Dear Parents,

         It is that time of the New Year when we begin assembling the classes for the next year. We rely on our current students to help body out the “experience” of the class while the remaining students are new! This is truly how the dynamics of a maturing Montessori class measures out year to year.

     Already, since our return to school, we are averaging three phone calls of interest a day and we are touring about the same number of families each week.  Some prefer or are only able to come during the weekend – but the bottom line is they are coming!!!

      Rest assured we will always have a place for your child (ren) FIRST! We will not enroll over capacity. We will complete our process of re-enrollment and sibling enrollment from our current CVMS family members.

      To facilitate the re-enrollment process we have attached the following information for you to consider:

1. Program Outline and Schedule of Fees

2. Enrollment Agreement Form

      Please let us know by January 31^st of your intent to re-enroll by returning the enrollment agreement. This WILL hold your reservation in your preferred program (age requirements notwithstanding).  Following this schedule will allow us to open enrollment to new students as they come in.

      If you have questions as to what program may be best for your child, please do not hesitate to call me. I will be more than happy to discuss this with you.

      Please read the programming options offered for the 2010 -2011 school year carefully.  We have tweaked a few numbers.  Basically, tuition has remained stable. Because we do not have a cost of living increase in tuition a sibling discount may be applied for the third child enrolled. 

      Once again, we are excited to offer the very best in Montessori education we can by adding dynamic new staff members and programming. We look forward to continuing and growing our relationships with each and every one of you and your children!

 Claire Doody, M.A., M.Ed., Director

“As soon as children find something that interests them they loose their instability and learn to concentrate”

                                                          Maria Montessori – “The Secrets of Childhood”

We see this happening each day, and we just need to catch the signals through which the children let us know what are they interested in. For the month of January the planets did a great job in this regard. It is rewarding to see that children so young can learn so many facts and grasp such abstract concepts. I will mention science activities first, and then point to what is new in each of the Montessori areas.

Science:

-          Planets, some characteristics, their distances from the sun

-          Earth’s rotation, day/night, time zones

-          Earth’s revolution, seasons

-          Gravity

The children learned firsthand how difficult it is to spin and move in an orbit at the same time, that the further a planet is from the sun the longer it takes for it to orbit once, that gravity is how the Earth keeps us from wandering off into space, and because of gravity, everything that goes up comes down. We talked about satellites, asteroids, comets, space ships, we read about how people figured out the Earth is a sphere and made the first maps, and we looked at pictures taken from outer space.

Amphibians, their life cycle, habitats and some strange looking members of this group, such as the red-eyed frog tree and salamanders, caught the children’s interest and fascination.

Daily Living:

Cleaning up and working with water transfer activities is running smoother as the children are more able to control and coordinate their movements and are by now accustomed to taking care of their environment. They have great appreciation for beauty and order and are sure to notice when something is out of place.

The generous snow gave us a few opportunities for large motor skills exercises by just walking and jumping in the deep snow.   

Sensorial

In sensorial area, we paid special attention on spatial relationships and dimensions: big/small, large/larger/largest, far/near, close/closer/closest, long/longer/longest, around, in front/behind, up/down etc. To coordinate with science we reviewed the sphere, the ellipsoid, the cube, and the pyramids from the geometric solids.

Language

We read folktales from “When the World Was Young” and “When Stories Fell like Shooting Stars” about the creation of the universe. Children were able to discern between fiction and true facts, and pointed that long ago people did not know as much as we know today. We looked into books about frogs, planets, Africa, and deserts, and discussed “The Stone-Palm Tree”, a story from the Sahara about courage in taking a challenge and thus becoming stronger.

Math

The planets were handy again for practicing the ordinal numerals. Mathematical concepts are used throughout the day, besides the Montessori materials. Come and see some lessons at the parents’ night (February 2^nd, 6-8 p.m.)

 Geography, Environment and Cultural

Our trip around the Earth continued in Africa. We elaborated on Sahara, some characteristics of deserts, and Egypt with its ancient culture.

Arts and Crafts

Dropping paint and rolling marbles in paint as orbits, are the reasons for the strange pieces of artwork you will see in coming home. The children also came up with original Solar Systems in their paintings or by pasting circles of various sizes.

The pyramidal stack of cardboard squares, our replica of the Egyptian monuments, summarizes abilities to organize, compare, sequence, and relate to the pink tower, geometric solids, and math squares.

