Stop, Drop, and Roll!

October is National Fire Prevention Month, so Miss K's Circle Time theme for this week is Fire Safety. After saying the Pledge, singing the National Anthem, and reviewing the calendar/weather/season, Miss K talked to the kids about fire and that fire does good things (warms us, cooks our food, roasts our marshmallows :) and bad things (can hurt us, etc.).

She showed the kids pictures of matches and lighters and explained that they are tools, not toys, and that children should never touch them. She explained that, although their house likely would never be involved in a fire, they needed to know what to do just in case it ever were: First, they should never, ever hide from the fire. If they hear a smoke detector, they should "Get out and stay out." She had the kids repeat that phrase several times and explained that, even if their very favorite blankie in the whole wide world were inside the house, they should never, ever go back inside to get it. She asked the kids to identify exits from the classroom and explained that smoke rises, so if a room is filled with smoke, they should crawl on their hands and knees to an exit because the air is cleaner there.

Then Miss K lit a big jar candle and explained that, just like we breathe air, fire does too. She put the lid on the jar and the kids watched as the flame slowly burned itself out. She explained that if the kids' clothes ever were to catch fire, they shouldn't run around, because that would simply feed the fire lots of air, helping it to grow. Instead, they should "Stop, Drop, and Roll." She led the kids in this song (to the tune of "Hot Cross Buns"): "Stop, Drop, and Roll; Stop, Drop, and Roll; If your clothes ever catch on fire, Stop, Drop, and Roll." She also explained that the kids should call 9-1-1 if they were ever in a dangerous situation without an adult.

Next she reminded the kids that fire, matches, and lighters are tools adults use and that they are not safe for children to use. She had the kids take turns pulling pictures of various tools (oven, saw, lighter, matches) and toys (teddy bear, tricycle) out of a bag, and then they sorted them into the tool or toy category.

These kinds of lessons always give me a big lump in my throat, and I'm so grateful that Miss K is teaching the kids such important stuff.

We were very excited to have Miss C and her family back today. After Miss K finished Circle Time, the kids got right to work.

I recently read this post at The Learning Ark, and I knew a daily plan would totally appeal to my daughter. This morning before school, I asked her, "What work do you want to do today," and she immediately rattled off, "Word Drawers 2, 4, and 9; metal insets; and mystery bag." Well OK then! We wrote out her To Do List, and I drew a small square next to each item so that she could check off each thing as she went (right up her alley!). When we started our Independent Work time, she immediately got her list and got to work on the Word Drawers:



Miss K's daughter worked with the knobless cylinders, Miss D's son worked with the number cards (unfortunately, my flash stopped working right here, so I didn't get any good shots), and Miss C's son worked with the latches board:



Miss D's son wanted to do Word Drawers, too, so I asked him to get Word Drawer 1, which has words made up of the first 8 "red" letters, r/a/m/f/b/i/t/g. We laid out the pictures and then sounded out the words and matched them. We did the same thing with Word Drawer 2, which has words made up of the first 8 red letters, as well as the 8 "yellow" letters, p/o/n/l/h/u/s/c. To this point, though, I hadn't introduced h/u/s/c, so this was more of a challenge for him. Tomorrow I plan to introduce h/u/s/c, as well as review the previous 12 letters. I also will ask him if he would like to make a plan for his day.

At this point, my daughter had finished everything but the mystery bag (actually this sensorial game), which she and Miss D's son played together.



Miss K's daughter busied herself with dominoes and the latches board while Miss C's son worked with the knobless cylinders:



Miss K's daughter took a turn with the mystery bag game, as well. Here she is holding the bag as Miss D's son closes his eyes and tries to pull the proper piece out of the bag:



For Music Time, Miss D had many different songs prepared, including Stop, Drop, and Roll (only this time, we sang it to the tune of "Shake, Rattle, and Roll"), and she included movement with it. She also had the kids pretend they were trees, and they sang a song about leaves falling to the ground.

