October Montessori

This month in Montessori:

(3-year-old and 5-year-old)

Ender's shelves for this month were partly focused on his interests and partly on the themes we had in our time together. Ender turned 5 this month.

ON TOP: the basket on the left holds his Awana materials. Ender is in Sparks this year, so we have a story to read and a verse to memorize each week. The container underneath that basket is the moveable alphabet, which we use daily in our time together, and the other basket on top holds library books that he can look through or read on his own that are on the same themes we are learning about together, this month his basket holds picture books about asia, trees, the human body, and some early readers. The black card file box holds our scripture memory verses.

Second Row: The green basket in cubby #1 holds a small yellow notebook and a few writing utensils. Ender writes all kinds of things in there, but lately he has been making tons of lists. Cubby #2 is a tray with a few addition flash cards in it and several math manipulatives. Ender works the card with the manipulatives. Since math is one of his favorite subjects, this tray is used almost every day and I have to change out the cards quite often. Cubby #3 holds a floor puzzle of the continents.

Third Row: Cubby #4 holds Ender's maze book. I originally planned to change this cubby out at least twice a week to be other puzzle type books he has enjoyed in the past, but after I made the first swap he asked me to always leave the maze book "at least for awhile". Cubby #5 has his Marvel superheroes folder where he stores his favorite artwork and a pad of paper for future contributions to the folder. Ender's favorite animals reside in cubby #6- currently 2 elephants and several dinosaurs.

The cubes in the bottom row hold lincoln logs, legos and a collection of hats, glasses, scarves, ties and other dress up stuff.

Ezra's shelves are just starting to include work from the Montessori 3-6 albums, but still involve some of his favorite toys. He is 3 years and 3 months.

ON TOP: A stack of puzzles and Ezra's book basket. His book basket includes a variety of picture books that we own and also from the library. I didn't follow a particular theme this month, but I did unintentionally  include a lot of classics: Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel, Katy No-Pocket (Sandpiper), Chicka Chicka Boom Boom, and a few Curious George titles.

Second Row: Inside Cubby #1 I placed a piece of paper on a clipboard and I drew a large square divided into 25 boxes. I also attached a sticker sheet. Ezra loves to peel the stickers and put them inside the boxes. It's a simple and inexpensive introduction to 1-to-1 correspondence. Cubby #2 holds Ezra's cutting basket. I fill his basket with a few small pieces of construction paper with straight lines drawn on them and a few small pieces with a square or triangle drawn on them. He can cut them out on the lines or he can choose a blank piece of paper to chop up as he pleases. Cubby #3 holds Ezra's magnetic alphabet. This is just a set of kitchen magnets I bought when Ender was small, and because they are contained in a metal pan all he has to do is turn the pan upside down for a quick magnetic surface. Currently he has the letters for his name plus a few other letters he knows in the box. We add letters as he learns what they are called or what sound they make.

Third Row: In cubby #4 you'll find the pink tower. Ezra started with this work this month and at first I only included the 5 biggest blocks. Now that he knows how to complete the work he progressed to having all of the blocks in his cubby. I also include a mat in that cubby to remind him that it is work to be done on the floor. Cubby #5 and #6 have changed out frequently this month. The picture above shows a shape puzzle and a block puzzle, but other work in the place of these cubes has included his maze book, a farm play set and buttoning work.

The cubes in the bottom row hold all his animals, the train set and the duplo blocks.

The Basics

I've been stewing for the last however many months now about Kindergarten and the "official" beginning to our home school- at least as far as the state is concerned.

 

I've worked to foster a lifestyle of education and a home that reflects that philosophy, even though my boys weren't quite school-aged. Simplicity and order has been the focus of our home for the last few years, and despite a dedication to this lifestyle these little thoughts started to creep in:

 

"What if we miss something really important along the way?"

 

"What if we miss the perfect time to do something?"

 

"What if . . . "

 

My super-organized plan-ahead side went into a bit of hyper-drive there for a bit and lots of lists were made, sites and books read, and advice requested. I don't know why but excessive planning helps me see that we really don't need it all. We're totally okay with about 1/4 of the list. Thankfully I also have a rational side that starts to complain if it looks like we'll be "doing school" too much.

