Our School Library

After finding this haul of books at the local thrift shop, I decided it was high time I reorganize our little "library" of children's books and learning books.

My first job was to separate our books into piles by subject. James and Juliet helped. : )

Next, I used dot stickers to visual discriminate each subject. I couldn't find inexpensive dots in the variety of colors I needed, so I purchased some plain white dots and colored them with markers.

I created this legend to help James find what he needs. For example, for homework each night, James must read a book to his father. I tell him to go to the classroom and select any one of his readers, which are the green group. He knows where to get them and, most importantly, where to return them!

After a lot of thought, I decided to use one of the bookcases in our classroom. I know this seems like an obvious choice for school books, but I actually had a hard time giving up two of our Montessori shelves. That is, until I determined our new routine and realized we'll be using less of our shelves for tray work.

There are a couple of baskets to hold the smaller collections of books, such as our Nat Geo's for kids.

Our reference books (encyclopedias, dictionaries,etc.), my teaching books and manuals, and any other textbooks are on a bookcase just outside the classroom. James has lots of non-school type books and all of those are on the bookcase in his bedroom.

At the moment, I have no desire (read: energy) to catalog our all of books. I know there are a variety of awesome online resources that would help me do this, but our selection is still relatively small and quite manageable. :)

~Thank you for your comments!~

Our New Routine

I mentioned in a recent post that I have been re-evaluating our curriculum and how we do school. With the help of Jolanthe's Homeschool Planner worksheet, I created this schedule:

There were key subjects I knew I wanted to cover, some more frequently than others (e.g., math, writing, reading). I also wanted a variety of topics within each day because while James is a creature of habit and routine, I knew it was important that I keep our school time interesting and new at the same time. For example, we do an "art study" every Thursday, but the art that we study is different each time.

Every Sunday evening I plan out our schedule for the coming week by writing in specific notes on the template. I refer to this schedule during our school time and I make a check mark as we finish a subject. I do this so that upon review I can quickly see what's done and what isn't. There are days when we may have to skip a lesson here or there, and because it's not checked I'll see that I need to cover that material tomorrow.

After I've planned our schedule, I gather together all of the materials we'll need for each day and I create "daily trays". I place these trays on the shelves of one of our bookcases. This is not unlike workboxes in the sense that the child simply goes to one spot to collect their work for the day. Each morning James goes to shelves, gets the tray of the day, brings it to the table, and knows that everything on that tray is what we have to work on.

On each tray is a clear folder that holds that day's worksheets. I purchased three Kindergarten and 1st grade workbooks and I simply tear out several pages for each day. Occasionally I add in worksheets I've found online, too.

At the end of the day we paperclip the completed worksheets and put them into this folder. My husband really enjoys seeing what James has done, and James is so proud to show his daddy his school work!

I also have a "teacher tray" where I keep books I use repeatedly throughout the week (e.g., our chapter read-aloud, our reading comp. book, etc.). This is really handy as it keeps my materials separate from James'.

At the end of each week I save the completed schedules in my organizer. This is helpful because it serves as a record of what we've done and it also provides me with a clear idea of what we need to cover. By the way, I must mention that I *love* my organizer! I haven't quite decided how to use it to its full potential, but so far it's been a great help. Inside of it I keep a copy of our monthly calendar, notes, ideas, planning sheets, Weekly Reader teaching guides, as well as pouches filled with writing tools and stickers.

That's one other thing that's been a fun new addition to our school time - the stickers! I remembered that I used to love when my teachers put stickers on my worksheets to show they were pleased with my work. I found loads of these little stickers at the local teacher's supply store. James was just tickled when I pulled them out and I've noticed he puts in a bit more effort in the hopes he'll get a sticker!

Many thanks to my wonderful friend, Terri, for this idea. I made this schedule sheet for James and I keep it posted in our classroom next to our calendar so he can see what's coming. He really likes it and often looks over to it and announces what we're doing next. We start school at about 8:30/9am (or later... depends on how motivated we are in the morning!) and the entire routine takes us about 3 hours. This works out well since our afternoons are usually busy with playing, errands, or classes. (BTW, "morning exercises" is just a more grown up way of referring to "circle time". : ) You can read more about our circle time here.)

