Did someone say there's a vacation?

Oh, my!  There is no denying that vacation is upon us.  The excitement and energy level of the classroom this week could not be ignored!  It was quite a week - one which even included a two hour weather delay…  I am always thankful for the opportunity to work with my students, but it sure is wonderful to have a break!  Here are just a few pictures from our rather hectic week:

Making shapes with the Constructive Triangles.

Using labels to act out verbs and then symbolize them.

Reading and sequencing the Gingerbread Men poem.

Using Box C of the Constructive Triangles to create interesting designs and patterns.

Looking at patterns and dimension with the Pink Tower and Brown Stair.

Coloring always has such a calming effect - we have been enjoying these Nutcracker pages to go along with listing to the much of the Nutcracker ballet.

Many students are moving along with Language work and are sounding out and building words with the Moveable Alphabet.

Addition facts with colored beads.

A group of children worked on this and repeated it a few mornings in a row.  It is always exciting when they explore materials and work collaboratively!

A Little Christmas Gift

Each year, the children make a small gift to take home at the holidays.  In in keeping with recent years of tradition and making tree ornaments, this year's class completed a variation on the same theme:

We rolled Christmas-themed scrapbook paper with pencils and placed them in clear ornaments (which is a fantastic fine-motor exercise, by the way!)...

…and added a little bow.  Very simple, yet festive - best of all, the children took such pride in making them and are looking forward to sharing them with their families!

The Sounds and Sights of December in the Classroom

It's been a busy couple of weeks and the classroom has been filled with the sights and sounds of the season.  Here is a collection of photos from the last two weeks of school:

Using a scoop to transfer jingle bells.

Practicing putting on gloves.

Teen numbers with the Teen Bead Hanger and number labels.

Working sensorially with the Binomial Cube.

Pairing Sound Cylinders -  refining auditory discrimination.

Tracing and naming shapes from the Geometric Demonstration Tray.

Practicing making tally marks.  

Reading sentence practice.

Matching bells by pitch.

This poinsettia paper craft is always popular with the children! :-)

I added a basket of letter stamps to the play dough.  Several of the children have enjoyed building words in the play dough or giving each gingerbread man a letter.

Visual discrimination of size using all four of the Solid Cylinders.

Patterns with shapes and colors using the pattern board.

Opening/Closing practice with different shaped boxes - each box has a little bell inside.

Brown Stair exploration with the red Knobless Cylinders.

Here is something I haven't seen in my classroom until now -  The Pink Tower with Knobless Cylinders.

This is what happened after bit more exploration.

Ending sounds of words using the Language Step Board.

Animal puzzles:  Parts of the Bird

Working with the Puzzle Map of Africa and learning the names of countries.

Sequencing days of the week and numbers with the December calendar.

Number 1-20 writing practice.

Static Addition with golden beads.

Reading practice: blending sounds with the Vowel Tree.

Decimal system cards and golden beads.

Exploring dimension of size with the Pink Tower and Brown Stair.

Making words with 'ar' using the Small Moveable Alphabet.

Three-Part Reading Cards

Tracing leaf shapes from the Botany Cabinet.

Writing words with the Moveable Alphabet.

Setting out the Decimal System Cards (while wearing the word 'the' on a lanyard) :-).

A verb lesson with grammar symbols.

Phonemic awareness:  blending sounds in words.  (Please visit Trillium Montessori's Teacher Pay Teacher's site for this lesson and other wonderful materials!)

Building the Pink Tower.

Using the smallest Red Rod to measure the others.

A seasonal number sequencing work.

Land, Air, Water:  picture sorting.

Tally Mark Practice

One of the skills practiced by my Kindergarten students is making tally marks.  This is practiced on a daily basis in the their Calendar Notebooks as they track the number of days in each month as well as the daily weather.  I have noticed that this skill is one that could stand some additional practice, so I put together a hands-on lesson highlighting the tally mark concept.

Craft stick tally marks -  it's very simple yet concrete.   I added a basket of small stones each with the numbers 1-15. Later I plan to add numbers 16-20 - I just ran out of craft sticks…!

Tally Marks 1-10.