 

And again, it all comes down to the basics:

• Faith


• Reading


• Writing


• Number work

 

I'd like to share our plans here with an understanding of the factors for our family:

 

1. I work full time in my studio, but at odd hours compared to most full-time folks. Our kids are with me in the mornings til just after lunch, with their grandmother until dinner, then daddy in the evening. Daddy rocks the whole "feed them dinner, wrestle/ride bikes/play at the park, take a bath, read books, prayer" evening thing and Grandma gives them the space they need to make all kinds of wild artsy messes and spend 4 hours in a row with legos if that's what they desire.

 

2. I'm definitely a go-with-the-flow/spur-of-the-moment gal if left to my own devices.

 

3. My oldest son is Mr. Structure with a capital S.

 

4. We have to balance the two so neither of us go crazy.

 

5. My newly minted 3-year-old REALLY wants to be a part of everything.

 

So, we have a framework for the year built around two concepts: the alphabet and the continents. In between I have a few ideas for interests I think Ender might want to pursue, but I'm going to leave that open for whatever comes up. I could totally wing the whole thing and have a great time doing it, but Ender does a million times better if he knows exactly what to expect from the day.

 

I wrote a few "units" (I use the term very loosely), 1 for each continent, 1 for astronomy (which we're working through right now) and 1 each for Thanksgiving and Christmas. It's all based on our basics- faith, reading, writing, and numbers, with a lot of room to add or subtract as we need to.

 

Our alphabet framework is nothing new, but it is a way for us to include Ezra while also giving Ender phonics work. We will be working with 1 letter per week with a theme for each day of the week, working toward making a page for each letter to put in an alphabet notebook. I'm planning to use some of the materials available through homeschoolshare, but I'm making some of my own too. I'll share more details as we complete work (provided I find out it actually seems to work for us).

Making Cardinals

Cardinals have been hanging around our house lately, so when Ender caught sight of this craft idea at My Montessori Journey, he went in search of all the right tools to make his own cardinal! He was a bit on  the lucky side to have found paper plates since we have been purposely not using paper plates/towels/napkins for awhile now, but he found a few lurking in the  pantry.

 

 

 

 

 

 

We learned two things- our paper plates were too waxy for much of the color to stick no matter what medium we tried, and we also learned that Ezra was able to follow the lines to cut but just wasn't strong enough to cut the whole project.

Toddler Alphabet Work

Ezra recently hit a sensitive period for letters and sounds. He started pointing out words to me about a week ago. Everywhere he sees letters, he announces that there are words to read. He also pretends to "sound out" words like he has seen Ender do so many times, except  in Ezra's English all words begin with "k-, k-, k-". (as in "k-, k-, k- dog".)

 

Ender has patiently been telling him what all the different letters are called, while I tell Ezra the sounds when he asks. He loves the letters W and X and can find them just about anywhere those particular letters can be found. I added language work to his shelves a few days ago, and he's choosing to spend much of his morning with the alphabet.

 

Ezra's favorite alphabet works:

 

:: The Leap Frog Fridge Phonics. He puts a letter in the slot and it sings a short song about what sound each letter makes.

 

:: Felt letters. I cut big felt letters for Ender when he was three and I pulled them out again for Ezra. Ezra sometimes treats them like shapes and builds with them, but I've also put out just a few letters some days (like just the vowels some days, or just the letters in his name, etc.) and he likes to ask the names/sounds of each letter. In following with Montessori I give him the sound right now.

 

:: A name place mat. I printed his name on a piece of cardstock and laminated it. Ezra can trace over his name with marker over and over, or we can use dough to shape into letters- tracing is really fun for him right now, so he's using this work quite often.

 

:: In the same vein as the item above, I made a few "trace mats" for Ezra that have a dotted line to follow from one object to another. He can use a marker on these, but usually he just traces with his finger or with a paint brush. Whatever medium he'd like works for me!

 

Learning at Our House

Ready for something educational around here?

I know. Me too.

Thanks for tolerating all the knitting and list making around here lately. I promise it's a vital part of my educational philosophy and process.

I've posted here in the last few months about my thoughts on Kindergarten and the research I was doing to figure out what might best fit our family for our first "official" year next year. There are so many great things out there and I deeply appreciate the merits of Reggio Emilia, Montessori, Charlotte Mason, and unschooling.