I'm really, really pleased with our new schedule and learning method. I like that we're still using our classroom despite the fact that much of our work comes from books and worksheets. We have school every day in our classroom and work at the little table in there. Three times a week James does "shelf work" where for 30 minutes he can work on anything on our shelves. Currently, the work on our shelves is from our mini-units. (Side note: I thought we'd move through those MUCH more quickly than we have - there are 3 units we have yet to cover!) When we get through those I will create only a handful of trays each month.

For the moment, our "curriculum" is really just a hodgepodge of methods using various books, workbooks and tactile materials. Beginning next fall we'll be using more specific methods for our core subjects.

In the next week or two I hope to share about our new school library!

PS: here's a recent pic of my sweet pea. I just can't get enough of that smile!!

~Thank you for your comments!~

Instrument Basket

This is just a small and simple addition to our classroom, but one that has really livened up an already lively circle time!

We sing a lot of songs during our circle times and it occurred to me it'd be fun to have a basket of instruments for us to use as musical accompaniment. We have quite a few instruments, thanks to our years in Kindermusik, but I'll only put four or so in the basket at a time and then rotate them out every month.

James gets so excited when it comes time to chose his instrument and he takes the selection process quite seriously! :) He loves having the choice instead of being told "this is what instrument you're using today" (as is the case in Kindermusik).

~Thank you for your comments!~

Classroom Tour

Ok, here it is - our new classroom! It's quite a bit different than our old classroom now that we have an entire room to devote just to school. This, of course, means we do not have a guest bedroom/office and any future children we may be blessed with will have to share a room with one another. We're more than fine with all of that. Since we decided to homeschool, we realized it only makes sense to devote an area to that purpose.

Anyway, on with the tour...

The next 4 photos will give you a 360 overview of the room starting from the vantage point of the door. You'll notice the room is broken down into several areas all of which I'll go through in a minute.I was sure to keep in mind that this is James' classroom, therefore wherever possible everything is displayed at his height.

There are three large windows that let in lots of natural light and we haven't needed to use the overhead light as a result. One teeny tiny thing that irks me a little is that the curtain rods were hung too high by the previous tenant so the curtains are a bit short for the windows. :)

I was lucky to find 5 very similar bookcases here on the island. Not an easy thing to do when supplies and variety are so limited. It's hard to tell from the photo, but the rug is very soft and colorful - I think I found it at Target.

That's the entrance to the right. There's LOTS of storage space behind those closet doors.

Now for more details. One thing I made a point of doing was incorporating many special, personal affects into our classroom.

When you enter the room, directly ahead are the language shelves and our classroom calendar. I wrote about our calendar here and about the works you see on the shelves here. The little basket on the very top shelf holds print-outs of seasonal songs we sing during circle time. The very fragrant clove box is from Indonesia, a gift from a friend.

To the left of the language shelves is the reading nook. I think this is my favorite spot in the whole room. In front of a sunny window (with an ocean view!) is a little rocking chair (found locally) and a basket of seasonal books. We made the Waldorf window stars and beeswax ornaments last spring.

This is where James sits during our circle times. I always pictured him sitting on the rug, but he saw the rocking chair and fell in love with it. :) He loves to hold the pumpkin whenever he sits there.

To the left of the reading nook are the practical life shelves. My grandmother painted that still life portrait. The small wooden statue of the girl holding flowers was made in Minnesota (my home state).

