One of the main highlights of our week was our first lesson on food tasting. As children grow beyond the infant stage, they begin the journey to independence as toddlers. Many parents notice this change in their children when it comes to mealtime, as they begin to hear a resounding, “No!” when it comes to eating the foods they once loved and trying new ones. In order to help families, we have integrated food tasting into our toddler program as a way to ease children into the idea of trying new foods by teaching them all about the food and encouraging them to participate as a group.

This week we introduced some delicious red apples!

Children were really excited to see the food tasting tray covered. They knew there was a surprise and they immediately gathered quietly around the tray. There were smiles and expressions of awe at the moment I removed the towel that was covering the apple. This fruit was presented as a whole first, then cut in front of them, presented as half, and then served individually. In our conversation, we included such adjectives as cold, big, smooth, red, and tasty to keep adding to our vocabulary. Children observed while I slowly picked up a piece of apple and placed it inside my mouth, tasting it slowly and dramatically, with the purpose of encouraging curiosity and expectation when it was their turn to taste. They immediately started to ask for their turn to taste it! They really liked it! This lesson is a favorite every year and we can’t wait to explore all the different food items in our list each week.

This week we also celebrated our first birthday in the classroom. Always a joy to see those smiley faces feeling seen and cherished!

We also had the great opportunity, after a couple of years of not being able, to gather as school and celebrate the International day of Peace. Each year, the International Day of Peace (“Peace Day”) is observed around the world on the 21st of September. Established by the United Nations, Peace Day provides a globally shared date for all humanity to commit to Peace above all differences and to contribute to building a Culture of Peace.

On this day, Montessori schools from around the world join together to sing for peace. The song travels around the globe over a 24-hour period, starting with New Zealand and ending with the Hawaiian Islands.

Maria Montessori truly believed in peace education as she felt that world peace can only be achieved through education. In Montessori, we strive to give children the tools to live at peace with others and settle conflict in a peaceful manner.

While you enjoy some of your children’s pictures, we encourage  you to put the volume up on this beautiful song and remember that each one of these little ones are so deserving to live in a peaceful world. So let’s work together for it!

Enjoy your weekend,

Mrs. Hood and Ms. Bethann

Your children have started to settle little by little. There are less tears everyday at drop off time and more dancing and giggles throughout the morning. As your children’s confidence and trust have increased, they have started to explore the environment more intentionally. They have even started to socialize with some of their peers. Those that are able to say a few words have started to recognize and call their friends by their names.

As the children continue to use their freedom of movement and freedom of choice, some ground rules have been introduced. One of those rules is Respect for Others’ Work. In traditional school settings, children this age are encouraged and even expected to share. Sharing is a very important concept, but for children of this age it’s a task that they are not developmentally ready for. In our environment we encourage the concept of taking turns instead. This encourages patience, mindfulness, independence, order, and concentration. Children don’t feel threatened by the idea that another child will take their material away, instead they can peacefully work with the material until they are done. When children want to work independently we encourage them to say: “This is my work. Please don’t touch.” We also encourage the children to observe quietly how other children are working with a material. It’s so fun to see that even at this young age children are able to work on mastering these skills! They just need the encouragement to do so.

Another rule we introduced this week is We Respect our Materials. As guides, we model slowly and consistently throughout the morning the importance of carrying and handling our materials in a gentle way. If one of our students decides to throw a piece of material across the room, we encourage them to use one of the balls instead and we verbalize to them in a few words how we should use the materials. “We throw the ball.” “We are gentle with our materials.”

On another note, children had a blast exploring our school’s gym and our toddler outdoor space. They have been practicing how to sit in a community circle, how to transition from place to place, and they all did a great job on our first fire drill this week. Some of the children’s favorite songs this week seemed to be: “Walking in the Jungle” by Super Simple Songs, “Walk Around” by Nancy Kopman, “The Goldfish” by Laurie Berkner, and of course “The Wheel on the Bus” by Cedarmont Kids and “Old Mc Donald Had a Farm.”  

Enjoy the pictures of your beautiful children, 

Mrs. Hood and Ms. Bethann

And of course we had to finish our school year with a wonderful water day! Children had so much fun and we loved watching them enjoy this beautiful day.