Finally, we read the "G" verse and story from My ABC Bible Verses: "Go into all the world and preach the Gospel to every creature," Mark 16:15. We discussed that "Gospel" means good news, and that the good news is: "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life," John 3:16. Of course, that's the "F" verse we did last week, which is one thing I absolutely love about My ABC Bible Verses - the verses build on and reinforce the previous ones - it's a very well thought-out book, and I highly recommend it.

Sail, Sail, Sail Your Ship...

(Sorry, that song has been stuck in my head all week!) Miss K wrapped up this week's Columbus Day lesson by having the kids make their own ships using a snack-size Pringles container, a popsicle stick, some playdough, and a white index card. Then they tried to sail their ships from Spain to North America:



Using only their breath, the kids tried blow their ships through water from one end of a tub to the other - it was harder than it looked!



The sails on Columbus's ships displayed various things Columbus felt loyal to, including a Y for Queen Isabella and an F for King Ferdinand, so Miss K had the kids decorate their ships' sails with things they wanted to tell the world about themselves: that they "came in peace," that they loved Christ, etc. They were really proud of their ships and loved this activity.

After Circle Time, we reviewed the eight "red" letters (r, a, m, f, b, i, t, g), and then I introduced the first four "yellow" letters (p, o, n, l). First we played I Spy to get the kids listening for the sounds, then I showed them the actual letters and had them sort phonetic pictures for each letter. Laura at My Montessori Journey has spiffy pre-made letters for the kids to paste into their Sound Books once they've mastered a new letter, but of course I've been having to make my own. Up to this point, I had been printing out a sheet of letters and then cutting them out for the kids to paste in. On this day, I was running a bit behind and hadn't gotten a chance to cut out the letters. But it actually worked out really well, because my daughter wanted to use scissors to cut out the letters herself. I didn't get a picture of her work, but she did a really precise job, so that hardly any white paper could be seen along the edges of the black letters - it was very sweet to see her concentrating so hard, and the whole exercise ended up being a nice extension to the Sound Book. I haven't gotten around to uploading documents yet, but when I do, I plan to make the phonetic pictures and Sound Book letters available for download.

Miss D's son wanted to try the Sensorial puzzle I had introduced the day before, and he chose to make a ship:



My daughter chose to work with a drawer from the Geometric Cabinet:



She matched the circles to all three sets of cards. When Miss D's son was finished with his ship, I set the thin outline cards on one side of the room and the circles on another and asked each of them in turn to "find me this circle...," while pointing to one of the cards.

Miss K's daughter started with her current favorite activity...



...only today she made a "football game." ;)

All three kids had a nice time working together with the knobless cylinders:







Miss K's daughter worked with the fabric box, and then she and my daughter built the pink tower/brown stair extension:



For Arts & Crafts, the kids finished the calendars they started three weeks ago; they turned out great! Miss K put a lot of effort into this ambitious project, and it deserves its own post - be on the lookout.

Finally, we finished the day with jobs and the F verse and story from My ABC Bible Verses: "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life." John 3:16

I have been so impressed with the kids' ability to learn these verses. Every day we go over all of the letters from the previous weeks, and with very little help, they can recall all of the verses. By the end of the week, they get a little antsy to move on to the next letter, but by doing one letter a week, the verses and stories seem to be sinking in.

Sadly, Miss C and her sons were absent all week due to illness. We'll be taking next Monday off for Columbus Day, but we're looking forward to having the whole group together when we meet again next Tuesday.

Sail On

Today Miss K continued her Columbus Day lesson by showing the kids a globe and tracing Christopher Columbus's route from Spain to North America. She and the kids discussed how long it would take to sail such a route (5 weeks), what the explorers would have needed to take with them on their ships, etc. They reviewed yesterday's songs and played the explorer game again, in which they hid North America somewhere in the classroom and searched for "new land."

All of the geography talk inspired Miss K's daughter to take a crack at the puzzle of North America...


...and I was thrilled that Miss D's son wanted to try the "game" (love it!) where we match objects to letters by their beginning sound:


My daughter used the moveable alphabet to spell out the names of some consonant/vowel/consonant phonetic objects...