The bouquet of flowers was a thoughtful gift from my sweet husband. :)

Next to the practical life shelves are the art and music shelves. On the top shelf is a portrait of Beethoven (we focus on a different composer each month and I change this photo accordingly) and an 'antique' :) MP3 player with speakers which are sitting atop a beautiful woven mat that I purchased while in Belize. We are a music loving family and we especially love classical music. I keep it playing - on a very low volume - throughout our school time. It makes for such a peaceful environment. I forgot to turn on the music the other day and James noticed and asked for it to be turned on. Then, when Fur Elise came on he said, "Oh! Beethoven is playing the piano!". The crocheted doily under the little straw basket was made by my other talented grandma. :)

This middle area under the windows is really just open floor space for bulky work and our sensory tub. I just have to share that outside this window is our driveway and just behind that is a nature reserve full of beautiful trees and wildflowers and with walking trails throughout. Since it's nestled within an estate, it's very private and we have yet to see another person in that area. It's where we spend our recess time, pretending we're explorers. :) The God's Eyes you see hanging in the window are the very ones I made at Camp Ojiketa some 20 years ago! (Yes, I save everything - I'm a pack rat sentimental like that!) The little wooden frame in the middle of the window sill is from Nova Naturals as are the beautiful seasonal and interchangeable postcards within it.

To the left of the windows are the science shelves. This bookcase, like the art & music bookcase, is a tad shorter than the others. I did this so James could reach the top shelves a bit more easily. As you can see we have a classroom fish which James has named "Mr. Pocodeo". It is James' responsibility to feed Mr. P each morning before we begin circle time. He loves doing this, although he does tend to overfeed Mr. P a bit. :) To the left of the tank is a little fish fossil set in stone. I found it many years ago during my travels. James says it's a picture of Mr. P.

Next to the science shelves are the culture & history shelves. You can see our US flag (in a vase w/ stones) which we proudly pledge allegiance to each day, our continents globe, and an oil painting of Paris that I purchased from a Parisian artist during one of my visits there.

To the left of those shelves are the math shelves. I must point out that I set out most of our Montessori materials for photographic purposes only - not ALL of these math items are out right now. Also for the purposes of the photo, I opened the boxes to show what's inside. The painting on top of the bookcase is a fun one - it's an alphabetic tour of some major cities throughout the world. I believe I found it in the Land of Nod catalog (a few years ago).

The last set of shelves nearest to the door are the sensorial shelves. I know the shelves are, in general, a bit out of traditional order, but this is the way that worked best for our room.

I have two live plants in our room, both of which James is responsible for watering once a week. I cannot tell you how much he enjoys taking care of these plants! I have a small watering can and cloth set out for him to use. There's a bathroom adjacent to our classroom so it's easy for James to use his step stool to fill the watering can with water in the sink. He uses the cloth to cover the spout while he's walking from plant to plant, to avoid any spillage. That adorable black and white photo above the plant is of my father-in-law (God rest his soul) when he was a little boy, circa 1925-ish.

And finally there's a small table and chairs and baskets with wipes and tissues on the side.

So there you go! What do you think? We LOVE it. The room is bright, airy and very relaxing. I find myself going in there just to sit and be. It's definitely my 'happy place' and I hope James feels the same way. :)

~Thank you for your comments!~

Our Classroom Calendar & Circle Time

I've been excited to share our classroom calendar with all of you! I created this about a month ago during my break and I'm really happy with how it turned out. I cross referenced several company made calendars and a couple I've seen on blogs (see here and here) and I included a few of my own ideas to come up with our own version that works for us...

Of course there's the basics - the days of the week, months of the year, the seasons and the calendar itself. The number cards for the calendar will be changed monthly to represent a different theme (e.g. October's cards have a pumpkin, November's have a turkey). As to the number cards, I plan on making most of them (because I guess I like to create more work for myself!) using clip art (found on Google or abcteach.com) and a Word template I created. There are, however, some good and free number cards online - see here and here.

One little annoying thing about this calendar is that it's preset with only five rows of weeks, which means if the beginning of the month falls at the end of one of the rows and if it happens to be a long month, as is the case with October, that last day won't actually make it onto the calendar - notice how the 31st is missing? As the month moves along I'll shift the calendar up and remove the first week. Wish I didn't have to do that though.

