This week it was all about color in the Aspen classroom! Aspen dove into the world of color by learning all about the primary, secondary, and tertiary colors. We experimented with color mixing, explored variations in colors with shades, tints, and hues, and learned the names of the colors in Spanish. During our lessons on colors, shades, and hues, Ms. Lindsey taught us all about the color wheel and the concept of warm and cool colors. We learned that if you add black to a color it creates a shade and if you add white to a color it creates a tint. At the same time, we learned many new vocabulary words such as monochromatic, analogous, and complimentary. As a follow-up work to this lesson, the Aspen children worked with a variety of art appreciation activities involving color classification and famous works of art. Upon further exploration of the above, we applied what we learned about color with our Color Mixing experimentation activity and the creation of suncatchers to learn about absorption.

In Kindergarten lesson, the kindergarteners have been focusing on the classification of their environment from largest to smallest (for example: galaxy, solar system, planet, continent, country, state, city, street, house). The kindergarteners have also been practicing learning their address. In Readers Workshop, the Chickadees continued their work with phonics playing the “Change It” Game and practiced combining groups of “sound clues” to form words. We then changed only one sound in each group of sound clues creating fun word combinations. The Chickadee group also read the book Fox in Socks together paying close attention to similar sounds and rhyming words. At the same time, we focused on the placement of our mouths, tongue, teeth, and lips when we repeated the sounds while rhyming. The Cardinal group focused on color words, number words, and sight words. The Cardinal group Kindergarten students then applied their knowledge of the above on a worksheet. The Cardinals also read the book Fox In Socks where we searched for phonograms (vowel teams, blends, and e at end words). In Writers Workshop, the kindergarteners finished their informational books and will read them aloud in class next week to their classmates.

Next week our thematic topic is Pumpkins!! We will learn how they grow, discuss the life cycle of a pumpkin, and have fun exploring our pumpkin filled Practical Life area! Speaking of pumpkins, thank you to all of the Aspen parents for making our field trip to Ramseyers so special and fun! You are all amazing!

Using an eye dropper and watercolors to create pictures with water!

This week it was all about apples in Aspen! We learned all about the life cycle of an apple, where they grow, how they grow, and practiced labeling the parts of an apple. The Aspen class engaged in a variety of follow-up activities such as apple slicing, apple classification, labeling the parts of an apple, and exploration/observation of apples with our botany tray. At the same time, we took the opportunity to learn about fractions and used apples to demonstrate whole, half, and one -fourth. After learning about fractions, the Aspen children took turns learning how to safely slice apples. We then used their sliced apples to create apple prints for an extra special art project with Ms. Lindsey. Aspen also created their own taste testing science experiment by seeing if Red Apples, Green Apples, and Yellow Apples taste different! The Aspen children discovered that each type of apple had its own distinct taste. Ask your child that type of apple was their favorite!

The kindergarteners have continued their exploration of Geography and North America by focusing on Ohio and the States that surround it. The kindergarteners also learned many interesting Ohio facts and practiced identifying states on a map. In Reading Workshop, kindergarteners continued their lessons on phonics, identifying sound clues, and combining sound clues together. The Chickadee Reading group practiced the above and played the “Change It” game. We wrote words on a dry-erase board and then changed one of the sounds to see if we could create a new word! Chickadees also practiced slowing down and paying attention to each letter sound in a word. We all tried very hard to not get tricked by paying close attention to each sound! The Cardinals Group practiced the above a well, but they also focused on sight words and words that don’t always follow your typical language rules. The Cardinals now know five sight words: of , the , and , a, and once (a super silly word that does not follow the rules having an o making a w sound)! The Cardinals also practiced tapping out their sight words and then worked on identifying colors words. In Writers Workshop the kindergarteners continued creating their own books and some even started a brand new book! Each kindergartner received instruction involving the proper formation of the cursive letter r. They then applied what they learned independently through various writing activities in Writer’s Workshop

Next week our thematic topic will be color! We are going to explore the world of color by learning the primary, secondary, and tertiary colors; we will discuss the gradation of colors (shades); we will engage in color mixing activities; and we will investigate the colors used in various works of art.

