Pretty, Funny, Happy, Real 20

Pretty

We spent Christmas down on Captiva Island, Florida.  I love this photo so much I used it in a recent blog post!

Now that we are back in Tennessee, it's easy to find "pretty" here, too.

This is a shot of the groundskeepers at Cheekwood Botanical Gardens.  The man in the background is drilling a series of holes every foot or so, and the woman in the foreground is putting bulbs in the ground, getting ready for spring!

Funny

I've been coming down to Captiva Island almost every Christmas since I was 11.  Santa Claus arrives a little differently there.  Here Santa is arriving by parasail!

Happy

The moment big brother Tesla came home from college, Alleluia wanted him to open his presents from St. Nick.  She made the gift box on the stairs behind them.

Real

I'm planning to write a post on a spontaneous toddler/preschool matching activity called, "Find the Matching Mitten."  So I have actual unedited footage of Alleluia scouring our huge tub o' mittens and hats, just to find a blessed pair to wear!  She had spent part of that morning's walk crying that her "hands are rotten" because they were so cold!

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"Become who you are."

"Become who you are."  John Paul II said this a number of times in a number of ways:  once to the world's youth, once to families.  Here's another form of the same idea:

"Do not be afraid to be the Saints of the New Millennium, if you become who you are you will set the whole world on fire" (John Paul II World Youth Day 2000)

What does this have to do with Montessori?

It has EVERYTHING to do with how we approach children--as gifts from heaven created by God (not by us!).  We need to ask again and again, "Lord, who is this person sent to me?  What is he or she created to become?"  What a great prayer in the midst of frustration with a child, or in the quiet classroom, before the day has started. My wonderful mentor taught us to consider going down our rosters each morning and praying for each child.  With my own 3-year-old I find myself often asking her guardian angel to help me try a new approach when we've reached an impasse, to give me fresh inspiration when I'm at the end of my rope with her.

Why reflect on this today?  This is the 20th anniversary of my entrance into the Nashville Dominicans as a postulant.  Yes, I'm married now, with 6 children at home, one in heaven.  What gives?  After two months spent discerning my vocation--time I remember fondly--the novice mistress and I came to the conclusion that I didn't have a vocation to be a sister.  What a wonderful experience!  After so much searching, I had clearer vision of my calling, of what God made me to be.

And that brings me back to the title of this blog post:  Become who you are.  Let's remember that our work with children is to help them to become who their creator meant them to be.  

I used to play a silly game with my dad where he would ask me what I wanted to be when I grew up.  Sometimes I'd say a steeple climber and sometimes I'd say an artist or whatever.  He'd say, "That's okay.  You can be that, then," even though I wasn't really sure if there WAS such a thing as a steeple climber!  I was very, very lucky to have a father who was just as interested as I was in what I would become.

This excellent article from yesterday's Daily Princetonian points out that many times, in our rush to help young people reach their potential, we actually squash their hearts' desires.  Who are we to try to form our students into our image and likeness? 

Let's be receptive to the little people in our lives, in our homes, in our classrooms.  May they feel our warm acceptance of each of them as a gift, and may we help them on the long road of discerning who they were created to be.

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Happy Feast of the Epiphany!

On Epiphany we celebrate the manifestation of Jesus' divine nature.

Many fans of the Montessori method don't know that the first Casa dei Bambini--started more than 100 years ago--opened its doors on Jan. 6, the Feast of the Epiphany.  

There were three gifts, loaded with meaning:  gold for a king, frankincense for  a priest, myrrh for burial.

Do we sometimes lose the essential message of Dr. Montessori's work, just as we lose the essential message of Christmas and the Epiphany?

I ask myself this question a lot.  "Alleluia" has just turned 3 and I am revisiting my album pages from my days training at Belmont University.  The big three we'll focus on in the coming months:  Language, Sensorial work and Practical Life.

Our children are made in the image and likeness of God.  Let's ponder the meaning of that this season and ask for His guidance in our work.

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Warning: Unorthodox Use of Math Beads for Christmas!

WARNING:  What follows is NOT a recommended Montessori work -- just plain old fun and the result of having traditional materials in our home.  :)

So as you can see from the photo below of our Math Bead Cabinet it stands merely 10 feet away from our Christmas tree this year.  It was far too tempting to use the Golden Beads as a garland--WHY HASN'T ANYONE TRIED THIS BEFORE?  :) 

See the sparkly Christmas lights on the left?

"Alleluia" has been home with a stomach bug and, well, we got a little bored, so after wrapping the tree with the Golden Beads it seemed natural to build the Pink Tower (to look like gifts under the tree).