In order to make note of the current date, I'm using a little key ring that will dangle on the corresponding day's tack. James moves the ring each day. It has a little star and moon on it, perfect for my astronomy loving boy. :)

I'm teaching James about the passage of time and so I created little pockets for each day of the week with 3 place markers, one for 'today', 'tomorrow', and 'yesterday'. We move them each day and review the days and terminology.

We had no need for a "Color (or letter/number/shape) of the Day" type situation since James already knows all of that, but I did create a "Question of the Day" and "Prayer of the Day" pocket. I'm excited about the questions because they've really encouraged James to vocalize his own opinions on things. The questions are things like: 'If you could be any animal, what would you be?' and 'What's your favorite...' As for the prayers, they came from this beautiful little board book given to James by his Godparents.

James is really into the moon and so I created a little section where we can track the phases of the moon. I purchased the cards from Montessori For Everyone. Of course we had to have a weather section. James LOVES going to the window to look outside and determine which weather card(s) match the day. I downloaded the cards from abcteach.com.

Circle Time
This calendar is just one aspect of our circle time. As I mentioned here, we actually have two circle times - one at the beginning of school and one at the end. Our first circle time starts with a greeting and a good morning song, the Pledge of Allegiance (there's a little US flag on top of one of our bookcases) and then we look to the calendar where we discuss the days of the week, the current day, the passage of time, the season and the months of the year and then we'll do a little fingerplay song (to warm up our hands for work). :) I ask him to think of which work he wants to do first and then I dismiss him to roll out his mat and have fun!
During the 2nd circle time we'll sing another song, talk about the phase of the moon, I ask our question of the day (which we both answer), read a story, sing another song and then end with our prayer of the day.
I know it all sounds like a lot, but it takes no more than 10-15 minutes per circle time and it moves along nicely. Most importantly, James enjoys every minute of it!

Songs
A reader asked me which songs we sing during our circle time. We sing a lot of the basic ones you all know (such as, Itsy Bitsy Spider, If You're Happy, Wheels on the Bus, etc.), and I have a tendency to make up songs quite often. :) I also create a set of songs based on whatever theme we're working on. I take the time to search and find these all over the internet (i.e. I have no specific sites to recommend) and I occasionally make them available to you when/if I have the time to create a PDF document.

Here are a few key circle time songs we sing that you might not know...
::Good Morning - I sing this song, but I changed the last verse to say, "Good morning, good morning, it's nice to see you."
::Days of the Week - this version is really nice and has a easy flow to it (I just couldn't get into the Addams Family version!). I did change the end to say, "...and Saturday, then we start again". The original wording makes it sound like there are two Sundays.
::Months of the Year - this version is sung by the same artist as the Days of the Week song.

~Thank you for your comments!~

James' World - Redux!

As promised, here is the photo tour of our new and improved classroom! (warning, this is a long post, so get a cuppa hot cocoa and settle in!)

I am so excited to share this with all of you - the only ones who will appreciate my hard work! Oh my sweet husband appreciates our new classroom, but doesn't really *get* how exciting it is for us homeschoolers to create and organize our learning spaces!

Ok, on with the tour. Oh wait - if you're interested in seeing before photos, click here.

Now if you follow my blog you know I'm leaping whole heartedly into the wonderful world of Montessori. That said, I recreated our space with that method and our new materials in mind.

Here's our Montessori corner... (sorry about the inconsistent light in the photos - some were taken during the day, some at night.)
I was getting tired of our trays accumulating on our countertops, and since James is always wanting to do some type of school activity I wanted to make it so he could help himself to whatever, whenever (*assuming he's had a proper presentation of the items first).

Close-ups of the bookcases...
First, and my favorite, our Practical Life/nature display shelves:

Whenever I walk into the kitchen this is what I see in the adjoining room - it makes me sooo happy!! I plan on keeping 4-6 PL items out at a time with a weekly rotation and a balanced variety of skills. I'll post close-ups of the trays in the slideshow on my sidebar in case you're interested.

