Parts of a Plant {Botany}

Care of the environment is an important aspect of a Montessori classroom.  I'm bummed we haven't done a very good job of this yet this year.  This morning we headed over to the store to pick out some plants. Barrett picked out a cactus- he said it was easier because he didn't have to water it (smart kid) and Indie picked the first ones she found that were pink. 

I introduced the Parts of a Plant nomenclature cards.  These include: the whole plant, root, leaves and stem. Montessori Print Shop has a Plant Nomenclature Book  and photo cards for types of Roots.  You can find some Botany friendly cards at The Little List. The cards pictured came from Karen Tyler's Botany Album

 Creating our Parts of the Plant Book.  

These nomenclature books are always a huge hit and such great writing practice. 

Looking for more? Popular Botany Posts from Mixing Playdough:

Flowers

Seeds

Fruit (Apples!!!)

Trees and Plants (link to free printables)

Deb at Living Montessori Now also posted the motherload of Apple Related Activities. 

Apple Printables and Montessori Inspired Apple Activities

Charlotte Mason- Exploring her Philosophies

It is no secret that I have been heavily influence by Maria Montessori. Her view of children and their capabilities is inspiring.  She was a scientist first and by simply observing the children she was in contact with, she figured out how to guide them so that they could succeed. 

There are of course problems with any philosophy or method. Montessori never intended home use of her work. She was very clear about student/directress ratios and age ranges. She made many of her materials herself and was very controlling of her ideas.  Her primary work was accomplished with the 3-6 age crowd mainly because the older ones were in school already. Unfortunately, she never really expanded too much into the older ages. There is a little bit on Early Elementary and pretty much nothing after that. 

In a home environment, I have struggled with how to implement some of her ideas as the kids get older.  Group work is so integral to the Elementary Montessori Classroom that it is almost impossible to mimic it in a home environment. 

So, here I am, exploring more philosophies and ideas and trying to find a good fit for my oldest. One where he is challenged appropriately but is also leading his own learning. I recently saw this quote in an issue of Wild and Free (a free bundle to download): 

"Cherish in your children the love of investigation"

I love this quote and it inspired me to look more into Charlotte Mason and her philosophies. I feel like I have a lot more to learn but I wanted to share a bit about how she compares with Montessori and what specifically we are going to try to incorporate into our work. 

Mason lived from 1842-1923. This seems to be a turning point in a lot of educational philosophies. She is a huge influence in Christian homeschooling circles.  

She believed that "education is an atmosphere."  This is where you will find the greatest disparity between philosophies. She was very much against changing the environment to fit a child. She felt that a child should not be isolated to a "child friendly" environment.  That means no small chairs or tables or kid sized things that you would find from Froebel or Montessori. 

She also believed that "education is a discipline. " That education was stronger than natural inclinations. 

Mason stated that "education is a life" and that because the mind feeds on ideas- children should have access to a large amount of curriculum and resources. 

She agreed with Montessori in the realm of external motivators. Both believed that they have no place in learning and are detrimental. You can find modern research confirming this in the book Nurture Shock.  

In terms of early childhood, Mason believed that kids should be outside exploring their environment and that was more important than any other type of learning. You can see a movement back towards this in some of the Forest Kindergartens popping up.  

I am a huge proponent of getting kids outside but I also know from experience that when given the opportunity- they will surprise you.  Montessori put out materials that appealed to children for a reason. Access to a moveable alphabet may spur on your little one to learn how to spell before she can read.  Numerals and counters will have them reciting addition and subtraction problems before you know it. Montessori believed that young children needed to be in a concrete world able to explore with their senses. Concrete always comes before abstract. 

Montessori wanted to cultivate a spirit of learning more than a mechanical skill or mechanism. Mason believed that under the right conditions "studies serve for delight"  and that "the consciousness of daily progression is exhilarating to both teacher and child"

I am growing to love both of these philosophies and am grateful for the chance to pick and choose from them. 

Here's a list that I would like to incorporate into our home for early elementary:

Notebooks for Nature, Math, Explorations

A Century Book (For history, it is a book with pages marked for every hundred years from 4,000 BCE to current time)

Narration of Literary Works 

Recitation, both secular poetry and biblical 

Living Books 

Resources:

Overview 

http://infed.org/mobi/charlotte-mason-education-atmosphere-habit-and-living-ideas/ 

Curriculum Resources

https://simplycharlottemason.com/planning/curriculum-guide/

Books

Charlotte Mason Education, Levison

More Charlotte Mason Education, Levison

Charlotte Mason's Volumes Online (Ambleside)

For your Homeschool Self

A Recovery Program by Diane Flynn Keith

Ecology {Introduction and Scope}

I started introducing little bits of Ecology to Indie this week. It's one of those subjects where learning seems to occur naturally but it's also nice to work on some nomenclature specific to this science. 

Ecology is the study of how living things interact with each other and the world around them. It's easy to talk about taking care of the earth AND scare the crap out of our kids. We do NOT want to do that! Montessori was very clear that our intent should not be to scare but to equip and empower. 

