Dear Families,

We completed our second week of school! What a joy it has been getting to know each student personally. We had a lot of fun sharing our brown bags with each other. All students did great, even if they were nervous! If your student did not bring in their brown bag last week, please have them bring it in this week so we can get to know them better. Moving into this week, please remember we have our Parent Open House THIS THURSDAY, September 7th, 2017 from 6-7:30pm. Please check out the Parent Open House post for more information.

Here are the highlights from the week:

• All students received a lesson in biology, fractions, writing, arithmetic, geography, history, and geometry!
  • These lessons are taught in small groups, based on ability and knowledge of each subject.
• As a class, we caught caterpillars to explore within the classroom
• We have made progress in our community jobs. Each student has a job within the classroom, at some point during the day, and they are required to complete their job to the best of their ability. We have jobs such as: dishes, snack, floor managers, shelf dusters, garbage/recycle, tables, and chairs!
• We celebrate Maria Montessori’s birthday by recognizing the work she did to make our school possible.It was beautiful to hear the students give gratitude towards her.
• We began our classroom study of the 7 Habits for Happy Kids by Sean Covey, in Peace Education. This months focus will be on Habit 1: Be Proactive. We discussed the importance of being responsible and taking initiative.
• We ended our week with the First Great Lesson: Birth of the Universe. During the week, we read I Wonder by Annaka Harris and Older Than the Stars by Karen Fox to help spark the student’s imagination. By the end of the week when Ms. Lana told the First Great Lesson, the students were still in awe. Together, we created our own mural of what we picture was the birth of the universe.

It was a wonderful week! We look forward to another successful week full of exploration and learning! We hope to see each family at Parent Open House this Thursday.

As always, please let us know if you have any questions or concerns at LPas@mariamontessoriacademy.org.

Kindly,

Ms Lana and Ms. Carolyn

Dear Families,

What an exciting week we had. Returning students did an excellent job mentoring new students, including Ms. Lana. Students learned classroom expectations, worked together to build our community, and received spelling and arithmetic assessments. Ms. Carolyn taught students the playground expectations along with fun games to play (hop scotch, letter bounce, tether ball, tag, etc. )

Here are the highlights from our week:

1.Who is missing?

This was a hit for community building. Each student closed their eyes. Ms. Lana would tap a student on the head to hide under a sheet. The other students would open their eyes to try and determine who was missing from the group. The students had to use their observation skills to identify the missing student. As a group, they got good enough that we hid six students at once!

2. Crossing the river

This game allowed students to see similarities between each other’s interests. Ms. Lana would call out a phrase such as, “if you like bananas, please cross the river.” This opened up more friendships within our classroom.

3. Alliteration name game

Students were asked to think of a noun hat started with the same letter of their name. For example, Ms. Lana stated, “Lana lizard.” Students laughed with each other and learned their peers names.

4. Gratitude

We end each day with gratitude. Each student can choose to share their gratitude or kindly say, “no thank you.” This exercise is a great opportunity for students to stop and think about the good that happened in their day.

5. Mountain Lion Mentors

We ended the week by working with our Mountain Lion Mentors. This year, our class is teamed up with Ms. Shanan’s class of Upper Elementary students. Today, we had a lesson on who Maria Montessori is, her birthday, and one thing she is known for, hats. We broke up into pairs (UE student with a LE student) and together they created their own hat. Laughs could be heard and smiles shined through. Each student, if they desired, shared their hat.

Thank you for your support in making this transition for all of us smooth. Please remember to see when your student presents their home project next week so we can continue to learn about each other.

As always, please contact us with any questions, concerns, or comments.

With gratitude,

Ms. Lana and Ms. Carolyn

August 28th-September 1, 2017: Brown Bag

As a way to introduce each other to the class, we would like your student to bring in three items that best express who they are, in a brown paper bag. For example, family pictures, sports equipment, favorite items such as hobbies, or activities. There are two requirements: please make sure all of the items can fit in the bag and that there are no electronics.

Since this is our first home project, we have scheduled specific days for your student to present. Please see the dates below to know when your student needs to bring their bag.

Thursday, August 24th, 2017

1. Ms. Lana
2. Ms. Carolyn

Monday, August 28th, 2017

1. Adalyn
2. Zyan
3. Jonathan
4. Lilli
5. Julian
6. Aysa

Tuesday, August 29th, 2017

1. Kaido
2. Zachery
3. Ariana
4. Samantha
5. Randi
6. Carsen

Wednesday, August 30th, 2017

1. Brinlee
2. Carter
3. Celia
4. Bridger
5. Mary Jo
6. Emmy

Thursday, August 31st, 2017

1. Addison
2. KateLyn
3. Evee
4. Dash
5. Gen
6. Madden

Friday, September 1st, 2017

1. Skye
2. Megan
3. Caenna
4. Isaiah
5. Taige