As families across the U.S. are preparing for one of the biggest holidays of the year, our children have been preparing for the Thanksgiving festivities! This week we introduced the concept of color mixing to the children. Using coffee filters in the shape of maple leaves, children discovered that when mixing red and yellow we can create orange! Children were excited to see the water moving and creating new colors! There is tremendous joy that floods a child’s spirit when they discover a transformation happening in front of them. We love color mixing because it’s a process that helps to develop a love of learning. We can’t wait to discover new colors together!

We also had a great time baking our vegan banana bread. Children learned names of ingredients and had the opportunity to touch, smell, see, measure, and mix all the ingredients. We can’t wait to share the fruit of our work with other students in the FWM community at the sharing bread event in honor of Thanksgiving next week! We can’t wait as well to share a special time with our friends in the younger toddler room for our own Toddler Thanksgiving bash! It’s going to be epic! Stay tuned!

“Movement, or physical activity, is thus an essential factor in intellectual growth, which depends upon the impressions received from outside. Through movement we come in contact with external reality, and it is through these contacts that we eventually acquire even abstract ideas.” –Maria Montessori

One of the main advantages of our prepared environment is the opportunity for children to move freely! Children engage with the materials as long as they want and are able to choose activities that perfect different skills – all while they think they are just playing!

One of the most popular areas in our environment is the movement area. The children seem to love climbing the stairs and finding their reflection on the big mirror. They enjoy jumping on the trampoline, balancing, climbing and jumping from the balancing board, spinning in the bilibo seat, and carrying heavy objects or, better yet, carrying their peers around the classroom in our wagon. This week we also introduced oversized blocks for building and imagination. Children exercise their need for maximum effort through this work and it offers a great opportunity for problem solving and bonding with a peer.

In addition to this, our toddlers have access to the gym all week at different times! We are so thankful for it, since we truly are able to “follow the child” and adjust activities according to their needs without interrupting their work cycle. Children enjoy climbing and jumping on the mats. They love running as fast as they can! They also enjoy playing with the balls and learning the basics of soccer.

On another note, one of our most popular works this week was hammering golf tees into a pumpkin using a wooden mallet. They also enjoyed corn for food tasting. New vocabulary words such as corn kernels, husk, cob, and silk were introduced.

Children have a natural attraction to animals of all kinds. Research shows that humans’ innate interest in animals is biological: we are drawn to species that are “other” than human and in many cases have an instinct to want to care for or nurture creatures that are small and vulnerable. This week we introduced forest animals in our Language area. Through a concrete lesson and short, meaningful videos, children observed these animals in the forest and learned some specific facts about black bears, foxes, owls, moose, and beavers. We learned that black bears have sharp claws. They climb trees. Foxes have bushy tails. Foxes are members of the dog family. Owls have large eyes. They are active at night. Moose have a big body. Some of them have big antlers. Beavers have big front teeth. They have a broad tail. Beavers build dams using mud and wood. Using models to represent these animals, children repeated these facts to teachers and peers, practicing the use of two to three word sentences with the new descriptive vocabulary acquired.

Another highlight of this week was in the area of self-care in practical life. Children learned how to respectfully use a glass pitcher and serve themselves water in real glasses throughout the morning. In our environment we use porcelain and glass purposely. Their use empowers and allows children to use ‘real’ things, shows the children we trust and respect them, lets the children know that they are capable and that we respond to their abilities, and helps them develop their skills. We give them the opportunity to learn natural consequences: drop a glass and it will break. Children learn and adjust their movements to protect the fragility of their environment.

Needless to say, children were pretty hydrated this week since they found the activity quite attractive, and there were no broken glasses at all. Don’t be surprised if the water bottles start going back home quite full. This means your child is busy practicing this new skill.

For food tasting we introduced pomenagrates. As always, children were curious and excited! It was certainly a juicy experience and 98% of the class enjoyed every bit.

We All Go Traveling by Barefoot books, We All Sing With the Same Voice by J. Philip Miller, and The Thankful Book by Todd Parr were the books most requested this week!

Global Culinary Night is Thursday, November 14th, from 6:00-7:00 pm.

Practical life activities present themselves as a highly logical, sequential chain of activities that indirectly lead the child to grander things.

During the last few weeks your child has been gradually learning how to independently use materials in the environment. One example of this is found in our practical life area where children have been practicing transferring and pouring different sized dried objects, in addition to many other exercises. This week we were excited to introduce a new fun activity, one that your toddlers seem to really enjoy, transferring water. Working with water is a great sensory experience and is a good exercise for their hand muscles and fine motor skills. We can’t wait to present all the wonderful works that require water and to watch the children freely and respectfully using these activities in our environment.

In language, children were attracted to a new work called the mystery basket. This is a preliminary exercise for reading. Through this peek game children label objects in the environment. On this occasion we used objects that we usually use in our kitchen. Words such as: whisker, masher, strainer, ladle, pitcher, and strawberry huller were introduced. Children observed, touched, and learned the use of each tool. We hope you can reinforce the use of these vocabulary words by inviting your child to cook with you and show them how you use these tools in your daily lives.

For food tasting, children enjoyed the flesh of a roasted pumpkin. They also enjoyed roasted pumpkin seeds! Most of them liked the pumpkin flesh but ALL of them loved the roasted seeds! We encourage  you to  incorporate this yummy snack at home with your children! They truly devoured them!

We hope all of you that celebrated, had a wonderful Halloween!