Hola familias de Live Oak!
Coming up next week:
Our end of the school year celebration will be on Thursday the 8th, from 9:20 to 10:30 am. Looking forward to seeing you all!
Friday the 9th will be half day. There will be no childcare. Dismissal time: 12:20 to 12:30.
We can’t believe that in only one more week and the school will be over!
We know the children sense the end of the school year. We can see and feel the energy!
The flowers and maps have taken over the Human Body unit these last three weeks.
After presenting the Montessori flower puzzle, the children dissected a fresh flower (a Chinese lantern) and identified each part of the flower: the corolla, petals, pistil, stamens, and calix. We could tell that most of the students really enjoyed and engaged in this botany activity. The flower puzzle has been popular with all the students. They enjoyed matching each part of the puzzle with a dissected fresh flower.
Treasure hunt
The land and water forms map group activity inspired the students to make their own maps.
Together, we studied and read the ECC map they made with Julianne. Then, we explored the yard using the map. We loved seeing the children dive into a topic that came from them!
To support this enthusiasm, we organized a treasure hunt around the playground. We hid three small bags with treasures that you might have seen last week in their useful bags (a little green rock). It was a very exciting and fun activity!
Geography
Our last land and water forms were archipelagos and chains of lakes. Many of the children engaged in the world project until they finished the seven continents. This activity involves a lot of concentration and fosters fine motor skills.
Art
The art lessons have been focused on flowers. One of the lessons was oil pastel over black and dark blue construction paper. This lesson was inspired by the small common daisies that Jet brought to the teachers. Also, Paige shared a California poppy from her garden. We created a paper poppy flower craft with tissue paper. Afsaneh, one of our regular substitute teachers, collected rose petals from the school garden and helped the children make another flower project. We used oil pastel over paper from brown paper bags to draw flowers pointing to its parts. Another art project, which was for the four and five year olds, was the “walking line.” In this activity, the students verbally describe their morning routines before they come to school. Along with the descriptions, they draw a nonstop line with a pencil and it ends when the verbal description finishes. At the end of the exercise we got a variety of drawings: straight, curves, tangled, and circles.
Sewing work from Practical life has been very popular with the four and five year olds. It is impressive how they can perform this work as it requires a lot of focus and concentration. They embroidered trucks, hearts, little chickens, rainbows, donuts, balloons, and even baby dinosaurs!
Field trip
The Fire Station field trip was a dream for our class, and we finally did it! Everyone did a good job walking together to the Fire Station. We met firefighters and paramedics. They showed us a fire engine, and talked about all the parts and tools in it, like the hoses, ladders, and medical equipment. A firefighter put on his fire suit, helmet, and oxygen mask so we could see what a firefighter looks like while wearing all their fire-fighting gear. They also told us about how they eat, sleep, and live in the fire station. The firefighters even gave everyone a fire hat!
Many thanks to all the volunteers who helped us walk to the fire station. Anna,Whit’s mom, Megan, Amara’s mom, Cat, Elise’s mom, Isabel, Leo’s mom, Kate, Quinn’s mom, Joshua, Aliyah’s dad, and Kim, Henry’s mom.
Thank you
Griselda, Niki and Catherine