Completing patterns using apples and then creating our own apple patterns.

Creating apple prints from the apples we sliced during our fractions lesson. Note the pincer grasp being used to hold the apple! Each Practical Life activity is designed to indirectly prepare the hand for future handwriting activities!

Tweezing Sunflower Seeds at the Peace Table! A great way to relax and refocus!

This week Aspen learned all about trees! It was “treely” awesome! Aspen learned all about the importance of trees, the names of each part of a tree, the function of each part of a tree, and began tree classification work. During group lesson we discovered that humans and trees need each other and have a symbiotic relationship! Trees give us oxygen, and we provide carbon dioxide for the trees! During group lessons we looked at the function of each part in detail and then engaged in follow up work labeling our tree puzzle. At the same time, some of the Aspen children traced our tree puzzle and created their own trees! Ms. Lindsey also showed the Aspen children how to make leaf rubbings and invited the Aspen children to bring in leaves that they find on the ground. Aspen children should not pull leaves off a tree! We learned that the leaves are the food factories of the tree. Trees are autrophs (they make their own food) and through photosynthesis they provide nourishment for the tree. If we rip leaves off of trees they will not be able to do their job, and the tree will not grow! We also took a look at the inside of a tree with Mr. John’s science center tree box, and we learned about the rings inside a tree. Ask your child about what they discovered about tree rings!

This week during Kindergarten Workshop the kindergarteners began their North American cultural lessons, learning the locations and names of the countries in North America. They used the North American puzzle map to explore our continent and engaged in a variety of follow-up lessons. In Reading Workshop our Kindergarten students continued their exploration of phonics and our Alphabet. We discussed the science behind reading and how the brain uses phonics to connect sounds. We discovered that you can group sounds together to form words. Some phonic groupings make sense and others are complete nonsense. We then played around with phonics and created our own groupings of sounds! We came up with some fun sound groupings! Parents, encourage your children to engage in word play with phonetic sounds (beginning sounds, ending sounds, rhyming words, and thinking of words with similar sounds). In Writing Workshop the kindergarteners were working on stretching out letters (words) to write them, practicing our fine motor and movements needed to form our letters. Reading Workshop also practiced stretching out sound groupings while reading them by sounding them out slowly and then quickly. Just like in handwriting, we payed attention to the movements needed to form a letter. Reading Group payed attention to the movements of our mouth and tongue when sounding out letters.

Next week our thematic topic is All About Apples! We will have bushels of fun apple themed activities, some taste testing (what kind of apples do we like best), and artistic fun with apples! Have a great weekend!

Labeling and coloring the parts of a tree!

Superimposed Geometric Figures! Exploration of the visual sense and the application of geometric knowledge and the acquisition of geometrical language.

Exploring with the Hexagonal Constructive Triangles activity! Learning the names of triangles while exploring the composition of shape and form.

This week in Aspen it was all about the continents! Aspen has spent the week learning the names and locations of all seven continents. We also used our Geography Envelopes and Geography Cards to explore the culture of each continent! We studied animals, biomes, landforms, and people from each continent. At the same time, we learned all about where we live from largest to smallest; for example, planet, continent, country, state, city, street, house! The children also engaged in a variety of cultural follow up activities involving identifying the names and locations of the continents, countries, and states. It was so much fun learning about the world around us!

The Aspen children also had their very first library time with the very creative and amazing Ms. Lindsey! During library time, we learned how to care for books by handling them respectfully and carefully. We read the book The Children Who Loved Books by Peter Carnavas. Then we sang the song, “I Like to Read” as we danced and traveled to far away places! We learned that through books we can be transported to magical places and be anything we want! We then read Kitty Kat, Kitty Kat, Where Have You Been? as we traveled to Europe and visited Paris! Ask your child about their library experience and their French vocabulary word: gateaux! All of the Aspen children mentioned how much they love to eat gateaux!

