Author Archives: Cynthia

04/1/16

Language materials – the farm

We have been trying to implement the farm Montessori material for a couple of months now but it hasn’t really taken off so it was such a surprise to watch the children engage in the activity today!

IMG_20160121_102108

The children started by building the farm by adding in props and animals. Then they laid out all the words on the carpet beside it. They then chose from the nouns, verbs, conjunctions, prepositions, articles, pronouns, etc to form their own sentences to describe their farm!

IMG_20160121_102239

The younger students took longer to form their sentences because they were unable to decide upon what to write but after a while, they began to create their sentences quickly. Although the students did not necessarily know what an “article” or “preposition” was, they were able to find the words accordingly.

I do not think that the children will learn the grammatical structures right away but I think that after a few more independent work sessions, they will be able to identify that the nouns are black, the adjectives are blue, the verbs are red, etc.

IMG_20160121_104017

The students enjoyed the farm activity so much that they did not want to clean up and get ready for recess. They each took their time writing their carefully created sentences into their language arts books afterwards which allows them to look back on all the wonderful work they did later on.

03/14/16

Inquiry process

We were given the opportunity to share our inquiry projects with our peers in our inquiry class. I enjoyed this part of the process because it allowed me to listen to what others were working on and reflect upon how I could bring that into my own inquiry project.

My inquiry project is done as a group. We are exploring the ways that Montessori curriculum can be incorporated into Physical Education and Health. In the Montessori curriculum, physical education is categorized under practical life and does not have materials specifically designed for the subject area. As a group we seek to investigate new ways that we can tie the two together so that the Montessori philosophy can be addressed.

03/14/16

Engaging nature

In my practicum classroom, we are encouraging students to engage with the natural surroundings. They seem to be enjoying the activities that we have been doing. The other day the class created Aboriginal talking sticks using found materials. We went outside and the students gathered rocks and sticks. Then we returned to the classroom where the students put their talking sticks together by using corn husks and rope. Afterwards they painted them and we had a discussion about the significance and symbolic meanings behind a variety of colours.

IMG_20160218_103917

The students planted pumpkin seeds into the class’ germination station last week and since then, they have already grown 8 inches! Later this week, they will be moving them into the school garden so that they can grow further. The students are all anticipating to see how much growth will occur during the next two weeks while they are away on Spring Break.

IMG_20160218_104005

03/14/16

100 day!

Hurray for 100 day! Each primary classroom had a different station and the students were able to rotate through them during the day. The students appeared to enjoy all the activities and were reluctant to move from one station to the next because they were very immersed in their activities.

IMG_20160218_100024

Here are a few ideas that you can bring into the classroom for 100 day.

100 day collages

IMG_20160218_104145

IMG_20160218_125329

100 day bingo

IMG_20160218_110008

IMG_20160218_110024

Fruit Loop necklakes using 100 fruit loops

IMG_20160218_095303

IMG_20160218_095356

What can you build with 100 geoblocks?

IMG_20160218_100858 IMG_20160218_102621     IMG_20160218_110013 d

01/31/16

Weekly school visits (Jan 28, 15)

It is good to be back in the classroom after not being here last week. The classroom layout has changed significantly changed since the last time I was visiting the class.

Instead of the round tables being at the front of the room, the rectangle table was placed in front instead. Throughout the months I have been in this classroom, there has been numerous changes in the format. This is because there is an emphasis on the importance of the prepared environment in the Montessori philosophy.

Continue reading →

01/31/16

Accepting differences lesson

For one of my lessons during my 2 week practicum, I taught the class about multiculturalism and the importance of acceptance.

As a hook activity, I provided each group with a colouring sheet and asked each group to only colour the picture with one colour. The students were puzzled by this and asked me why they could only colour with one colour but I assured that I would tell them when they were finished. Afterwards, I gave the students an identical colouring sheet and had them colour it however they do so please.

Continue reading →

01/31/16

Language materials

Today I had the opportunity to watch the children in my class work with language materials. Many of them had not used them before so they were all quite excited to be able to use them for the first time.

There were a variety of boxes to choose from and the children work from left to right starting with the pink ones. With each box, they learn new grammatical structures.

IMG_20160121_104242

Continue reading →

01/31/16

Peace lesson

For Remembrance day, I decided to teach a lesson on peace.

I began by asking the class what peace means to them and I wrote the definitions on the board. This allowed them to see the words visually and helped those who may be visual learners absorb the material better.

Afterwards, I read the book “Paulie Pastrami brings world peace” to the class. The book gave the class ideas for bringing about peace in their communities.

Continue reading →

01/21/16

Weekly school visits: week 3

Today we ran our animal kingdom inquiry first thing. I showed the class how to use a mind-map to organize what they already know about their animal kingdom into categories. They answered my questions and looked interested in creating their own. After my demonstration, we put them into the revised groups we made at the end of the day last week and I drew their assigned animal kingdoms out of a basket because then it would be randomized.

Continue reading →