So I spent the end of 2009 reading and talking with my husband and praying over these decisions. But for the last 2 months I have put all the Kindergarten thoughts on hold quite purposefully and we've gone about our days. Partly because I needed to focus on this day and the things we are learning and doing now, but partly because that is how I work best. I read and research everything I can find and then I have to let it all sit in my mind for awhile.

So I knit and make other lists that help me feel productive while I let all that information stew.

I began journaling about it over the weekend for the first time since before Christmas and a lot of things that seemed so muddy in December seem very clear now. Brian and I spent part of our time this weekend talking about our goals for homeschooling and a general family philosophy since we both consider homeschooling a lifestyle rather than a portion of our day. I realized also that our current days have shifted into a really comfortable place as far as our "schooling" and that I want to hang on to it for our core.

Every day includes something with math concepts, something for Ender to use his reading skills, and something to write. We also read every day- on average a chapter from whatever read-aloud we're on, something from whatever subject Ender is interested in (outer space at the moment), and as many picture books as they'd like (always Sandra Boynton for Ezra right now. The boy LOVES those hippos!).

Our extras (science, history, geography and all the stuff you're supposed to have besides the three Rs) are by interest right now and I'm perfectly fine with keeping it that way for a long while. We've been reading the Magic Treehouse books a chapter or two at a time and several of them have non-fiction companions- we're on our second of the non-fiction books (Space) and Ender really loves them. Ender is also learning to use the non-fiction section of our library to find books he might like about different subjects and he's already figured out which publishers might have the best pictures in their books. This is the project-based/Reggio Emilia portion of our day. I take a step back during this time and we go wherever Ender wants to go. In the last two weeks it's brought us to learning about how a telescope works, who Galileo and Isaac Newton were, what gravity is, and how people dressed a few hundred years ago. I'm loving the conversations we're having lately, and he's doing a fine job directing himself.

The last two components to our days are time outside and time to make things. Of course time outside will be a bit easier when there is less ice hanging around, but even now we try to get out for at least a little bit. I look forward to being able to be out all morning or afternoon again when it warms a little bit more. Last summer we hit a great rhythm with having quiet afternoons with the making box and I hope a similar pattern will emerge again in its own way in the coming months when I will be home all day again.

So I suppose my little panic about what we "should" be doing has been quelled for now. My plan for when it bubbles up again? Reading through Ruth Beechick's books, Real Learning and looking back through our journey so far to remind myself of how much we have learned from playing checkers and card games and spending all day outside.

Ender's Current Work

This has been an interesting month for Montessori work for us. For the first time in a very long time I haven't rotated any work in or out for Ender because he has been using every work every work period for almost three weeks. In a regular week we will start with work on Monday and usually by Thursday there is at least 1 or 2 baskets/trays I rotate out because he hasn't  used them all week. I usually rotate at least 2 more by the next Monday so that about every 2 weeks he has completely new work.

For the month of January the work on the shelves for my 4-year-old currently includes:

 

:: A tray with 1 die in a bowl and a half sheet of largely gridded paper that I made in MS Word. Ender rolls the die, figures out the number and writes the number in one of the grid boxes. This work meets his desire to be able to write numbers on his own (a frustration he met when he was measuring a lot of things over the Christmas break).

 

:: Moveable alphabet and cards with consonant pairs on them. -ch,  -sh, -th, -wh, -gh, -ng, -ph. Ender uses the moveable alphabet to form the pair and then says the new sound. We just added the last four pairs to this work after working for a few weeks on the first three.

 

:: A cutting basket. Ezra is learning to make little snips in paper with scissors so Ender asked for cutting work too. Ender's basket includes half sheets of paper marked with lines to practice moving the scissors forward has he cuts, precut strips that he can cut through with one snip and plain half sheets of paper that he can cut any way he likes. He usually starts with one of the more structured parts of the activity then switches to the plain paper part way through.

 

:: Using this cabinet for inspiration I've collected novelty erasers and small toys from the dollar store and the dollar spot at Target to use as counters. I've set the tray up in the same way with three bowls. The addition cards he uses only add up to 1-6 since he's just starting out with this work and he can choose any 2 counters to work the problem. In the coming weeks when he feels a little more comfortable writing his numbers I'll expand this work so that he wites the equation after representing it with the counters.