This week we talked a lot about a clean environment and a dirty environment. Our ongoing project is taking pictures!  

 Our toddler specific activity: 

We reused egg shells by spooning potting soil. The general idea is to water them and place a few seeds in for a beautiful new plant.  All our eggs ended up involved in a sensory experience and were pulverized.... so... fair warning :) 

For the next few weeks or so we will touch on these subjects:

Recycling

The natural world without any impact from humans

Dirty vs Clean environments

Upcycling/Reusing Materials

Erosion

Contour Farming

Resources:

Living and Nonliving Cards from The Homeschool Den

Ecology Manual from KHT Montessori (and corresponding cards)

ETC Montessori Ecology Scope and Sequence (for elementary, free and great!) 

Music Appreciation: Peter and The Wolf

We LOVE film scores around here. My entire iTunes account is just about every kid movie released in the past 5 years. It's a little hard to justify making a unit out of Megamind but maybe I'll hit some inspiration soon. 

I was super excited when Barrett mentioned that they had been introduced to Peter and the Wolf in his music class and loved it.  There is a reason it's such a classic. It's the perfect way to introduce the sounds of various instruments and the kids can all relate to the story.  I put together some of the resources we've been using this week. There are probably a million more if you search "peter and the wolf unit study" but this should get you started! 

The Helpful Garden has free instrument nomenclature cards. This blog has been an incredible resource. Go check her out, she is phenomenal. 

If you want to just print the instruments for this music:

Violin (Peter)

Bassoon (Grandfather)

Oboe (Duck)

Clarinet (Cat)

French Horns (Wolf)

Kettle Drum (Hunters)

Flute (Birds)

Sarah Jane Studios has a beautiful paper puppet theatre you can print and make for only $5.50. The kids needed a descent amount of help but it was a great together project for the afternoon. 

We have been enjoying this copy of the music by Prokofiev. The story is narrated by Sting, how fun is that? The kids didn't really care, but you know, I thought it was a nice change from "Let it Go." 

You can listen for Free here as well. 

This is the book we checked out from the library. It goes along very nicely with the recording so the kids can follow along. 

Making Sense of the Language Albums

I'm not sure why but I think that the Language Albums have been getting a bad reputation. I don't know if it's the length or the cost of getting a pre-made set or just that's it's a little different than the phonics first reading than spelling approach most of us grew up with. I've spent the last month or so going through the manual, making the materials and introducing a select few to the kiddos. It's really not so bad! I'm just going to give an overview and share some resources that will hopefully help make it seem not so scary. 

-Sounds are introduced first not letter names. I know that it's next to impossible to keep kids from learning the names of the letters but if you refer to them as the sound it makes reading a lot easier. 

-Lowercase first. 

-Except for the Pink, Blue and Green reading the kids could be working on various sections at the same time. It is not completely linear. 

Preparation

1. Practical life exercises many emphasize going left to right (for the english language)

 2. Sensorial exercises  this would be matching, rhyming, opposites, puzzles, what's missing

3. Writing this includes activities to strengthen the hand such as the metal insets, peg boards, lacing, markers and crayons

4. 3 Part Cards these are used a ton in various subjects. For language the idea is to introduce the concept so they are familiar

5. Oral Expression Drama, Poetry, Songs and simply having a conversation are included here. 

The rest of the album is normally split up into the different levels of reading. There is Pink, Blue and Green. There is nothing uniquely special about these. They just go from easiest to hardest. 

Pink Reading

1. Initial Sounds sandpaper letters, sound cards, sound boxes

2. Word Building moveable alphabet (BUY or MAKE) 

3. 2 or 3 Letter Phonetic Words. word pictures, word lists, sentence cards and single word books. You can find a TON of resources if you look for "CVC" words online. This is the same thing. 

Blue Reading

1. Word Building with 4 or more letter words

2.  4 or More Phonetic Words word pictures, word lists, sentence cards, i spy, blue books

Green Reading

1. Introduction Digraph sandpaper letters, phonogram cards, phonogram classification cards

2. Reading word and picture cards and books 

3. Word Building All of these activities are done with the moveable alphabet and include topics such as consonant digraphs, homophones, silent long e. Find affordable options Here or (even better FREE) 

Grammar

Grammar Symbols Resource

1. Nouns noun box, animal farm, singular and plural

2. Articles "a" "an" "the" definite and indefinite

3. Adjectives noun adjective box, phonetic farm

4. Verbs verb game, noun-verb box, phonetic farm +verbs and Adverbs adverb game, adverb-verb box

5.  Prepositions, Conjunctions, Pronouns and Interjections are all introduced one at a time. 

Writing

Metal Insets, in the air, cornmeal, sound patterns, chalkboard, wide lined paper, capital letters sentence cards

Finding the Manual:

The Helpful Garden Free- she does an amazing job

Montessori Print Shop Manual and Language Bundles 

Montessori Album

KHT Montessori You can purchase individual albums or enroll in the certification course.