Kindergarten students continued their geography lessons with Mr. John as they explored our world in depth and in more detail. During Readers Workshop the kindergarteners reviewed phonics and played some phonics games. We practiced our detective skills and learned that sometimes books and words will try and trick us by changing sounds in the middle or end of a word. A good Sound Detective looks at each sound in a word. In Writers Workshop the kindergarteners practiced proper letter formation and continued to create their booklets where they get to be both the author and illustrator.

Next week the thematic lesson will be trees! We will learn why trees are so important, discuss the names and the functions of each part of a tree, and will be introduced to a variety of follow-up tree themed classification activities!

This week in Aspen it was all about seasons! The Aspen class began our Seasons Lesson by learning about day and night. We discovered that our earth rotates (spins) on its axis, and as a result, we get daytime and nighttime! We were amazed when we found out that when we have day time here, there are children in other parts of the world having night time; therefore, when we are at school, children in other places are having dinner or even sleeping!! Aspen then learned that as our Earth rotates, it tilts. This tilt affects how much direct sunlight different areas receive, and as a result, we get our seasons! The more direct sunlight the Earth receives, the warmer/hotter the weather. On the other hand, the less direct sunlight, the cooler/colder the weather! Finally, we discussed the differences between the seasons in Ohio! Did you know that some places don’t have four seasons? Some places have only two! Or they have mild climate changes!

Throughout our exploration of seasons, we got to experiment with our painted globe and a flashlight! With this activity, we got to observe our key words axis, rotation, and orbit first hand. Our flashlight acted as the sun, and we helped rotate the Earth (painted globe), experiencing day/night and the changing seasons. We also got to take turns being the Earth, orbiting around the sun and rotating and tilting to represent how old we are. It sure was a fun filled week in Aspen!

In Kindergarten lesson, the kindergarten students have been learning about the continents and the concept of direction. They have been learning the names and location of each continent as well as the cardinal directions: North, South, East, and West. During Readers Workshop we discussed that reading is actually a science and as “Sound Detectives,” it is our job to find the clues and experiment putting sounds together. Sometimes, we will create groupings of sounds that make sense when they are put together, and sometimes our groups of sounds will be nonsense or silly! It is up to the Sound Detectives to use their clues! Our Readers Workshop is split into two groups: the Cardinals and the Chickadees. This week the Chickadees read the books Alphabet City and The Alphabet’s Alphabets and practiced their detective skills sounding out letters. The Cardinals also read the book The Alphabet’s Alphabet and focused on the formation of how each sound (letter) is formed. The Cardinals also began combining sounds to form words and were introduced to the concept of phonograms. In Writers Workshop both group began creating their very own book and worked on proper letter formation, becoming writers! What a busy and fun week these kindergarteners had!

Next week the Aspen thematic topic is all about Continents! The Aspen class will be introduced to the Continent Puzzle Map, The Sandpaper Globe, The Painted Globe, The Geography Envelopes, and The Continent Boxes. Aspen will learn the names and location of continents, be introduced to the terms land, water, continent and Ocean, and will begin exploring the world and culture around them with the Geography Envelopes and Continent Boxes! See you next week!

Admiring a completed activity!

Welcome back Aspen families! We hope you all had an amazing and relaxing summer vacation! The new school year is here, and the Aspen children are settling into classroom routine and have already begun exploring the classroom! This week we began our school year with the Procedural Movement Lessons (The How To’s Of A Montessori Classroom); therefore, we learned how to walk the line, how to move through the classroom, how to use indoor voices, how to carry and roll rugs, how to choose activities from the shelves, and how to take turns talking during line time. Returning children were amazing role models and helped our new classmates with all of the above and more! It was a great first week of school!

Next week we will continue with Procedural Movement Lessons and will begin learning all about seasons. We will learn why we have seasons, discuss the concept of day and night, and will learn the names and characteristics of each season.