:: A tray with a white board, marker and eraser. I picked this board up inexpensively at Target awhile back. On one side it has the primary lines for writing letters and numbers and the other side is blank. Since Ender is still drawing many of his letters he uses the blank side most frequently. Recently, however, he has started to try to stay to a certain size when writing his name and he has been using the lined side for that.

:: Blank paper and markers to draw whatever he likes. There have been a LOT of dragons lately.

:: The Brain Quest Kindergarten book. I *know* it's totally not a Montessori thing, but it has a lot of letter and number tracing along with space to try each letter or number on his own. For a kid that feels the urge to utter the "I can't do it" phrase several times a day all the tracing work has been the perfect bit of confidence building for him. He's much more willing to try once he realizes he has traced that letter with a pencil before.

We work on these pages as he desires each day, so sometimes he does one page, sometimes as may as four if he's really wanting to write a lot that day. Our only rule is the same as other work- you must finish what you start.

 

:: As always we have two baskets of books on the bottom shelf. Right now our basket themes are Winter and Hibernation. We read from these in the morning and evening. Most are picture books, but a few are short non-fiction books. I order most of these from our awesome local library, but we do own a few. We try to add a few seasonal titles to our collection each year. Ender also checked out a few books about China inspired by dragons, so he also has a few of those titles on his shelves to look at whenever he'd like.

Buttoning Turkeys

 

I linked these turkeys from Montessori Journey last week, and I made ours over the weekend.

 

 

I doubled up the felt for a little extra durability, and my favorite part is the wood buttons. I have a brand new little obsession with buttons, which is soooooo not good! Do I really need another thing to collect?

 

 

Ezra snatched the turkey away from me the second it was finished and spent a good twenty minutes buttoning and unbuttoning. It took him a very long time to button them the first time (this is his first work with buttons) and just as I was about to show him how to work with the buttons Ender stepped in to tell him how to do it and he did a great job!

Our November

 

Some of our fall/November/Thanksgiving plans:

 

Thanks and Giving Trees

 

What's Alive?

 

Learning to Button with Turkeys

 

Candy Making

 

Superhero capes (shhhh! don't tell- these are for Christmas!)

 

Leaf projects: collections, rubbings, drawings, paintings . . .

 

Using some ideas from Jean Warren's November calendars.

 

Picking from the excellent Thanksgiving and Fall ideas from the Crafty Crow.

 

And our habits to build this month are generosity and kindness, particularly with brother.

Lacing Things

Ender has requested again to learn to sew, but admitted he didn't want to use a sharp needle, so we did the next closest thing. He's using yarn, a child's plastic needle and a smallish square of plastic canvas. He can easily see the holes, he can choose to self- correct if he'd like, and he's satisfied with his work.

 

And Ezra wants to get in on the sewing fun, so he's been lacing beads. He's still figuring it all out (I can't get over the serious look on his face! He looks like that half the day- the other half he's laughing wildly or terribly upset over something) but he sticks with it for awhile before deciding he's done.

 

Ezra's Favorite

Ezra's latest favorite?

 

This Melissa and Doug Block Puzzle that Ender received for his third birthday. Ezra will play with this puzzle for ages, sometimes stacking towers or making a "pum" (his word for home) and sometimes doing the puzzles as they were intended.

 

ETA: Yes, I know he's on top of the table while he's building. He's on top of tables, chairs, couches, etc. most of the time. If anyone invents a toddler anti-climbing device that actually works, let me know. Otherwise I'm choosing to believe that he's developing extraordinary balance.

Dice Graph

I found this idea on My Montessori Journey and changed it just a bit to suit our purposes. In the original the die was a printed die with an Easter picture on each side. Ender has been really interested in rolling dice and counting the dots lately so we went with a regular die for this activity. I made up the graph ahead of time in a Word document.

 



 

Ender rolled the die, figured out how many dots there were and colored a block in that number's column. He was really excited to see which number would win!

 



 

Number 4 wins!!!