This nature display makes me smile everytime I see it. I will publish a separate post about this. :)

Next, the Sensorial shelves:
I will only rotate items as James masters them. I have the remaining box of knobbed cylinders on order and when it arrives they'll all move to the very top of the bookcase. Also on these shelves are the knobless cylinders, the geometric solids and the cookie cutters for our monthly playdough (which has to stay refrigerated and which James has full access to).

Lastly, the Tot School shelves:This is where I'll place our Tot School trays - the activities I create for our letter of the week and any seasonal/themed tasks. One shelf is dedicated to just number and letter type activities and I'll also keep a puzzle or two and some other educational toys on these shelves as well. All of these items will be rotated weekly.

To the right of the Tot School shelves is James' book & music corner. There's a comfy beanbag nearby. Also a basket of musical instruments should James feel the need to rock out. :)

To the right of that is the patio (this is where we do our messy/water activities - it's also where I keep our container garden). Here I keep the toy bins and on that shelf above is where I store our school supplies. I also have an art station set up with lots of yummy drawing tools.
Moving on to the other side of the room...
James' work table, our seasonal board, a few of James' masterpieces :) and over in the corner is a lovely little barn from Santa and a basket of kitchen items next to the PL shelves.

So there you go - our new classroom. What do you think??

Our verdict? We LOVE it. James said "Oh WOW!" when he saw it for the first time. He has been in 7th heaven now that he can pick and choose his activities whenever the mood strikes him. And, I was pleased to notice, he isn't careless about the items. He understands they are special things and is quite good about keeping them nice and tidy. Aw, my little 'Type A' guy... like mother, like son. :)

*Montessori believed it was important to first present materials to children so they may see how to correctly approach the work and thus provide them the opportunity to succeed at it. "Don't let a child risk failure until he has experienced success." ~ Maria Montessori

James' World

Last year I made a post about James' new playroom. It has since evolved into a playroom/classroom and it's my favorite room in the house! Wish I had some place like this when I was a kid!

I always enjoy seeing other people's playing/learning spaces, and since a few people have asked me to, I thought I'd share some pics of what ours looks like...

The room is actually meant to be used as a dining room so it's situated adjacent to the kitchen and living room making it a perfect location for a playroom! It gets nice and sunny in there and those windows look out to the ocean. :) (see why it's my favorite room?) The book nook is in the back corner. The top two shelves of the bookcase hold some of my teaching tools - thankfully I found a new method of storage since this picture was taken (see below).

To the right of the book nook. There's an open patio that we use for messy activities. It's also where I keep my container garden. To the right of the doors is James' "discovery table" (see close up below). I change it up often to keep him interested. That cute little Bobby car and play kitchen are, so far, a total waste of money. He could care less about them for now. :(

Here's an updated picture of my new storage shelf, which my sweet husband installed (thanks, honey!). It's full of more teaching tools. I used to have everything crammed onto the bookcase and in our office, but now it's all in the same room - yay!

Facing the wall opposite the patio doors. Notice the cute kitty on the mat. :} Both cats LOVE sleeping in the playroom! In the corner is the little art station. I keep the basic supplies (crayons & chalk) out in the open, but all the messy stuff (i.e. the good stuff) is kept in my craft closet in our office. To the right of the art station is his ABC station (close up below). I rotate the items on this station, too. Some times I'll put out books, magnetic letters, ABC color pages, etc.

Another shot from the same angle, but in this one you can see his work table, the seasonal bulletin board (close up below) and some of his past art work. He just started an art class this month, so the bulletin board will be full of little masterpieces :) in a few months.

Close ups of ABC station & discovery table. During Tot School time I move the stuff off the discovery table and lay out 3-4 trays of different activities.

Close up of seasonal bulletin board - this is where I get to use all that scrap paper I own and never use otherwise! I'll have to figure out a new way to adhere the artwork to the board though since my little monkey likes to climb up on his chair, pull out the push pins, and bring them to me saying, "owie, mama." (yikes!) Guess I should take the hint!

And finally a cute piece of artwork near the doorway. :)