 Songs/Dances of the month:

The Man who Lived in the Moon, Space Trip, African Playground, a children’s song    from Ethiopia, Pata-Pata from South Africa, and Songs from a Zulu Farm.

 Stay tuned for upcoming events and the units of study in February.

 Dorina Nimigean

Happy New Year with good health, good spirits and peace!

We trust the twelve days of winter vacation brought each of us what we wished for: time with the family, time to cook, to rest, to read, to listen, to count the blessings, time to dream and think of better times.

December went swirling like the first snow of the season. From all of the new activities and lessons we added, I will mention bellow some of the favorites: grinding anise and cloves, matching scents, wrapping a present, and playing the dreidel.

Evergreen trees came to our classroom in stories and in small branches (Spruce, Balsam Fir, Hemlock, White Pine, Holly). Following a brief description on their characteristics, the children visited the display table touching, observing with the magnifying glass, and learning to match the labels with the trees.

With so many beautiful stories to choose from we spent more time than before for reading and discussing. Among the most favorite books: “The Mitten”, by Jan Brett, “The Selfish Giant” by Oscar Wilde, “Frog in Winter” by Max Velthuijs, “Why Christmas Trees Aren’t Perfect” by Richard Schneider, “The Nut Cracker” by A. Hoffman,  “The Twelve Days of Christmas”, “The Night Before Christmas” or “The Story of Hanukkah”.

With the “The Snow Tree” by Caroline Repchuck we learned about symbols and similes. After recreating the story in which animals decorate a pine tree to bring the colors back, we took turns in choosing a new decoration and finding a meaning for the objects we picked. What a delight to listen to the reasoning: “I put the little mouse because it reminds me of cheese”, “the bed is for when I am sick”, “if you have faith, you’ll be alright”!

Birds and their characteristics were studied through books, charade-games, and crafts (we recycled the feathers from Albuquerque Turkey and toilet paper rolls to make one kind of a bird). We learned that some animals migrate, some stay active and are adapted for cold temperatures (thicker fur, feathers, and fat), and some hide and sleep. From the last group some have a deep sleep (hibernate) and some have a light sleep and once in a while munch on the food they stored in fall.

With the continent of the month being South America we also touched on the rain forest with books and floor puzzles. Discussions about life in the tropical climate will continue as we move through Africa, Asia and Australia.

Besides singing, we listened to parts from Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker Ballet, to Vivaldi’s Winter, to music from South America, and we danced on Carnavalito from Bolivia.

Thank you:

- For coming to our sing along into the holidays. These children do love to sing. Their joy to  see you there was worth all your efforts.

- For all the wonderful presents you showered us with.

- To Mei Ling’s mom for donating a real stuffed owl and for putting together feather displays  and activities kits to expand our studies of birds.

We welcome three new students Aidan Doyle, Rachel Cassily and Amal Krishna who will join us beginning January 3^rd, and we extend our best wishes to Zachary Elmer who has moved to a new school.

In January we will talk about planets, earth’s shape, rotation (day/night), revolution (seasons), maps, and compasses. As usual, we will move from stories to the scientific facts through experiments and games. Animals: amphibians. Cultural: Africa

We will start sending a raccoon (not a real one:) to spend a weekend at home with a child, and to be brought back to school the following Monday. The host child will have a chance to be in the spotlight while sharing with us some moments from the raccoon’s visit. A journal will be provided for children to draw pictures, write or tell about their care for the raccoon.

Kindergartners and Junior Kindergartners

In December we introduced the exchange game. The children familiar with the decimal system learned to exchange ten units for a ten, ten tens for a hundred and ten hundreds for a thousand in order to solve problems with dynamic addition, multiplication, and division.

A daily routine is working with numbers that add up to teens. After using the counters repeatedly, some children begin to discover with great joy and excitement they no longer need the props: they can add the numbers in their heads. Memory work is also fostered by using addition charts.

Before we sent the birds home we used them in a short puppet show; a fun way to practice verbal skills, clear communication, roll playing, to wait for turns, to show and enjoy appreciation.

Reading is becoming more challenging as new phonograms and sight words are found in longer texts or in science books. With patience, repetition and encouragement we are building up the basics of written vocabulary.

 It is important to establish a routine in reading every day; be an example and have yourself a good time with a book. Keep in mind that “Children have never been very good at listening to their elders, but they have never failed to imitate them” – James Baldwin

 Dorina Nimigean