 

Themes

Am I the only one that gets all glassy-eyed thinking about all the educational possibilities that are out there? I mean, just looking through early childhood things you can make yourself crazy trying to do everything that is worthy to do! There are the unit studies and lapbooks over at Home School Share, the Alphabet Path at Serendipity, the Montessori 3-6 albums and excellent Montessori ideas blogged over at My Montessori Journey, abundant craft ideas collected at the Crafty Crow, Five in a Row, and so many blogs and books that I find myself in a perpetual state of idea collecting.

 

I finally got around to reminding myself that I am actually a teacher by trade and that I taught preschool for a few years and I *may* have a slight idea as to how to teach my own son! So after reading all the awesome ideas and filing them away in my brain, I went into planning mode- wrote down the basics, copied pages, sorted, filed, and ended up with our general outline for the year.

 

For My Four-Year-Old

 

We will be having a "letter of the week" theme. Ender knows his letters and sounds, but I wanted to have something to plan our year around that was predictable for my super orderly child. We will start with A and work in order through the alphabet, using different materials to learn how to form the letters (dough, sand tray, alphabet builders, and writing as he is able). I pulled ideas from all over the place, and I'm planning to share our plans as we work through them. We started with letter A this week and because of a little craziness in my work schedule we're taking 2 weeks with letter A instead of one.

 

Even though we're using the framework of the alphabet this year, we have plenty of time to take off in more specific directions when Ender has ideas for projects or we find things that interest us. The alphabet is just a guide, projects can come from anywhere at any time!

 

I plan to include number concepts, though those will be on a more casual basis depending on Ender's interest. We're sticking pretty close to Montessori for our number concepts, and I'll share these as they come along.

 

We're using the Kumon cutting book and the maze books too- Ender loves mazes, so he's on to his second maze book in this series. He's having a lot of fun with starfall.com as well, so he's getting a bit of computer time 2 or 3 days a week.

 

For My Two-Year-Old

 

In addition to our letter of the week, I've planned some toddler themes for Ezra. Ender really likes to help Ezra learn, so we're going to have some play center themes for the two of them to help Ezra build some vocabulary and to just have some fun!

 

For Both Boys

 

My goal is to focus on seasons and holidays- to notice the changes in the trees and plants in our own yard, to watch for signs of the incoming season, to learn a little more about the traditions of our holidays and to notice how life moves with the seasons. This portion is just as much for me as for the boys, but I hope they will have being a bigger part of our seasonal chanes this year.

Musical Alphabet: Part 1

 

Ender has been learning about the musical alphabet for the past week. I made 8 sets of musical alphabet cards (A-G) about 2 years ago to supplement a few of my music students and the cards have become one of my most used games since they are so versatile and open ended.

 

I made the font big enough on the cards so that there were 4 letters on one page, and 3 letters and a blank space on the second page. I printed each set on a different color of cardstock (to help young children see each group of A-G as it's own set) and laminated all the cards including the blank cards. I specifically chose to use the uppercase letters for these cards as a prequel to later music theory when we write major keys and chords using uppercase letters and minor keys and chords using lowercase letters.

 

I'll be listing the games in sequence over the next few weeks as Ender learns the steps. The work should be used in this order and repeated until mastery is shown before moving to the next extension. The first few periods are easy and will be mastered after 2 or 3 times, but later steps can take up to several weeks for mastery. These games are intended for students who already know letters A-G (meaning they can identify them on sight and out of order) and have a fair understanding of what before and after mean. Many 3-year-olds are ready for this kind of work, but some are not. None of these activities are part of any Montessori album I've seen, but we include the cards on Ender's Montessori shelves as a choice during his work period.

 

Part One

 

First, we work on identifying the letters. I lay out one set of alphabet cards in a row, in alphabetical order. I ask Ender to say them with me, starting on A. If your child hesitates anywhere, repeat the process as many times as it takes for them to know the letters in order with confidence.

 

After going through the letter names I hand Ender his own set of alphabet cards (different color) and ask him to line his cards up with mine- A under A, B under B, etc. After he has completed this portion I ask the question, "Do you know what happens after we get to G in the musical alphabet?" And his now-programmed response is, "we start all over again!" So we start with my letter A and say the musical alphabet through to G, then immediately start with his letter A and say the musical alphabet through to G again.