Our playground was set up in different stations so children could choose what they wanted to do. There was water ball basketball, fishing, boats, bubble making (of course),  finger painting, water paint roller, truck washing and a super fun splash pad that brought so much joy and laughter to your children. After having a great morning in the sun, the children were surprised to find an ice cream truck at our school soccer field! They were so excited! Closing the morning with a yummy ice cream was just the best!

 

Looking through school pictures, I cannot stop the overwhelming feeling of thankfulness! I know we have said it before, but we need to say it one more time: Thank you for entrusting us with your little ones and walking next to us to give them the best experience each day!

We give them back to you pounds heavier, inches taller, months wiser, more independent, confident and mature than they were back in September. They did themselves a great job unfolding and growing each day and we feel honored to have witnessed it. They, for sure, will continue to be part of our lives. Even though some of them will be moving up a level, remember that we will always be interested in your children and their destiny-wherever they go, whatever they do and whoever they become.

They are truly precious to us!

Enjoy the contrast pictures of the first weeks and the last weeks of school of your child in our Toddler program!

Have a great summer!

Love,

Mrs. Hood and Ms. Maria

Is it true? How’s it possible!? Are we really a week away from ending our school year? It seems like it was  yesterday when we were welcoming the toddlers into our school! Your children have been working as busy bees from day one and they have challenged themselves in every way. We couldn’t be more proud to see how much each one of them has accomplished in different areas, one of them being great social-emotional development.  It’s incredible to see the type of friendships that have been born between them and how socialization has started to be very important to them. This is a great sign of growth!

At the beginning of the school year it is usual to see a lot of  toddlers parallel playing… children are aware of other little human beings around them but they are not interested in really connecting with them. They might look into each other’s eyes but as their thinking is still so concrete they actually just seem interested in the “little ball” with the nice color that moves so it’s logical they decide to explore it. This is what we normally call: poking each other’s eyes. It’s also common to see a toddler curiously trying to explore another child’s face with their index  finger and the other toddler thinking he is just receiving something to taste. Yeap! We call that one finger biting! Ouch!

Thankfully the connection has developed and as they have matured, it’s now common to see the children waiting for their friends at the door, inviting each other to play together, having logical conversations, joking and making each other laugh, hugging and verbally expressing their affection for each other. Amigos are the best!

As we enjoy the last couple of days together as a little family, we spent quality time outdoors this week singing, walking, running, building, digging, chasing each other, laying in the sun, talking, exploring nature and of course, naming worms. We also explored peas for food tasting!

We can’t wait for all the fun planned for next week. On Wednesday 6/8 is our Toddler’s Water Day and we will be having our Crossing the Bridge ceremony on Friday 6/10. Please refer to the email sent with all the instructions.

We wish you a beautiful weekend,

Mrs. Hood and Ms Maria

Maria Montessori believed that nothing comes into the mind except through the senses. During the early years, as children develop their senses, their attention is directed toward the environment. The purpose of the Sensorial activities is to help the child in their efforts to sort out the many varied impressions given by the senses. These activities are specifically planned to help the child develop discrimination, order, and to broaden and refine the senses. These experiences also help prepare them to be a logical, aware, and perceptive person.

As we continue our studies on birds, this week the children received a lesson on the birds’ calls and songs. Children are learning to identify each bird sound through a fun work where the children press a button, hear the bird and have to match the picture card with the sound. As every work in our environment has a control of error built within it, the child has the opportunity to self correct by matching the color dot behind the card to the color of the button, helping the child to match the sound to the correct bird. As children practice this work they will learn to identify the birds just by listening and they won’t need to look at the back of the card anymore to be successful. To say that this has been a big favorite work is an understatement! It has been precious observing the children taking the time to listen carefully and observe the details of the birds’ pictures.

Children also worked on an art project creating their own binoculars so, as the great ornithologists that they are, they could spot birds in the playground and learn to identify them. How proud they seem every time they spot a bird!

Another popular work this week has been a water work, mixing colors. This is a multi-step work your children seemed to love, again bringing longer periods of concentration and great sensory stimuli.

As we celebrated together another birthday this week, we wanted to thank you once again for trusting us with your little ones. To be able to assist them, watch them grow and bloom has been a blessing we don’t take for granted.

