School this past week . . . or two . . . or three

Whew!  I took a bit of a break there!  Life has been getting a bit hectic, trying to fit in my work, E's school, housecleaning, and holiday crafting!!  I'm still feeling the pressure, so I probably won't be posting quite as much as we head into the holidays, but I'm going to try to get some school posts in here and there.  We ARE doing school time - 2 to 3 days a week.  I'm trying hard to keep 2 days with our Montessori work, the third day is often baking, nature walks, and art projects.  Another day in the week we have MOPS, our moppettes program is awesome, they really do some good "bible school" type work with the kiddos.

Anyhow, last week we had "pajama school!"  Every morning E woke up and wanted to do school work but would not get out of her jammies.  Isn't it great to be home and not have to put on real clothes until you want to?

Tuesday was an awesome day all around. I went to take a shower and when I came out, E was already hard at work with the continents map.

She also made up her own extension for the shape stacker.

 
I finally got around to printing out the pumpkin life cycle three part cards.  And I thought I would give it a go using the words as well as the pictures this time.  E really enjoyed the work.  I was pleasantly surprised that she was able to match most of the words on her own.  She got triped up on "seed" and "seedling" - I think that one was the only one she didn't self-correct. 

We also put together a pumpkin life cycle on a paper plate.  I got this printable from  A to Z teacher stuff, it includes a lesson plan (more for older kids) and these lift-the-flap type coloring pictures.  I had E match the words on this as well, first I wrote the word on the paper plate, then I had her find the coloring picture that matched and glue it on top of the word I wrote.

Other work E did this week included the sandpaper numbers (she traced them all and helped me put them back in the correct order), and the brown stair.  After she built the stair correctly on her own, I showed her how to match the pink tower cubes up to it.  E thought this was the coolest thing ever!  I just love the enthusiasm of the preschool set!

I'm currently (well as soon as I get off the computer) switching out practical life and language activities in the school room.  I'll have a post up on what's out as soon as I finish. 

Linking this post up to Montessori Monday at One Hook Wonder.

Montessori Monday

I'm still having internet issues, so Montessori Monday is up on Tuesday.  Oh, well.  The issues probably won't get resolved until August, so bear with me!  This week, I had one stubborn 2 1/2 year old and one 3 1/2 year old monkey in school.  Isn't that fun?!?  E is reacting, I think, to the fact that I am spending time working with K instead of solely with her.  And K just has a fantastic imagination.  This week he pretended to be Curious George.  He did work, and worked well for the most part - just pretended to be a monkey the whole time!  I am debating on whether I should run with this, and create a few monkey works for him - how about a monkey/ape sorting activity - or downplay the whole thing so he doesn't get out of hand. 

Sensorial:
E worked on geometric solids.  She worked on matching them to their face cards again.  I finally got around to getting the cards from Montessori for Everyone, so hopefully we can work with those this week.  E really likes the ovoid shape.  She put everything else away, but wanted to carry that one around to do her other work.

I presented the circle and rectangle drawers from the geometric cabinet to E.  She enjoyed them and wanted to do more drawers, so I guess I know what's on the agenda for this week!

K worked with the yellow and green cylinders, matching them up together.

I also presented the brown stair to him.

Practical Life:
E and K both got to cut bananas for snack.

K's favorite activity is STILL sorting the fruit!

We did a little spooning and pouring, I think I need to change out those activities so they'll be more interested.

Language:
Both kids have been interested in the sandpaper letters and alphabet drawers.  And I've been scouring my home, trying to find small objects to put into the alphabet drawers!  I had K do a sort between two drawers, then of course E wanted to do it too!  I do have a few more drawers available now, so that made it more fun.  They loved finding new objects!

K worked with sandpaper letters and the sand tray.  He loves this and wants to do the whole alphabet!!  I think I'll start him on some more pre-reading skills, and pull out the moveable alphabet for him.

Math:
K worked more with the counting sticks.  He asked me to make more for the rest of the numbers. (Mine only go to 5).  I don't think more stones will fit on the sticks, so I guess it's time for cards and counters!

E loves to work with the sandpaper numbers.  She traces them (sometimes even correctly!) and names them.  Sometimes we work on putting them all in order.  She wants to be like K and write the numbers in the sand tray, but usually we just end up making shapes and pictures instead.