 

 

For the next step, I pick up both sets of alphabet cards and put one aside. I ask him to close his eyes and I mix the remaining set so that the letters are out of order. I lay them out in a row as if they are in order. When I ask him to open his eyes I ask him if he sees that cards are out of order. Ender says yes and I ask him to put them back in order from me, starting with A on the left. If he gets stuck anywhere, let's say on finding the letter that comes after D, I will say, "A, B, C, D . . . what comes next?" to help him see that a problem solving strategy here would be to use the letters he already has in order to help him solve the problem. When he has successfully put them back in order, we cheer and say the letters in order aloud again, starting with A.

 

 

For the last step in this period, I lay the cards out in alphabetical order and again ask him to close his eyes. I remove one letter card, replace it with the blank card and turn that letter card face down. I ask Ender to open his eyes and I tell him, "one of the letters is missing. Do you see where the empty card is?" I ask him to tell me which letter is missing. If this is difficult I will again use the problem solving strategy of saying "A, B, C . . ." and tapering off just before the missing letter so that he realizes that the letters surrounding the blank card give him a clue as to what might be missing. If he answers incorrectly, I'll say, "hmmm... I think I see that letter over here, so it can't be that one . . ." and pretend that I'm thinking really hard about this problem too.

 

 

Once he comes up with the correct answer I show him the letter card that is turned face down, and SURPRISE! He's correct!

 

Corn Shucking

We've been doing an awful lot of corn shucking around here- we've been having corn on the cob for dinner more often than not lately and Ender loves to help. I know, I know- not strictly Montessori, but definitely practical life!

 

First, you have to get all the "green stuff" off:

 

 

Then you have to get "all those tiny little hairs!"

   

Can you tell that Ender leans toward the perfectionist side? He was determined to get every single bit off of the corn!

New Work: Montessori 3-6

I spent a lot of the weekend hunting down a few new things for our homeschool with the focus on three things: The new activity/item must serve the goals that Superman and I have worked out in the last few weeks, it must be simple to make and maintain, spend less than $10 total. Tall order, I know! But I looked through the Montessori 3-6 albums that I have and my Montessori 3-6 List to remind myself of everything that has been presented to the boys. I also looked through my copies of Basic Montessori and Montessori from the Start along with some of my favorite Montessori blogs.

 

I'm going to present extensions to some work, but I've also collected a few new ideas to introduce in the coming weeks. Not all are strictly Montessori, but they are fun!

 

First is a nice little version of Uno that I found while looking through My Montessori Journey. She linked to Kelly's Kindergarten- what a site! She has quite a collection of blackline printables that make the files invaluable- you can program them for whatever your child is working on. I chose the Sightword Uno Cars file (since both of my loves are in love with the movie Cars) and I programmed it with sight words for Ender. I printed the 6 pages in the file then another set of just the sight word cards with a few different words and a few blank cards. The blank cards make a great matching game for Ezra!

 

I'm also going to present pin punching soon. I think we'll start with some small simple shapes, with the intention of having shapes available that match up with what we're learning about in other areas.

 

We started to do a little work with addition and subtraction this week, so our next step forward is working with equation cards like the ones at My Montessori Journey. Our manipulative cabinet is not quite as big yet, but it's growing! Right now we work together talking through each problem and working the problem with manipulatives. This has been the first thing Ender has asked about every morning this week. " Can I play more of that math game?"

 

I'm going to give another try at presenting the sand tray for letter and number writing. Ender did NOT like it when we tried a few months ago because of the texture. He is really sensitive about tactile experiences, but recently he's felt okay to walk on sand barefoot at the lake, so I hope that with a little prep he'll try to work with the sand tray. His goal is to write words on paper and this will guide him to his goal as long as he's willing to try.

 

I also made a graphing sheet similar to the one in this post at My Montessori  Journey. Ours obviously won't be Easter themed; we're going to use a regular die for now to help him get used to working with the die before using dice in other work.

What in the World Are You?

I've had a few people ask exactly what kind of home education we do around here. And  the truth is that I'm not exactly sure what to call it! And maybe that's just it- I hate being pegged as any one thing or being forced to do someone else's list of things (which, I think, is why I'm chaffing as I look through curriculum for Kindergarten. I just don't want to do what someone else tells me I should do!). But enough people have asked me to define our homeschooling style that I thought I should really answer them, but instead of me giving you our definition, I'll tell you about my educational influences and you can decide what to call us.