...and then Miss D's son used the moveable alphabet to spell out the names of the objects from Laura's word drawers 1 and 2, which are made up the first 8 red letters: r, a, m, f, b, i, t, g.


Miss K's daughter built her "barn" :)...


...and then (hooray!) finally discovered the knobless cylinders. This blog's followers will know that I've been trying to get her to work with these for weeks now, because she enjoys building things, but for some reason they never "took." I think Miss K might have mentioned something about making a birthday cake for Daddy, and that was all the hook she needed:


Miss D's son got in on the knobless cylinder action...


...while my daughter and Miss K used the blindfold and the fabric box:


Once Miss K's daughter saw Miss D's son using the red knobless cylinders, she wanted to try building with all four sets:


Can you tell that Miss K's daughter is rubbing off on the other students in the classroom :) ?


Today Miss K's daughter tried this Sensorial puzzle:


She chose to make the ship in honor of Columbus Day.

At this point, Miss D's son wanted to try the teens board, which he saw my daughter do yesterday. I've mentioned before that he has really big paws hands, and for the life of him, he could not thread the unit into the two grooves to cover up the zero in the ten - you know what I mean? Bless his heart, he tried so hard, but he could only get one side to go in at a time, so that the unit would end up lopsided over the zero. Does anyone out there have any suggestions for making this easier? I'd truly appreciate any input.

After our work cycle, Miss D led Music Time. The kids used rhythm sticks, shakers, tambourines, and movement in a bunch of different songs, including some fall-, Halloween-, and Columbus Day-inspired ones. They love this part of their Tuesday and totally look forward to it each week.

We closed with the F verse and story from My ABC Bible Verses, and another day was in the books!

Exploring Christopher Columbus

In honor of Columbus Day (next Monday), Miss K's Circle Time theme for this week is Christopher Columbus. She asked the kids if they knew what an explorer was and if they could name one (Dora was mentioned, of course :). She told the kids who Christopher Columbus is; that he lived a long time ago, before there were planes, trains, etc.; that he was a sailor who sailed for the king and queen of Spain, etc. She taught them songs to help with the lesson, starting with the names of Columbus's ships (to the tune of "Three Little Indians"):

Nina, Pinta, Santa Maria,
Nina, Pinta, Santa Maria,
Nina, Pinta, Santa Maria,
These are Columbus's ships.

After reinforcing our current year and explaining when Columbus discovered North America, she taught the kids this song (to the tune of "The Ants Go Marching One by One"):

In fourteen-hundred and ninety-two,
Columbus sailed the ocean blue,
Columbus sailed the ocean blue in 1492.

Next she led the kids in a game. She removed the North America puzzle piece from the world puzzle and asked the kids to close their eyes while one of them hid the piece somewhere in the classroom. The kids took turns being "explorers," searching all through the classroom for land - so cute! As each kid searched for North America, the others sang (to the tune of "Row, Row, Row Your Boat"):

Sail, sail, sail your ship.
Sail it night and day.
Look for land, look for land,
All along the way.

It was a fun lesson that the kids really enjoyed! As soon as Circle Time was over, Miss D's son went straight for the bear sorting/tonging activity:



In the meantime, I pulled out the moveable alphabet and the pictures from word drawers 1 and 2, which Laura from My Montessori Journey graciously makes available on her blog. Word drawers 1 and 2 include words made up of the first 8 "red" letters: r, a, m, f, b, i, t, g. Miss K's daughter and my daughter explored the moveable alphabet and their Sound Books from last week a bit, and then my daughter set to work "writing" the names of the objects:



When Miss D's son finished up with the bears, Miss K's daughter took a turn:



This is one of her favorite activities, and one she often chooses. She always lines her bears up around the edge of the tray before she sorts them, but today Miss K pointed out that the bears along the outside of the tray are facing out, while the bears along the inside are facing in. Notice also that she starts with the purple bears right at 12:00, then works clockwise until she runs out of room and continues the pattern on the inside. So interesting!

