Parlez-vous Francais?

Bonjour!

We have begun speaking French with the children in honor of our study of Canada. This is less of a stretch for our staff than some of the other languages we have explored in the past such as Inuit, Yoruba and Arabic. Pauline and I both studied French in school and Leslie lived for a time in Haiti. The internet is also a wonderful resource. There are websites where one can just enter the phrase one wishes to translate and it spells it out and pronounces it in the language of choice. C'est magnifique!

We are greeting and taking our leave as well as doing the weather report and calendar "en Francais." The children have really embraced it. The enthusiasm that children have for foreign language really varies from child to child and from school year to school year. Some kids flat-out refuse to speak in another tongue! I don't want to brag, but I have been told I have an ear for languages and I certainly do delight in trying. When traveling, I find that most people appreciate it when one makes an effort and I am always so impressed that people from other countries speak English as well as they do!

We had a fire drill today and it went very well. A sense of urgency was definitely lacking, though, in the little boy who demanded to have an on-the-spot discussion of WHY we were having a fire drill. Rest assured, we leave no one behind, not even the most philosophical of evacuees. He came out, trailing the others, hand-in-hand with Leslie.

Looking forward to seeing you at the parent meeting this Thursday!

Regards,
Doni

A Book From Bella!

This past Wednesday, we celebrated the first birthday of the year -- Isabella's! Her actual birthday was at the beginning of August so when we chanted the months as she walked around the sun candle carrying the globe we started with August. It's really a lovely ritual that indirectly imparts the relationship of the earth, the sun,and time. After each revolution we read a brief line from her life for that year. Next we sang Happy Birthday to her, she made a wish and then she blew out her candles -- it took forceful, repeated blows, but she was determined! We each had a chance to wish her happy birthday and give her a hug. The ceremony ended with a gift book from her to the class -- Northwest Baby Animals. It features photos by Art Wolfe -- Doni claims the photos are so cute it makes her tear up! Thank you very much, Isabella!

The Metric System

Some of you already know that I (Doni) took a basic mathematics class at LBCC this summer, three days per week. It was great. Math had always been a blind spot for me and I thought I was just meant for grander things. As it turns out, I just needed a good instructor and text book. It was a great class and it really made me appreciate the genius of the Montessori math curriculum even more. One thing we studied in my math class was the metric system so I was eager to share some of my new-found knowledge with the kids. My dear old dad always maintained that the reason we Americans never made the switch to metric was that we tend to teach it by comparing and converting with our current system. He thought it would be better to just start "talking metric." That makes sense to me. If all of our canned goods and mileage signs were labled with grams and kilometers, I think we'd eventually get the jist.

So we've been recording the temperature in celsius when we give our weather report and today I introduced the kids to the liter. I poured the water from a liter bottle into a clear plastic box that was (nearly) the same dimensions as our largest pink tower cube. The smallest pink tower cube is one cubic centimeter, I explained, and if the largest cube was a box instead of a solid cube, I could fill it with 1000 of these smallest cubes (1 cubic centimeter=1 milliliter). I could also fill it with exactly one liter of water. I'm looking forward to showing some of the kids how to measure our Montessori materials as they can be precisely measured in centimeters being European in origin.

We also looked at some new Canadian coastal First Nations artifacts today including a lovely halibut hook made of wood and bone. We discussed how it wasn't necessary to carve a beautiful bird figure on it in order to catch fish, but that people have a need for beauty and that maybe the carving brought them powerful spirit help while fishing. Alan said, "Hey, there's a fish hook like that in that painting by the door!" He is correct, but in a million years, I would never have noticed! Thanks, Alan!

Emergencies!!

Two emergencies almost back to back! I only remember two other emergencies in our whole 26-year-plus history! At our potluck Saturday, Cian's tearful exit ended up being for, yes, a broken arm -- poor guy. Now it'll be six weeks before he can use that right arm. He came in today with smiles and took a sewing card to his table soon after arriving only to find out that sewing is impossible with only one hand. So we went around the classroom together so I could show him some activities that he could do that only required one arm and we only made it to one shelf before he chose something he wanted to do. A real trooper!

Then today while we were dismissing the morning children Eliason came up to me complaining of a stomachache. I suggested going down to the bathroom to see if that would help. A little later Leslie heard him crying in the bathroom. She brought him back to the classroom and I called Barbara, but while she was on her way Eliason began crying again and Leslie reported that he was breaking out into a sweat. So I called Barbara again to tell her what was happening and should we call 911. Doni did. So within a couple of minutes the Philomath EMTs came and within another 5 minutes the Corvallis EMTs arrived -- I think there were about eight of them in the room! They assessed Eliason and by 12:45 released him to Barbara. Lots of excitement for the full-day children, but they were incredibly calm. They all went right on eating their lunch being very quiet so the EMTs could talk to Eliason. All in all we now suspect it just may have been that trip down the slide that caused the rumble in the tummy:)

The EMTs told us we did the right thing calling them so we won't hesitate to call them again. When something arises that we think warrants it, we will call the EMTs first and then you.

Help with recruitment!

When Carol found out that we needed help with enrollment, she quickly came to me offering to do whatever she could. She asked about doing another Farmers'Market booth and getting fliers up around town. She called right away, but they were all filled up so we are now on the cancellation list. She also took fliers and brochures to spread around town. Thank you, Carol!!

Thank you!!

Many thanks to Lua for signing up to do prepare muslin and burlap squares for our sewing activities and cutting paper for number rolls!

Orbiting Children

We did a fun thing at group this week. We acted out the earth orbiting the sun and the moon simultaneously orbiting the earth. We played some more of this game later on out on the playground. It was not as easy as you might think! First of all, the child playing the earth must orbit the sun at enough distance to allow the moon to fit in between the earth and the sun. Secondly, the person playing the moon has to really haul in order to keep up with the earth. I took a turn playing the moon, orbited twice and had to quit due to dizziness! But it was fun.

For all you stargazers out there, there is a celestial event happening right now you may wish to get in on. According to www.EarthSky.org, right after nightfall, one can see Venus, Mars and the star Spica in close proximity to each other. Venus is the brightest. Mars is the faintest. They will be visible to the naked eye and will be within a single binocular field as well. But be hasty! They will disappear below the horizon 1.5 hours after sunset.

Just in case people weren’t in a back-to-school mindset, Nature helped us out by providing rain and fall-like temperatures for our first regularly-scheduled week. That brought to our attention how many of the kids did not yet have their rain gear here. Not only to children need raincoats with a hood or waterproof hat, but also boots. It is not sufficient to wear boots to school. One needs to have entirely different footwear for indoors than one wears outdoors. That is how we manage to have relatively unsullied carpets all year even with bunches of pre-schoolers trooping in and out. Please do mark the coats and boots with your child’s name and initials. Their water bottles should be marked as well. We’ve already had some bottles go home with the wrong family, so do take a look at it when your child exits the classroom and make sure it is the right one, please.

Our new student, Izel, returned from two months in Mexico City on Saturday and joined us in the classroom on Tuesday. She is already laboring to restore her English speaking skills, but still seems undaunted to be here with us. What a trooper! I know only enough Spanish to make people think I can understand them when they speak Spanish to me. It gets me into trouble! Fortunately, Dhabih, who’s mom is from Chile has promised to help us out linguistically when needed. We are so fortunate to have his help.

We wish all of you a wonderful Labor Day weekend. Maybe take some time to tell your child what you enjoy about your work!