We started as we have so many days, with our morning song, yoga (down dog shown here), our moment of silence, and then moved into our day. I have treasured these days with this group of students, but as we head into our last week of school, I am trying to soak up every last minute with them. We've had so many fun things going on for so long. Today, it was so nice just to be with them and enjoy them. It was beautifully ordinary.

a first loose tooth!!!

picking dandelions for a fairy house

White Pine Montessori School is a preschool located in a nurturing home setting in the Bethlehem - Littleton NH area. White Pine Montessori inspires children to develop their own natural independence, self esteem, and love of life and learning.

We spent a lot of time looking at the cecropia moth today. Moths sleep during the day, so he wasn't terribly active. But every time he fluttered his wings, the children fluttered around excitedly. We think it's a male because in a movie we watched about cecropia moths it mentioned that males have more developed, feathery antenae. 

We looked at his cocoon and tried to figure out how he got out because there was only a small hole at one end. Children colored in pictures of the moth. No one was particularly interested in matching the colors, so we had beautiful pink, green, purple, rainbow,... cecropia moths.

We also had human visitors today. A brother and sister, 3  and 4, and their parents spent the morning with us. We enjoyed meeting them and showing them around.

In the midst of the all the excitement, we found time to work too.

At the end of the morning we brought the moth outside to set him free. As we were passing him around on a piece of wood, it flew to the ground. We gathered around him and patiently watched. As children got closer, some offering it grass to eat, the moth decided it was time to leave. It fluttered around clumsily, bumping into several of us before taking flight. It was off!

White Pine Montessori School is a preschool located in a nurturing home setting in the Bethlehem - Littleton NH area. White Pine Montessori inspires children to develop their own natural independence, self esteem, and love of life and learning.

Right after the last student left today, I checked on our cocoons and found that the cecropia moth had emerged from its cocoon. It must have come out while we were outside playing. Darn! It is spectacularly beautiful. 

I checked online to find out what they eat and found that they eat nothing. Their only purpose is to mate. They live for a few weeks and then die. So I'll be able to keep it over night. We'll have plenty of time to look at it before we release it to find it's mate.

Poor Nellie is so sleepy. She needs a nap. Yesterday I finished the "n" book and the "j" book, Julia Jumps. (It's a good one!) This means the only book I have left to write in the Amazing Sound Series is the "s" book. 

I don't want to ruin the ending of Nellie, but I don't want to keep you in too much suspense either. So I'll let you know that after some challenges, Nellie does find a good place to take her nap

White Pine Montessori School is a preschool located in a nurturing home setting in the Bethlehem - Littleton NH area. White Pine Montessori inspires children to develop their own natural independence, self esteem, and love of life and learning.

I tried to get a sub today so that I could go see Emma play Taps on her trumpet for the Bethlehem Elementary Memorial Day Assembly. I wasn't able to find a sub, but the weather cleared up, so we all walked down for the assembly. There we saw a short movie about what Memorial Day is about and the band played The Star Spangled Banner. 

Then we went outside to watch the flag get raised up. We said the Pledge of Allegiance and it concluded with Emma playing Taps. We saw some older siblings and friends while we were there and we received a round of applause from the students when we were introduced to the rest of the school. The children paid close attention to all that was going on and seemed to enjoy all it very much.

On the walk back we stopped to see two men preparing to pour a new concrete driveway. A little later we stopped at the brook to have a snack.

After eating our snack we threw rocks, pinecones, and dandelions into the water and one of our friends found...

a frog! 

We brought it back and after much debate the children named it Rainbow. We made Rainbow a temporary home in our school for the day.

When we got back we also got to eat the butterfly snacks that one of our friends made to share with us. One wing had pretzels and the other wing had grapes!

After eating the snack, we colored coffee filters with markers, sprayed them with water, let them dry...

and made new butterflies to take home. What fun to have a snack that turned into a craft!

White Pine Montessori School is a preschool located in a nurturing home setting in the Bethlehem - Littleton NH area. White Pine Montessori inspires children to develop their own natural independence, self esteem, and love of life and learning.

More story writing today. One child couldn't find a picture that she liked so she drew her own princess, rainbow, and castle. She wrote, "The PRisEs is Going to the casol," all on her own. (The princess is going to the castle.)

Another child found a picture of tasty looking macaroni and cheese and wrote, "MMMMMMMMMMMMM," all on her own too and practiced writing her name.

The woodpecker came back to the basketball hoop this morning while we were inside, so we got a good view of it!

White Pine Montessori School is a preschool located in a nurturing home setting in the Bethlehem - Littleton NH area. White Pine Montessori inspires children to develop their own natural independence, self esteem, and love of life and learning. 

We've been trying to catch a glimpse of a "birdpecker", as one of our friend calls it, for a few weeks now. Today some of us saw it pecking away at a metal ladder before it flew off. A little while later it was pecking on our basketball hoop. What's up with a woodpecker that prefers metal? Does anyone know anything about this?

Holey socks - look at those toes! That sock is hanging on by a thread! 

Do all kids make "kites" or is it something that a child did here years ago and it has just stuck? I don't know, but children here really enjoy making kites...

and flying them. 

White Pine Montessori School is a preschool located in a nurturing home setting in the Bethlehem - Littleton NH area. White Pine Montessori inspires children to develop their own natural independence, self esteem, and love of life and learning. 

Some of the children were sleepy today, and with the rain, it seemed like a good day to pull out some pillows and blankets and read.

Children have spent a lot of time learning the sounds that letters make this year. We have also played lots of sound games to learn to identify the individual sounds in words. As a result some children are now able to write independently. 

Story Writing with Amy is a favorite activity this year. Children cut out a picture from a magazine, glue it to story paper and write about it. Amy has done a fantastic job helping them to hear sounds and teaching them to write some basic sight words. Some children are able to write their stories with no help at all, while others dictate their story so Amy can write for them, and still others are somewhere in between. We read all the stories written each day at our ending circle.

Montessori believed that writing comes before reading; that it is easier to hear the sounds in words and record them than it is to put the individual sounds together as when reading. Writing reinforces the skills needed to read. I see this with my students and I am thrilled that continue to choose this activity again and again..

Here are some examples of our writing from yesterday...

"THE PCOK iS Eting NECtR" 

(The peacock is eating nectar)

"this POLR BAR WENT IN to tHE AtLANTIC OSHN ANd IS COMING BAC FROM iT."

(This polar bear went in to the Atlantic Ocean and is coming back from it) 

I forgot to post our painted and decorated rock Moms after our tea party.  Each mother took one home and one lucky mother, with two kids at school, got two! I have to credit Danielle's Place for the idea and the Gale River for the rocks.

This has been such an exciting year of teaching. Our students are so motivated to learn and work so hard at it. Sandpaper Letters are one of the ways in which reading and writing are first introduced to young children in Montessori schools. My first year of teaching I couldn't get anyone very excited about working with them, but this year children have been so enthusiastic about Sandpaper Letters. Some days there are so many requests, that we spend a good portion of the day on them.

One young child who had just barely turned three asked me early on in the year to work with Sandpaper Letters. She didn't seem to absorb much from day to day, but she kept asking each day. We spent many, many days working on the same first three letters, "m", "a", and "s". In spite of her apparent lack of progress, she was eager and enthusiastic each time. 

And then one day... something started clicking! She's worked hard at it all year long and has learned almost all of her sounds now. 

This determination, enthusiasm and desire to learn has been widespread this year. It is beautiful to behold and makes teaching a joy!