Summer Enrichment 2: Let's Explore Outdoors!

The Outdoors have limitless opportunities for learning and exploring!

Morning Connection Videos:

Monday - This week we're introducing learning activities to take outdoors - sorting & classifying skills, sink or float experiment, a twist on an active vocab game, and a poem - A house is a house for me

Tuesday - For the months of the year song, ignore my motions and raise your arms for this month! A house is a house for me poem, A beginning sounds game (can also be done with rhyming words, ending, or middle vowel sounds), and making patterns.

Wednesday - Today we introduce "3 words" rhyming game, review finger spelling, and sing the number writing song. Remember that these kinds of language games are one of the best ways you can prepare your child succeed with writing and reading skills.

Thursday - Today we'll sing the seasons song (make sure your child knows it's summer now!!), compare two flowers - dandelion and daffodil, and introduce some sequencing activities. 

What flowers can you find outside now that it is summertime?

Friday - Happy Friday! Today we're singing "Days of the Week" in English and Spanish, and a tossing game with socks that also practices position words ("inside" and "outside") and partitioning 5.

A few outdoor activity ideas:

Sweeping a porch, patio, or sidewalk is fun and great exercise

Sink or Float - Find 6-10 objects outside, make a hypothesis on if they will sink or float, use a bowl of water to find out!

Fun with rocks - collect a few rocks outside, scrub them clean. Draw or paint on one! How many can you stack?

Flowers - How many different kinds of flowers do you see outside? Learn the names of 3. How do they smell?

Paint with Water - Have an old paintbrush? Dip it in a container of water and "paint" outdoors!

Patterns with Nature - collect objects outside (rocks, leaves, sticks, petals, etc) and use them to practice making patterns (how-to video), or try making more elaborate designs (examples)

Outdoor writing - Write with a stick in the dirt, or use sidewalk chalk (or a brick or rock!)

Other math and language resources and ideas on our Montessori at Home page

Egg in a Nest Breakfast Recipe

This variation on eggs and toast can involve your child in preparing breakfast and building some cooking skills.
Ingredients per serving:
- slice of bread
- 1 egg
- butter or oil
- salt & pepper to taste

1. cut a hole in the center of the toast (can use a biscuit cutter, a small cup, or a knife)

2. Heat skillet, add oil or butter

3. Toast bread on one side and flip

4.  crack an egg into the hole 

- If assisted by a young cook, we recommend cracking it into  a bowl, check for shells, and then pour into the hole!) 

- Optional to lightly beat the egg or leave the yolk intact

5. season with salt and pepper

6. Flip to finish cooking, transfer to a plate, and enjoy!

Practical Life Curriculum

One of the core curriculum areas of a Montessori classroom is called Practical Life. We begin with basic fine and gross motor skills and progress to increasingly complex activities.

Some of the earliest lessons are how to put on and take off an apron, and how to carry a tray (hands in the middle, thumbs up, flat, at belly button height!)

Simple pouring from one container to another progresses to dividing water evenly between two containers,  then using a funnel

Variations of water transfer with baster, sponge, or dropper

The progression for sweeping skills starts with using a small hand broom to sweep up beans on a tray

A child may choose sweeping as an activity from the shelf (such as the tray with beans and hand broom), or they can go get a broom and dustpan if they have a spill while doing another activity. Other times, a child may notice an area that needs to be swept and choose to sweep it for the joy of sweeping and to help care for their classroom.

While sweeping is a valuable life skill in itself, we have several larger purposes for these types of activities. Physically, the children are developing coordination. Cognitively, they are learning to plan, initiate, and complete a task - executive functions that are essential skills for life. Socially and emotionally, the children build their confidence by knowing they have acquired meaningful skills and feel capable and connected when they can help take care of their classroom.  

Children are also equipped and empowered to care for the classroom environment by washing tables and chairs (many-step processes that are great for building executive functions)

Cloth washing (very satisfying to scrub clean the small cloths we use for dusting!) and watering plants

All this work with water inevitably results in some spills on the floor, which provides opportunity to learn the importance of cleaning them up right away for everyone's safety. (Teaching pro-social skill of considering the needs of others)

Many young children enjoy folding classroom towels and cloths with great precision

All these activities help children feel ownership in their classroom and encourage them to notice and take responsibility for the space.

A teacher demonstrates the full sequence of each activity to an individual or small group before the child independently engages with the work. 

In addition to caring for the classroom environment, they also learn skills and activities to care for themselves. One aspect of self-care is food preparation. They have the option of serving themselves breakfast when they arrive. A few students help prepare the morning snack for the class. The children can follow portions cards to serve themselves snack whenever they are hungry and see an open space at the snack table. We also have several food preparation activities that the children can choose throughout the day. 

Extracting pumpkin seeds for roasting

After preparing food and eating, the child washes their dishes. (Teachers also run all dishes through the dishwasher each day!)

Hammering golf tees into a pumpkin as introductory hammering work and collaborative way to carve a pumpkin face

Outdoor Montessori Classroom

We had so much fun on our first day creating an outdoor classroom in the cool, shaded space next to our building!  A mix of familiar materials & furniture from the classroom and new activities just for outdoors kept everyone happily busy for the whole morning.

Woodworking

One of the highlights for many children was practicing some basic wood working skills - hammering and drilling.

Each child first receives a demonstration of hammering (or drilling) technique

Gardening

We repotted lettuce and bell pepper seedlings

Filling the pot with soil

Gently tucking in the seedling

Relocating the replanted seedlings and then watering them

observing and admiring

Food Preparation

This hardworking team made fruit salad as part of the morning snack for everyone (after first scrubbing the table to make sure it was clean for food prep!)

Children worked with a partner to wash hands before snack

Washing dishes after slicing a banana

Other Activities

balance beam and jumping spots

reading area

We also had a water table, cloth washing and a clothesline, and a variety of art activities. 

Looking forward to more beautiful spring days ahead so we can do it again!