Two For One Daily Reports:Montessori Monday

We had a busy weekend prepping for the holidays,and relocating the classroom(sigh). I wasn't able to put together any new lessons, and really didn't think it is necessary it is the week of Christmas:) We will be doing a lot of fun activities, and our "school" Christmas party is Friday. Last week we finished up our Explorer Unit. We had a lot of fun with this. So far their favorite explorer was not Christopher Columbus, all the rest of the explorers come in first place. We continue to love reading THE LION,THE WITCH,AND THE WARDROBE so glad we didn't read this book together when DJ was younger. DJ(7) says parts of this book is getting a little scary to him, he still wants to know what will happen next though. LOL.  Life Of Fred is still going strong. We were able to learn a lot about Hanukkah and the Jewish religion, didn't get a chance to make the Potatoe Latkes. Here are some photos of them during their work period on Friday and today.

 Working with coins from around the world, and locating them on the globe.

Finding multiples on the peg board and then stamping them on a hundred chart. Idea from Cultivating Dharma Math Album

 DJ was stamping multiples of eight here, he didn't realize he should of stamped eight as well. When he went to do more work with this I did an example and then he pointed out his mistake :)

 He enjoyed this work a lot and continued the work to find other multiples.
                                               

Today they were so excited and thrilled to be working in their new school room that they were  busier. Moving the school room was their idea! I agreed with all of the reasoning, and to be honest just needed some inspiration to make the move because I felt that being upstairs was more work than it was worth. They worked independently without any instruction from me. I do make suggestions and they seem to always in the end up following my advice.

We received our monthly Top Secret package from Natonal Geographic over the weekend, I put it on the shelf  last night, so it was the first thing that they did.

 DJ got out the Africa puzzle map after doing some games with Top Secret, the country that the mystery is all about is Kenya.

 You can't see it but Ken is solving multiplication equations on the chalkboard.

 Michelle is on school vacation so she was able to show Ken how to change an improper fraction to a proper fraction. Michelle did a nice job of explaining it to her.

 DJ was beyond excitement that he completed the Algebraic Trinomial Cube sensorially.

Reading information ablout plants. Ken shared with me that she now knows Dicot plants have two seed leaves.

The book she is reading is a free download availiable at Montessori for Everyone. It is full of information about plants and offers some wonderful questions that could begin research. I printed it on cardstock and binded it for $2.00. I really like this book and thought it was worth paying for binding, because sometimes you can't get this much information in one book and it may be well over $2.00 for a book that may have the information.

               Long Division with Rack and Tubes.

 They had to do this work , because they were hearing so much fun going on with the preschoolers and wanted to be a part of it. Crushing peppermints with a mortar and pestle.

In THE LION,THE WITCH,AND THE WARDROBE they have met Father Christmas who gives the three children gifts that they must use for good. Ken and DJ did a creative writing activity in which they wrote a story about a gift. They used a rubric that helped them compose and finalize their short story. They also created a nice illustration that involved coloring, cutting and taping a Santa printable that can be found at Making Learning Fun. They then glued their writing onto a gift bag and attached it to Santas' hand. They had fun decorating the wall of their new classroom with this work, I believe this was their highlight of the day.

                                                                            
To see other children doing activities inspired by the Montessori Method please visit Living Montessori Now and One Hook Wonder for Montessori Monday.