My experiences as a classroom teacher had the most significant influence on me. The thing I was so disappointed in was the fact that I couldn't give every single child what I knew they individually needed. This is why I don't teach group classes in my studio- different kids need different things and there is no way to put a group together that will provide for individual learning curves. I really appreciate the ability to tailor concepts to the student and to put a new idea into just the right words that will make it click in the student's mind.


These experiences are also the reason I am not a purist in any one philosophy. I don't believe that any one philosophy can account for the learning needs of every single child- that is why it is important that the educator has a million learning tricks to pull out of their sleeve- a little bit of Montessori, a little Charlotte Mason, even the often dreaded workbooks- a little bit of everything can be perfect for one child.


Montessori is obviously a huge influence for me. This is the basis  for our current schooling, though again I'm not a purist. I love that there is a purpose to every work, nothing is "busy work" and everything is designed to require something of the child. It makes my boys feel the importance of being part of our family and taking care of themselves- pouring their own drinks, setting their own place at the table. Everything has a purpose and a place. Everything is important, down to the process by which you do things.


I love the sense of space in Montessori philosophy. Materials are presented on the shelves as lovely options. Nothing is cluttered, and space is clearly defined by baskets, bowls, and mats. This serves Ender particularly well as he is a boy that is very orderly and has a strong sense of how things should be done. This serves Ezra well because he needs to learn a sense of order.


Charlotte Mason is really where my heart lies. My early years were shaped by good books and to this day I fight to find every available moment to read- how many books do I have checked out from the library right now JUST for me? Oh, about 30. I don't agree with completely eliminating "twaddle" from our reading lives (oh, how I love a good urban fantasy!) but I do think we should limit it for young readers and guide them in making good reading choices. Everything in moderation, I say- fluff books are fun at times just like a bit of junk food. I don't construct my whole reading diet out of fluff, but I do enjoy it quite a bit now and again.


The importance of nature and being out in the world to experience it is important to me too- I have two little boys that would live outdoors if I would let them. I'll be honest with you and say that it's not that eas or natural for me- I'm not the kind of girl that does well with bugs and dirt and germy things. In fact, if I were going to be  really honest I'd tell you that germs completely freak me out and I have to fight that on a daily basis so that my kids don't turn out weird like me. I'm determined to conquer some of my fears, even if it takes a long while. My boys need me to like (okay, tolerate) going outside with them on a daily basis.


Elizabeth Foss. I know, I know- she's not the author of a method and she should really be in the Charlotte Mason category because she's such a strong advocate for Charlotte Mason, but her blog, Serendipity, her book, and the 4Real forums have been a giant influence on me. The more I read of her and people who educate in the same way she does the more I find myself nodding my head in agreement. I feel freedom to homeschool in a way that frees me from being forced to follow a rigorous schedule or someone else's list of what "should" be learned in a given year. I'm no longer afraid of "missing something" along the way.


Other things that fall into various home learning areas? Well, we don't plan to use a math text until at least 4th grade (with plans to look seriously at Teaching Textbooks at that point) and have no plans to use traditional text books at all unless it proves necessary or one of my kids actually requests a textbook.  I have a child who is in love with "filling in the blanks" so we use Kumon workbooks as he desires. We have projects to work on, but not always academic ones (like the giant Wall-E coloring poster Ender has been working on for days now). I follow the interests he shows, but I also present my own ideas for materials and work to him that I think may turn into an interest. If it doesn't, no problem. But sometimes it opens up a new and interesting possibility for him.


So what are we? Who knows. Too scheduled to be unschoolers, too relaxed to fall with the traditional crowd. Not purist enough to call ourselves strictly Montessori, and maybe not even enough to define our homeschool as Charlotte Mason. Eclectic? Maybe. But I'd prefer to remain un-labeled. I like defying definition.

Reading: First, Middle, Last

We have been working on organizing words lately. We start by organizing our words into columns based on the starting letter, then by the middle letter, then by the last letter. We used the free pink series cards found here, and a moveable alphabet of lowercase letters.

