Montessori soapbox

Jaden came home with his 1st book last Monday (11.17) that he can actually read (which is different than the many Dr. Seuss books that he has memorized:). My not-yet 5 year old boy can sound out words and read (albeit 3-letter words with no long vowels or blends). I truly heart Montessori education! There are few other preschools (at least around here) that actually work with children on their sounds. Notice I did not say letters, who cares what the letter name is, to be able to read children need to learn the sound that the letter makes. Most preschools are typically designed as a playschool (which is not a bad thing by any means) that really only gets young children used to social interaction with a few songs thrown in for good measure;) Maria Montessori came up with the idea that children from the ages of 3-6 (especially) have an "absorbent mind". In other words their mind is like a sponge, taking in so much knowledge and information so effortlessly!

Other things that Jaden has learned and worked on this year include:
*Parts of a: fish, reptile(turtle to be exact), mammal (horse), amphibian (frog), flower and tree.
*He cut out and created a skeleton with parts labeled as well
*learned about the life-cycle of a salmon
*working on the concept of the teens (math in Montessori education stresses the understanding of mathematical concepts by having specific materials to show place value (and eventually hierarchical value)--for instance he needs a 10 bar and a unit bead to make 11, a ten bar and 2 unit beads to make 12 and so forth. After teens he will move on to eventually understanding the concept of place value with the hundred squares and thousand cubes.
*Continues to learn many new signs (they have a sign language teacher that comes in once a week), french words (French is on Tuesday afternoons), and lots of new songs (from their awesome music teacher). He is also excited to show me some new yoga poses that the assistant in his class teaches the children every morning.

I am so happy to see my child in a school that he is excited to go to every morning, that he is learning so much from, and that has such a great group of children, parents and teachers:)

I need to video him reading some of his new books and I will post it later!

***side note*** I am/was a Montessori and state-certified teacher (up until the day that Jaden was born). I taught 1st-3rd grade. I always tell people that I learned wayyyyy more about teaching in my 6 weeks of summer classes and 1 school year of Montessori training than I did in my 2 year state-certified program! Seriously, I could go on and on. . .

Off my soapbox now!