We got a little distracted by the trash truck driving by......

But wait--there's more!  Then we noticed that there are 10 cubes in the Pink Tower, just like there are 10 cubes in our Math Bead Cabinet.  So we had to see the cubes near each other.... (this is starting to sound like "If You Give a Mouse a Cookie.")

Hmmm.  That's neat.  There are 10 pink cubes and 10 cubes in the bead cabinet.

All joking aside, although the incorrect use of the Montessori materials is not encouraged, it is important for children to make connections between and among the materials of the classroom.  One benefit of having a classroom at home is being able to be a little more lax about rules sometimes.

While the bead cabinet is a "Math" work and the tower is considered "Sensorial" work, the tower provides indirect preparation for math (our math is done in base 10, for instance).

And in other news, when we extracted the Advent wreath from the attic we learned what the summer's heat can do to wax candles--MELT THEM!  Just a little free science lesson.....

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Using Jenga with Language Work or Family Reunions

Want an idea for your next family reunion or game night?  Or something to play during your class holiday party?  Here's a twist on an oldie but goodie.

For Thanksgiving we had about 40 people come together for a few days--no small feat!  The cousins who came range in age from infant to early 20s and some of them barely knew each other.  I saw this idea for Get-to-Know-You Jenga and decided to try it.  It was so fun you may want to play it for your next family holiday or reunion!

This is a good game for almost all ages.  When we played with the little cousins an older cousin read the question aloud.  Eventually we all took turns answering the same questions and we learned a lot about each other!

All you need to do is print out the questions, which are simple things about yourself like, "What are your 3 favorite foods?" and "Who do you admire most?"  Cut the questions into slips of paper and glue each one to a single wooden block.  We put craft glue in a dish and painted the back of the slips, but you could probably use common school glue or decoupage medium.  They dried very quickly and we were able to practice the game before setting it up for the little kids later.

I wondered if the blocks would still slide out easily.  They do!

The uncles with big hands have a more difficult time with it!

What family games do you enjoy?

This would also make great Language Work for the classroom.  While searching for the original post I found some other ideas of ways to use your Jenga game:

Word Tower

Multiplication and Addition Games

Library Trivia Jenga

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Flannel and Felt Christmas Tree

What started out as a Gandalf hat (I ditched it for a spray-painted witch's hat) has become a flannel and felt Christmas tree, thanks to my nieces!

For Halloween "Chop" wanted to be Gandalf, so I rolled up some poster board into a cone, sprayed it with adhesive and covered it with flannel.  The problem was that it didn't fit her head very well and it wasn't floppy enough.  What to do?

Well thank goodness my crafty nieces came into town for Thanksgiving, because--with just felt, glue, pom poms and string--they transformed it into a centerpiece!  The decorations are movable/re-movable, so we can change it up next year.  Nice, huh?

Shopping List

Silver Grey Felt by the Yard

Light Blue Felt Sheets (25 per pack)

Green Felt Sheets (25 per pack)

White Felt Sheets (25 per pack)

Pom Poms

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Pom Pom Turkey (and Magnets)

It all started a few days ago with playgroup, when one nice mommy made a going away gift for a boy who is moving this week.  It was a cookie sheet with colorful pictures--a rainbow, a gumball machine, etc--that he could fill in with soft pom poms she had glued to little magnets (perfect for the car).  The playgroup kids couldn't keep their hands off of it!

That's how the cookie sheet-magnet-pom pom saga began, and there followed some trips to the Dollar Store.

You may have seen these on Pinterest?  I found some sheets at:
http://www.makinglearningfun.com
http://havingfunatchelleshouse.blogspot.com/
http://www.bubblesandbobbins.com
http://www.confessionsofahomeschooler.com

I would just caution you anytime you have small pieces and magnets around:  NEVER leave them out where a child who is still putting things in his mouth can reach them.  Also, remember that some magnets can wreak havoc with credit cards and electronics.

That said, all you need is some printed sheets (you can even just draw your own), a cookie sheet that magnets will stick to (my big ones from Sam's apparently are NOT magnetic, so check), glue and pom poms in different colors.  My mommy friend colored some of her white pom poms with a marker, but when I tried that I just got messy.

Later I laminated the rainbow.

The magnets come in packs of 50 from Michael's.  I got the smaller ones.  50 Pack of Magnets

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving, so of course we needed a turkey, too!

This was from Making Learning Fun and it suggests using colored magnets sold for white boards.  Hmm....maybe next year.

UPDATE:  Here's another link to a Seven Continents Map to use with magnetic pom poms.

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