 

We started out with a word bank of 12 words:

 

 

Then we sorted them into different columns. I took pictures while we were sorting by middle letters. First we sorted into columns:

 

 

After sorting the columns Ender added the correct letter from the moveable alphabet to the top of each column.

 

 

After all that Ender read the words in each column and we also talked about how many words were in each column, which had the most, which had the least, and and which ones had the same amount.

 

Practical Life

 Ezra is just starting to drink from an open cup. We've had a few of these little coke glasses since we got married and they're a great size for Ezra's hands, even if they aren't a very traditional looking Montessori item.

 

Ezra started to take a very active interest in our cups a few weeks ago, so I started him out with just enough water in the cup to have 1 sip. After he was able to control that I started giving him a little more each time. He still spills on occasion, but he's very careful in general. Once he's really doing well with drinking out of the glass I'll put together a pouring activity so that he can pour his own cup and drink it. Now if only I could get Ender to be as equally interested in drinking from an open cup!

 

Ezra has also started to try to fold things. He watches me fold laundry almost every day and Ender has the fun task of matching socks. Ezra wants to have a job too so I've been directing him to hand towels and washcloths, showing him how to make the corners meet and to smooth out the fabric. He doesn't quite have the patience for it though, so he usually makes one nice fold and then crumbles it all up on the second fold and throws it back into the basket. Work in progress.

Changing

I’ve been thinking ahead about things I’d like to do with Ender in the next year, specifically since he will be old enough to attend preschool. This past fall we started our experiment of sorts. Brian and I knew we wanted to educate our children at home, but we were unsure of what exactly that would look like. As I read more and more about different philosophies of education (and gave Brian the condensed version), Montessori is mostly where we landed. I suppose technically we would be considered eclectic, since there is a lot that I appreciate about other philosophies, specifically Charlotte Mason.


In the last 6 months I have:

1. Worked on providing a learning environment in our home

2. Tried to have a definite work period in the mornings

3. Learned to observe the boys in order to know where to take them next.



Lesson planning is one of my very favorite things. I get to take my observations from the previous week or two and decide where the boys should go next. Some work stays on the shelves as-is, sometimes someone is ready for the next stage or an extension on a work, sometimes they are ready to move on to new work. The difficult part is that I sometimes get so excited about planning lessons for the boys that I get so far into planning to the point that we would be having sit-down school all day! Hardly the thing for a peschooler, much less a toddler!


So I think I’ve found a system that is working for all of us and I thought I’d share our slightly new direction.



1. Montessori Time Daily. This is usually 45 minutes, and I’ve been doing a lot of presenting (and re-presenting) of math works lately. Ender is working with our own version of the teen board and a lot of counting work. Ezra is keeping busy with practical life and farm play. He is in love with his animals!


2. Table Time. This time is often art, but includes working with dough, making books, specific crafts (like our butterflies from the other day) and other structured activities. We’ve been having a lot of collages lately now that Ezra can dip a q-tip in white glue without licking the end.


3. Books. We’ve always included a lot of books in our lives. We read several times a day and Ender is starting to enjoy listening to longer books. One of the changes we’re making for summer is to add themed book baskets to our learning area. We are blessed with an excellent library system and I take advantage!


4. Outside. As we head into summer this is where you’ll most likely find us.


Another idea I’d like to experiment with over the summer is to have a special center set up that will be changed as the boys lose interest. My starting ideas are to be job centric- postal worker, veterinarian, doctor, farmer, firefighter, etc. I’m curious to see what they think about that.

Graphing

We did our first work with graphing the yummy way- with M&Ms! I demonstrated how to make columns by color (we were working with Easter colors, so we had blue, green, pink, lavendar and yellow) and Ender did a great job sorting. He had a hard time with putting just one M&M per box, so that took a little bit of practice.

 

Ezra wanted to help too.

After Ender had formed the columns, we used another graphing chart to color in the same amount of boxes as M&Ms in each color.

 

 



The M N M at the bottom of the page was his idea. :)

 

And one last note. I swear we do make it out of our pajamas at some point during the morning. Superman pointed that out the other day- so many of the pictures I post here are from when the boys are still in their jammies. They do own clothing other than pajamas- I promise!