Regretfully, back-to-school is the beginning of Virus Season, and we were closed for two days due to family illnesses. Please know that we are recovering and school will reconvene next Tuesday. Tuition accounts will be credited for those days we were closed.
We are so fortunate to live in Portland, where trees are everywhere. I had invited the children to bring a leaf to share from their neighborhood, and on Tuesday morning at Gathering, we had fun examining them. T brought a leaf from a bamboo plant in his backyard; B's was from "a walk", and I shared a brightly colored one from a sweet gum tree. We noticed the different colors and shapes, then had fun building a tree puzzle which featured the different parts of the tree--the roots, trunk, branches and foliage--as separate pieces of their own. We helped to take it apart and build it together; this is part of our new set of "Teacher Puzzles"*.
In keeping with our discussion, we moved over to the table to do some painting of paper leaves. Holding a small paintbrush can be work, and the children all worked differently. Some mixed colors; some painted just a bit while others used the entire space. I let the children work as they choose on these activities, for as long as they choose, and it shows in how different each child's work looks.
Popcorn was a big hit at snacktime! T hung out in the kitchen to hear the kernels popping in the pan.
Playdough time always seems to gather the children right away. Today, there were lots of different activities going on. B spent most of her time cutting the playdough with scissors, right from the huge piece I'd given her; she'd cut off little bits and put them in the cups of a palate and we'd count them from time to time. V and T were working mostly on forming balls of playdough, and T invented a flicking game in which little balls of dough were aimed at a hole in a container. "SCORE!"
Rice play was turned into 'making ice cream--cookie dough ice cream' by T. B and V played in the housekeeping for a while, V dressing up and B making food and taking care of babies. Later, T and V built towers with the boxy stacking blocks, loading up nuts and stones into them.
At storytime we read a Henry and Mudge book that T had brought to share and the children sat working on lacing activites as I read; we had beads and big buttons available. This was very satisfying for everyone, and I enjoyed the side chatter as the children offered things to each other. "You want the purple button? Here." was the gist of the little conversations back and forth.
Outdoors, we went on a spider hunt--Huge Spiders!-- to find the webs and remove them before descending on the raspberry and blueberry bushes. The children ate most everything they picked, and some quality time was spent in the sandbox as well. Lots of digging!
I wanted to add a note about your children's lunch boxes and messy faces. When they arrive home, you might wonder at the disarray. Along with other areas of self-help that we develop at school, I am allowing them repack their lunchboxes at the end of lunch without a lot of direction and only assisting if asked. Your children need to be able to practice these things without micromanagment on my end, and this is something that other preschools support as well. If you are feeling challenged by a messy lunchbox, please come talk to me about options for containers, etc. that will encourage your child to do more of this themselves. Messy faces are par for the course as well, and while I do ask the children to use their napkins, they might have other ideas or may not quite 'get' the smears of food on their face. The point of it all is that I am giving your children the chance to do things on their own, and sometimes what's important to us (clean faces) isn't significant to them. Rest assured, if there is a food that does cause rashes, such as cinnamon or tomato sauce, I will ask them to follow up on their cleanup!
I'm looking forward to next week-- I was disappointed to have to cut our time short, as I have some very fun lesson plans laid out that I'm excited about. Let's hope all of your families are healthy too, and I'll see you then!
*"Teacher Puzzles" are Montessori puzzles which teach the nomenclature and assemblage of a variety of living things. Because the puzzles have very small, snug pieces, we work with them as a supervised activity. This also augments the practice of labeling the parts and discussion of the function of the individual parts. These puzzles cover a range of plants, insects, mammals, and fish and birds. And, of course, a child!