Miss D's son and my daughter worked together to write the names of the word drawer objects:



After they had written out all of the words, I took the objects away and Miss D's son practiced "reading" the words - he was thrilled! We then matched the objects back to the words.

Miss D's son then moved on to - what else? :) - the hundred board. He loves this activity! Over the weekend, my daughter had done it up to about 40 but we never finished it - he gladly took over.

Check out the 84 - nice work!


My daughter worked on the teens boards...



...while I showed Miss K's daughter her very own "My Metal Insets Book" that I made her from the metal inset work she did a couple weeks ago. (I was hoping to reignite her interest in the metal insets as well as spark an interest in Miss D's son, who shies away from writing.)



It worked!



I noticed Miss D's son eyeing her work - I'm hoping he'll want to try this activity this week.

We had a great work cycle, and then it was time for PE! Miss D recently found a parachute at a consignment sale, and today the kids were eager to try it out:



They sang songs and did a bunch of activities with the parachute and balls - it was a definite workout for them!

Where is everyone?


After PE, everyone did their jobs, and it was time for our Bible verse and story for the week, the letter F from My ABC Bible Verses: "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life." John 3:16

Week 5 Wrap-Up

On Wednesday, Miss K continued with her apple theme for Circle Time. She reviewed the Johnny Appleseed story from the previous day, as well as the lesson on seeds. She showed the kids a red apple and a green apple and explained that there are many different kinds of apples. Then she asked the kids which apple they thought would have more seeds and took a vote: would it be the red apple, the green apple, or would they have the same number of seeds? She cut through both apples at their "equators" and showed the kids that, even though the apples were different on the outside, they were identical on the inside (love the larger life lesson there, Miss K!). She showed them the apples' identical star-shaped cores, and then they counted the number of seeds from each apple:


Notice how she used the odd number format from the numbers and counters activity? Nice touch, Miss K! :)

After Circle Time, I introduced the next set of sounds from the red letter series Laura at My Montessori Journey uses: b, i, t, and g. We started the same way as we did with the first four letters: we played "I Spy" with laminated clipart objects beginning with each of the sounds, then I showed the kids the corresponding sandpaper letters and said, "This is what the sound /b/ looks like," or, "This is how we write the sound /b/." Once we had been through each of the four letters, we went through a big stack of phonetic object cards and sorted them according to their beginning sound.



All of the kids were familiar with these four sounds and letters, so we glued the letters into the red Sound Books they had made the day before.

During Independent Work time, my daughter asked to build the "super duper big maze" using the Long Red Rods and Number Rods (I had shown her how to do this once before after seeing it here), and Miss D's son wanted to try it too:



Here they are trying to navigate their labyrinth:


Miss K's daughter busied herself with the cutting activity, and then she wanted to try her hand at the hundred board:



Miss D's son can't pass up an opportunity to work on the Hundred Board, so he helped. In the meantime, my daughter was frustrated that her maze was so skinny, making it difficult to walk through, so she set to work constructing the maze using only the Number Rods.

Much easier:


Miss D's son and Miss K's daughter wanted to give it a try:


During Snack Time, the kids ate the red and green apples Miss K had shown them during Circle Time, and then they got to vote for which apple they liked better. Miss K made a chart with a red apple and green apple at the top, and the kids got to vote for their favorite apple by marking a tally under the appropriate column. After everyone had eaten, Miss K and the kids counted up all of the tallies (there were many once all the moms and 2yos had voted) and declared the green apple (actually a Golden Delicious rather than a Granny Smith) the winner. The concepts of voting and tallies and even ties (the apples "tied" for the number of seeds) were all new to the kids.

For Arts & Crafts, the kids continued painting the calenders they had started the week before. Last week they got through May, and this week they got through September; they'll finish up next week.

We closed with the "E" verse and story from My ABC Bible Verses: "Even a child is known by his deeds."

It was a good week! Even though we were only in the classroom for two days (with a field trip on Monday), I really feel like we accomplished a lot.