a piece of work, and they will choose to use one on their own. They are able to choose how much time they set on the timer and they value taking this ownership.

One of the beauties of a Montessori work cycle is that different types of work go on at the same time. The small bead frame is a math material which can be used to add, multiply, and subtract. It is one of the materials students use before moving to abstraction when completing math problems. After participating in geometry lessons, children practice their lessons to mastery before moving on to the next geometrical concept. They can choose to do this practice work independently or with a friend. This is true of work in many different areas of the Montessori curriculum. Often times, children are so proud of their hard work, they will share their efforts with classmates or teachers. They have internalized that the process of doing their work to completion is a reward in itself.

We often end our work cycle with silent reading or writing. We are noticing that each time we do, the children become more focused, more settled, and more peaceful. They are learning that this silent, undistracted time each day helps them to find more focus during daily work cycles as well.

 

We had a great time on our first field trip of the year to March Farms. We started by navigating our way through the corn maze using facts that we learned about the orchard to answer questions at each turn. We then picked lots of apples, ate lunch, and visited the goats before returning to school. We will be cooking with our apples next week.

Our work cycles are a wonderful combination of individual and cooperative work and lessons. This week third year students continued their work with measuring and constructing angles, second year students began learning about advanced land and water forms, and first year students learned to classify triangles by sides and angles.

Recess is a fun combination of make believe in the “forest”, climbing trees, swinging, and football. We enjoyed watching a few minutes of our first home Middle School soccer game.

Reminder:
On Thursday, October 19th (from 1pm to 9pm) and Friday, October 20th (from 7:30am-11:30am), FWM will be holding Parent & Teacher Conferences.

This is an important time to meet with your child’s teacher about how your child is progressing at the school. Scheduling for Parent & Teacher Conferences will be done on MyFWM.org in the Parent Module. The sign up will be open Tuesday October 3rd.

Please note, conferences are typically 20 minutes long; however, each slot is 30 minutes in order for teachers to take notes and prepare for the next parent conference.

Thank you in advance for being punctual to your Parent & Teacher Conference and for adhering to the 20 minute limit.

We are continuing to settle in to our classroom routines and have new lessons. First year students completed their lessons on the geometric solids and then enjoyed experimenting with our classroom prisms. About once a week we have community building time when the children play games with each other. This year the children have decided to call it F Day Fun.

The children are very enthusiastic about taking care of our classroom environment! Some of their favorite jobs are washing and setting tables for lunch, cleaning the sink and counter, watering the plants, and feeding Fraser and our gecko, Rocky.

Everybody benefits from Community Service days. We love when our Middle School friends spend time with us during work cycle, helping individual children with work or reading with them.

Our new maker space is a big hit! The children have been working cooperatively and using their creativity to build with Keva planks using lessons designed by Ms. Ulacco, our technology teacher.

 

It is great to be back in school with this dynamic group of children! We have had an active and productive first seven days of school. Returning students are acting as wonderful mentors to our new friends, teaching them about classroom procedures and even giving them some lessons on beginning materials! It’s incredible to see the connections being made by new friends.

We had a great large group discussion and created our classroom rules for the year. Second and third year students taught the new students about our classroom jobs and they chose their first jobs of the year. They are settling in to some focused work cycles. New children have been very excited to have new lessons and returning friends have picked up where they left off in June. We are looking forward to having an amazing year!