Enjoy a little peek into our work cycle:

Mrs. Hood and Ms. Maria

The time we all were waiting for finally arrived!  Our beautiful butterflies emerged, took time to strengthen their wings and enjoyed the well prepared environment your little ones created for them. Children enjoyed watching the butterflies walking around and using their long tongues to taste the fruits we provided for them. When the time came, we gathered together in the butterfly garden and opened the glass doors! We could almost sense the butterflies’ excitement as they felt the sun and the wind and immediately started to flap their wings. One of them flew high as soon we opened the doors, while the other four seemed a little more shy. I grabbed a little stick and offered it to them. After a couple of seconds the butterflies decided to fly, bringing smiles and laughter to your children while fulfilling their purpose as butterflies.

This activity always brings so many emotions for us as guides! In just a couple of weeks our school year will be over and as we reflect on the butterflies flying away, we realize that as with those tiny caterpillars,  we have observed and enjoyed every change in the lives of your children during this year! They have grown so much! It has brought so much joy to our lives just to step back and observe how independent, confident, and capable your children have become.  Like the butterflies brought so much joy to your children, your little ones have brought so much joy to us and we are so incredibly thankful to you for trusting us with them. Soon it will be time to open the “glass doors” and watch them fly and we are so sure each one of them is going to spread their wings and fly high!

On another note, we started our studies on birds this week and children have had a great time taking some time to listen to the birds outside and learning to recognize them by name. Cardinal, blue jay, robin, woodpecker, oriole, indigo bunting, warbler, house sparrow and goldfinch are some of the names you will hear often in our environment. Children got to observe, feel and smell the type of food birds eat and also learn some names like sunflowers seeds, millet, corn and wheat. They also helped to prepare our bird feeder.

This week some of our older toddlers got to visit a primary classroom and worked with some of the kindergartners and teachers. We explored cherries for food tasting, celebrated a  fantastic three year old birthday and got a fresh new member in our FWM community! Big congratulations to the Mica family on their new precious addition!

We hope you all enjoy the weather this weekend,

Stay cool and see you next week,

Mrs. Hood and Ms. Maria

Reminder: As the weather is getting warmer, please remember to apply sunscreen to your child before school arrival.

As the waiting for the butterflies to emerge continued this week, we learned about the life cycle of another fascinating insect: the ant! Eggs, larva, pupa and ant were some of the names they learned this week and children repeated over and over. We also introduced the anatomy of an insect using different giant insect models. Children learned that all insects have a head, a thorax and abdomen. They all have six legs and antennas which help them to feel and smell the world around them. They also learned that most insects have wings. To reinforce this lesson we learned the song: “Head, Thorax, Abdomen,” sung to the tune of “Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes” song.

Here are the lyrics:

Head, thorax, abdomen, abdomen

Head, thorax, abdomen, abdomen

Eyes, antennas, wings, 6 legs

Head, thorax, abdomen, abdomen

Children also learned that spiders are not considered an insect, however they are a nice animal to observe. Happily we had some live insects visiting our classroom throughout the week and children really took the time to make sure they had all the body parts we learned this week.

By the end of the week children got the opportunity to observe two butterflies emerging from their chrysalises, stretching their wings and walking around the environment the children prepared for them.

For food tasting we explored a pretty cool vegetable that wasn’t in our rotation list, but since one of our families grew it in their garden, we had the opportunity to taste it: rhubarb. A big shout out to Ms. Eli for sharing such an interesting plant and cooking for us some rhubarb to taste. Even though it seems children were not absolutely in love with it, they tasted it and enjoyed some of its tart/sour/sweet flavor. This was my first time exploring this vegetable so I truly felt like one of the toddlers exploring this food. I gave it a thumbs up… not sure how many of the toddlers will agree with me. The good thing was that nobody spit it out so I think it passed the test.

Some of the favorite books this week were: The Very Busy Spider by Eric Carle, Backyard Bugs by Jill McDonald and of course, Everyone Poops by Taro Gomi.

We hope you have a great weekend and please remember to take some time to jump in the puddles with your little ones.

Mrs. Hood and Mrs. Maria