Tea Time is Time to Practice Food Prep, Manners and Conversation

We celebrated the return of Downton Abbey today with teatime!

Teatime Comprised of Several "Works"

Think of it:  Flower Arranging, Silver Polishing, Food Preparation, Folding Napkins, Grace and Courtesy, and Washing Dishes.  These are all works that can be part of an afternoon tea.  Extensions can include making your own butter, baking biscuits, growing the chives and parsley for the cucumber sandwiches, dipping candles, and making jellies and jams.

Shortcuts:

We really liked these frozen biscuits with clotted cream:

Cucumber Sandwiches:

We cut the bread the night before using this sandwich maker we already had.

Even if you aren't a D.A. fan, this activity could be a great way of introducing another culture (if you are studying England, for instance).  Who knows, maybe it could become a "new tradition" at your house or school, or you could try this for Mother's Day?  Enjoy!

P.S.  We also have a ducky and an elephant creamer left over from our Practical Life days in the classroom.  If you'd like to find those, click here and here.

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Montessori St. Nicholas Day

A Christmas tree made of Long Red Rods and Knobless Cylinders

I hadn't planned anything special for our Montessori Morning today, even though it's the Feast of St. Nicholas.  Still, looking back, we did a decent job celebrating the man.  We made a Christmas tree out of the Long Red Rods and the Knobless Cylinders (3 people can do this work together).

A procession on the line

We talked about the Advent season, sang the "Liturgical Colors" song, and had a simple procession on the line.  Each child carried one thing to be placed on our prayer table (purple prayer table tablecloth, candle,  icon of Mary, angel and cross).  We sang "O Come, O Come, Emmanuel" and sat down for a short book together.  (Note:  I should have made sure I knew all of the words before we started!  Ooops...)

Reading from the Bible

As a group we read "A is for Altar, B is for Bible," and I re-introduced a unique work written about here (with all of the talk this season about "gifts" I thought the little presents would be a good tie-in).  Afterwards it was really nice--the children were calm and tended to choose works related to the Atrium materials.  "Fuego" wanted to sit with her mom and read from The Golden Children's Bible, which has great illustrations.  Another girl chose the Altar I work and said a short prayer with her mom.  Our newest member, a two-and-one-half-year-old boy, chose Flower Arranging.

Altar I work

 All in all, a great morning!  I think St. Nicholas would have approved.

Flower Arranging

Any ideas for next year?  I think maybe next year I'll print out a coloring page.

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Flower Arranging

Flower arranging is a traditional element of Montessori curriculum.  It dovetails well with some of our other activities around here, such as weekly Legion of Mary meetings (where fresh flowers are required) and weekly visits to residents at a nearby assisted living facility.

But how to transport the precious posies?  One workable solution is to save the 4-pack Starbucks Frappuccino packages.  (We buy these for long, cross-country drives and save the empties.)  The glass bottles look a little like the old-fashioned milk bottles (*love*) and the handle on the cardboard carrier is, well, handy.

Now for the gratuitous cute baby photo of Alleluia in a hat.

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