Kindergarten students will also begin Reading and Writing workshop next week with Ms. Kelley and Ms. Tonya on Tuesday ‘s and Thursday’s. During these workshops we will focus on phonics, language rules (phonograms, blends, and more), comprehension, sentence structure, making inferences, sequencing, and the mechanics of handwriting. Each week I will include an update on concepts covered during the Reading and Writing workshop here on our classroom’s blog! The kindergarteners will also be attending a kindergarten lesson (Kindergarten Workshop) on Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday with Mr. John. During kindergarten lesson, our kindergarteners will explore a variety of concepts in detail and are often given follow-up (homework) to be completed at home. Please check your child’s folder and return all homework to school the following day.

See you next week!!

Learning how to transfer water with an eyedropper.

using a pushpin to punch around the outline of continents.

Working on our new Binomial Cube!

This week in the Aspen Room it was all about St. Patrick’s Day, rainbows, and the light spectrum!  Aspen engaged in rainbow-colored activities, crafts, and science experiments exploring the light spectrum.  During group lessons Aspen learned how rainbows are formed, why they occur, and explored stories and legends surrounding the rainbow. Then the Aspen scientists shared ideas regarding how they thought rainbows occur. Prior to the lesson, each child shared their ideas and thoughts on this subject. The class unanimously agreed and made an observation that a rainbow needed rain (source of water) and sunlight.  The class then explored this observation and discussed the concept of reflection and learned about the light spectrum.  We learned that each wavelength of light is reflected at different angles. Thus, the light spectrum is separated creating a rainbow. The Aspen children also shared stories on how they have created rainbows with a hose, bubbles, spray bottles, and sequins making new observations sparking an interest in trying to create rainbows.  Thinking about our observations, we decided to experiment creating rainbows. Therefore, we had the opportunity to experiment separating the wavelengths in the light spectrum using a prism and a flashlight! Our Practical Life area was also filled with colorful rainbow themed fun!  Ask your child about their week!

This week we also began our introduction to the International Festival and began to learn about Europe.  The Aspen children were introduced to the European flags activity, animals of Europe, and landmarks of Europe.  We also began learning the location and names of the countries we will be representing for the International Festival. If you haven’t already picked a country please make your selection this week.  If you visit Signup Genius you will find a list of available countries. Next week, we will continue our exploration of Europe.   https://www.signupgenius.com/go/4090b48a8a92da6f94-country

The Aspen kindergarteners explored vowels and consonants and engaged in lessons identifying vowels and consonants while practicing their reading skills with word lists.  The kindergarteners also practiced their handwriting skills throughout the week.

Hello Aspen families!  My apologies for the time lapse and gap between blog postings! But what better way to resume a blog post than a fun filled week of Dr. Seuss inspired fun.  It was a blast seeing all of the crazy socks, fun hats, mismatched outfits, mustaches, and occupational attire! At the same time, it was inspiring and interesting getting to hear what our students wanted to be when they grew up! We had lots of amazing aspirations and ideas to share with our classmates on Friday during line time.  The Aspen room sure has some awesome kids with amazing goals for their future. Besides, the fun mentioned above our week included a variety of fun activities promoting the importance of literacy and word play.  As a class we revisited the terms author and illustrator and discussed what those terms mean. During the work period the Aspen students were able to engage in word play with a Dr. Seuss rhyming activity where we matched pictures and words that had the same sounds, explored the vowel tree (for those students who are combining sounds), and were introduced to the pink rhyming material (for those students that have demonstrated decoding skills).  The Aspen students also engaged in a group activity where we experimented writing our own rhyming story as a class. During line time, we created a list of rhyming words and created our own short story.  There was a lot of silliness and laughter with this activity!  Check out our story posted in the hall outside our class.  The Aspen students also tried their hand at rescuing letters, counting or adding goldfish, engaged in color matching activities, and created daily Dr. Seuss themed crafts.  It was a Seussical experience in the Aspen Room this week!  Ask your child all about the fun we had.

In kindergarten the children started their introduction to the world of Geometry. The kindergarteners were presented lessons with the Geometric Cabinet where they learned the geometric terms for various shapes. They also discussed the concepts of angles, learned how to identify them (characteristics of angles), and learned their names.  The kindergarteners then applied their geometric knowledge during the work period!  They truly enjoyed finding right angles around the classroom.

