Parents,
A big thanks to all the parents who helped out with our field trip on Friday. It went so smoothly thanks to all our amazing parent volunteers. We appreciate you so much!
This week we will continue our study of maps, land forms and leaves. Our leaf party will be on Wednesday the 17th. We would love any donations of leaves you have raked from your yard.
We will continue our study of maps, leaves, day and night and invertebrates. In art we will begin talking about secondary colors.
Maria Montessori often used the term “normalized” when she spoke of children and classrooms. The essence of this term means that the children feel comfortable and confident enough to work as if the teacher were not present. The children are not strong armed into following the rules of the classroom/school. They follow the rules because they have gained that control over themselves. Typically the normalization process takes about 6 weeks, but sometimes it takes longer. Over the next little while we will be focusing on a few components of this normalization process in our classroom that we want improve. They are: cleaning up after you finish a work and choosing to work rather than goofing off. Our goal is for the children to be able to monitor them selves. We want the children to be aware of the choices they are making and be able to evaluate those choices. One way you can help with this at home is to hold them accountable for their responsibilities. If they are supposed to clean up their plate after dinner then have them clean up their plate after dinner. Often it is easier and faster for the adult to just do what ever it is that we want our children to do but this does them a great disservice. We want to teach them how to be successful in society and that almost never involves waiting for someone else to do your job for you. I know that there are those of you who are thinking that this will start a civil war at your house. No one wants to engage in constant battles with their child. Sometimes this can be diffused if you involve them in the decision of what responsibilities they want to have. Even if you start small it is a start.
Have a great week!
Ms. Jen & Ms. Jess