Little-Ns Own Origami Creations

Little-N loves origami. He has worked on some basic models and folds over the years. This year he has taken origami to another level and is now creating his own models. Below is a swan model that he made up.

 Little-Ns origami swans.

A row of Little-Ns swans in his room.

Little-N showing some of his friends how to make his origami swan.

Peeling and Cutting Carrots

Little-N enjoys cooking and preparing food. I noticed that he didn't peel vegetables properly so I reintroduced him to the carrot peeling activity.

Flower Arranging

Everyday we have a vase full of fresh flowers on display in the Practical Life area.

Below the vase we have a flower arranging activity which is basically a tray that contains various small vases and a pair of scissors.

Children are shown how to take a vase, fill it half way with water and use the scissors to cut the flowers they would like in their vase.

Here is an example of a four year old's flowers. Very nice!

The child can then take their vase to the table that their working at and put in the top left corner of their table. Having flowers at a child's table makes such a difference to their concentration and well-being.

Advanced Practical Life: Following Instructions

I purchased a mini green house for the garden. This time I didn't build it, instead I left it up to Little-N to read the instructions and build the green house. Reading instructions and following them is an important skill that everyone needs to learn. Unfortunately I know too many adults that dismiss the instructions and go ahead assembling something. Usually they end up with a lot more work, if not a total disaster. Thankfully Little-N followed the instructions and did really well.

Lots of weaving

In my classroom I have taken away the early practical life activities and started to put more advanced work. I started the class with simple practical life activities for a reason you can read about in this post and this post. I no longer need the simple activities any more, but practical life is still equally important for older children. Over the next few weeks I will be adding many interesting advanced practical life activities, some indoors and some outdoors. I will try to post about as many as I can.

To start off, weaving has been a big hit with the boys. The first picture shows a circular weaving loom, I like this as it is short and simple so a child could maybe finish it in a day or two. This loom makes really cute weaved circles perfect for coasters. I bought mine for 20p but I am sure that you can easily make one at home.

This is a wooden weaving loom that I bought for £1 and its perfect. Really well made and simple to work with. One of the older boys [8yrs] sat and weaved for 30mins! We haven't completed a mat yet, so I am excited to see their faces once I take the mat of the loom.

You can easily make a loom and I blogged about the ones I made years ago here. These are nice because each child can have their own loom. Unfortunately only a few children actually finished their work, so we had many unfinished looms in the classroom. The wooden loom pictured above is for collective work, all children get to do a bit and when its finished we will use the mat in my classroom.

Years ago we also made felt weaved mats which the children took to display at home. The instructions for them are here.

Baking Cinnamon Rolls

On Monday the children made cinnamon rolls. Here are a few pictures of the activity. We used a bread machine to make the dough.

Cleaning Chores

Recently I have been reading 'Montessori Today' by Paula Polk Lillard and found some very interesting ideas that i wanted to include in my class. In chapter 7 ' Freedom and Responsibilities',  Lillard talks about the elementary children taking on nearly complete responsibility for the classroom. She goes on to discuss three steps to help the children to develop a total responsibility of the environment.

Since I do not have an assistant or co teacher, I sometimes find myself lost in the daily cleaning, checking and making new materials. The children do help, but I haven't relied on them to really take responsibility, but this week I changed that. I called a class meeting and explained that it would be great fun if we could all share the responsibilities, I explained that everyone will have chores that they must make sure the do them before lunch and before home time. I asked the children which areas of the class would need daily care and cleaning, we listed the following areas. 

-Language area

-Mathematics area

-Cultural area

-advanced practical life area

-Sensorial area

-Bins

-Cleaning tables and chairs

-Mats

-Floor

-Library and books

The children volunteered for the areas they would like to be responsible for this month. I'm so grateful that all my children are so co-operative. I made a chores chart and placed it on the notice board. Everyone was so excited.

Close to lunch time, all the children independently began doing their chores. When all the chores were done, we gathered all the children and went around the class for inspection, checking if shelves were dusty, if there was mess behind the bin and if all the materials were straight and complete. The inspection, helps the children see where they have forgotten or missed things, I try not to be the one that points something out, but let them find the mistake themselves.

With each area, I sat with the child explaining what needs to be done and how to count and check that materials are complete.

So far, my class has been completely spotless thanks to the children!

Weaving

Recently the children in my class have been weaving with paper, felt and wool. I start the children off with simple paper weaving, then felt weaving and then I move them onto string weaving on a weaving loom.

To make the felt mat, you need an A4 piece of felt and felt strips. Fold the A4 piece in half lenght ways and starting from the folded end cut straight lines up to the top making sure you stop before the edge. My slits were about 1 inch apart. This is the same technique used when making a paper lantern. Next give the children strips of different coloured felt and show them how to weave those in. I used a stapler or pegs to secure the felt strips in place while weaving. After all the strips have been weaved in, sew the edges. This is Little-N's mat, he decided to make a pattern with his colours.

Those children who were successful on weaving a felt mat soon moved onto making a weaving loom. I decided that I want each child to have their own loom they can work on when they wish [instead of just one classroom loom]. I made a cardboard loom for each child following instructions found here. The older children made their own looms with a few directions from me. Everyone seems to doing a bit of weaving daily. I'm using all my left over yarn from knitting projects in my weaving loom and its nice to see how I can have bits of all my projects in one weaved mat.

Enjoying some sewing

Recently some of the children have been enjoying the sewing activity. I moved this activity from the table to the floor and the children seem to settle more while doing it on the floor. Each child has his/her own sewing project, all projects are kept in a basket. In the picture 2 children were having a great conversation while working on their sewing projects. The children are sewing on plastic canvas using an embroidery needle. I get them to do a row around the edge and then explore with the patterns they can make sewing in the middle.

Bindeez

Recently we added the Bindeez activity to our creative area. This is similar to 'Hama beads' that are used to make designs and then you iron to join the beads, however with the Bindeez you don't need an iron, just water. The activity consists of: a tray, a small bowl to hold the balls, a Bindeez tray and tweezers. The child choose a template from the drawer and then uses the tweezers to place the balls in the correct place on the Bindeez mat. Once the child has finished his design, he takes the spray bottle, fills it and then sprays the design. We then leave them overnight on the window sill to dry.

We keep the extra templates, refill balls and spray bottle in a little drawer on the shelf where the activity is kept. We also made some 3-D designs with them. The pictures are of Little-N working hard with this activity.

Mint Tea Activity

I have shown the children at school how to make their own mint tea. Usually when we have guest a child would offer to make mint tea for them.The child goes into the garden and picks some fresh mint leaves, s/he washes them and prepares the mugs. I put the kettle on and pour the hot water for the child. They then have to walk very carefully with a hot mug of mint tea [great practice for coordination]. In the picture Little-N is sitting at the snack table with a cup of tea he made for himself!!

Radish cutting

Last spring the children planted radish seeds in the garden. Now that the radish plants are fully grown the children are free to pick the radish and prepare it to eat. In the pictures 'Lion' [5yrs] picked a radish, tore off the roots, washed it to get all the mud off, then washed the sink to clean it from the mud. Next he got his chopping board, plate and knife and chopped the radish into bit size pieces. He then helped a younger child with another radish. He and a younger child sat happily at the snack table eating radish that they have grown, washed and cut independently.