During Reading Group, we took our Dr. Seuss theme and continued our fun with phonics and words by playing with different phonetic sounds.  Therefore, creating many silly words.  At the same time, we reviewed language rules while creating word lists.  After creating our lists, we then tried our hand at recalling the words from the list we created working on retaining information and comprehending what we read! We also practiced fluency skills reading simple sentences (some with sight words).

Exploring the linear sequence of numbers to one hundred!

Hello Aspen families!! I hope everyone had a relaxing long weekend that was snowfun!!  Our topic this week in Aspen was all about Martin Luther King Jr. and Rosa Parks.  During line time we discussed how these two individuals helped change our world for the better.  As a class the Aspen children shared their thoughts regarding inequality and how we can make the world a better place too!  Some of the ideas (thoughts) they came up with were being kind to everyone, helping people, listening to others, sharing (toys and ideas), and doing nice things for other people.  These Aspen children sure are amazing and will grow up to be amazing adults with thoughts and ideas like these!  We also read a few of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.s quotes and talked about the speeches he gave and his peaceful protests.  One quote that  we discussed by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was , ” Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.” As a class we talked about what this quote means and the power of spreading kindness.  This quote is what sparked our discussion about making the world a better place and led to the children sharing their ideas.  Finally, we engaged in some role playing and did the Rosa Parks play.  With this activity we had children take on different roles to act out the event that sparked the Montgomery Bus Boycott.  Ask your child about the Rosa Parks play!!

In Kindergarten lesson the children reviewed their cursive letters and writing sentences and also worked on math equations.  During reading group the children reviewed the short e sound and were introduced to the long e sound.  We then practiced reading long e words and worked on our comprehension skills.

Next week our topic will be adaptation,  migration,  and hibernation.

BOOK SHARE:   Thursday, January 27, 2022

Happy New Year Aspen families!!! Wow…it was so nice to be back in the classroom after holiday break this week!  We all missed each other so much and were very eager to see our friends and share our stories from the last three weeks. After a much anticipated class reunion, Aspen settled back into their daily routine and classroom activity choosing challenging work!

This week our thematic topic was all about Snow!   The Aspen children learned all about snow; how it is formed,  why we have snow, and took a closer look at snowflake ice crystal shapes.  Did you know that temperature,  humidity,  wind velocity, and the route a snowflake takes determines the type of ice crystals a snowflake has? Therefore, the saying  that no two snowflakes are the exact same is a true statement.  The Aspen children also watched a SciKids educational video about how snowflakes form.  Did you also know that the ice crystals in a snowflake attach themselves to particles of  dust or pollen in the atmosphere?  This helps give a snowflake its shape! Soooo…when we catch snowflakes on our tongue,  we are catching dust particles!! The Aspen kids thought this was interesting and disgusting!!

While we discussed snowflakes and the formation of ice crystals we also took the opportunity to talk about liquids, solids, and gases. We learned about these three states of matter and looked at the properties of each one.  We discovered that the particles in a solid are tightly packed together giving it volume and a definite shape,the particles in a liquid are free to move around each other but are still attracted to each other,  liquids have volume but they do not have a definite shape (they take the shape of whatever container they are in), and the particles in a gas move randomly with little to no attraction to each other, gases have no definite shape or volume.  We then used this knowledge to complete an activity gluing beads to represent the particles in these states of matter.

In Kindergarten lesson the kindergarten students were introduced to multiplication with the Stamp Game and explored the process of multiplication in depth.  They also reviewed handwriting skills by connecting letters to form words to create short sentences.   In Reading  Group we discussed the short e sound by practicing our phonics with short e words, and practiced our Comprehension skills.

Next week our topic is all about the Arctic and Antarctic !  We are going to compare and contrast these environments while learning all about the habitats (biomes), animals that live there, and their various geographical characteristics.

Book Share will be on Thursday next week!

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