News Archives - Page 16 of 27 - Greenspring Montessori School

2022 End of the Year Celebrations

Wheels Days

Our Children’s House classrooms hosted Wheels Days to kick off our end of the year traditions! The children love this tradition of bringing in their bikes, tricycles, scooters, rollerblades, and skateboards for a fun morning riding around the upper lot.

Flags of the World Parade

Our children came out to celebrate International Flag Day with a Flags of the World Parade! Children’s House and Lower Elementary students created flags for countries they were learning about and they paraded the campus to share their joy. Our toddlers and older students cheered them on from the sidelines. ⁠
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We love this special end of the year tradition!⁠

Adolescent Graduation

This week we celebrated our graduating eighth-grade students and all they have accomplished during their years at Greenspring. We are excited to usher them onward to their next great adventure – high school! ⁠

The Adolescents’ Microeconomy Work

In the third plane of development, the task of the Adolescent is to prepare for economic independence. Just as children in the first plane of development ask, “Help me to do it by myself” and children in the second plane ask, “Help me to think by myself,” Adolescents ask, “Help me live by myself.”

To meet this need, Dr. Montessori envisioned Adolescents participating in and managing small businesses (called “Microeconomies”) in order to experience economic activity in their community. This work provides “an opportunity to learn both academically and through actual experience what are the elements of social life.” (Maria Montessori, From Childhood to Adolescence, Appendix A). Thus, the Microeconomy functions not only as a way for students to generate funds for their projects and trips, but as an integrated curriculum that provides the opportunities for real-world, experiential learning.

At Greenspring, our Adolescents learn that economies can be based on production and exchange, capital, services, or even reciprocal relationship and community. They explore different economic models and consider the full life-cycle impacts of an activity before selecting it. What are the impacts on affected populations of people? The environment? What systems does the activity reinforce or work to break down? Microeconomy projects are large, and require both collaboration and division of labor. This is another way that the adolescents practice working together. As Michael Waski notes, “teamwork is the superpower of the adolescent.”

This year, the Adolescents began the year engaged in a compost microeconomy, where they began providing a service to their community and the environment. They created lessons to teach the other classrooms how and what to compost, which provided moments of growth for many of our students. They enjoyed collecting pumpkins to compost in early November, which led to both cooking and preserving pumpkins to eat, as well as ideas for a possible pumpkin patch in the spring.

Next, the Adolescents researched deer-free fencing to enable more ambitious gardening projects. Their hard work paid off! They have successfully grown seedlings of tomatoes, basil, kale (and more).

Bicycle Repair

Bicycle Sale

Seedlings

The Adolescents recently collected donations of bicycles in need of repair. They refurbished the bicycles and held a bike sale. The profits from the bike and seedlings sales will go towards the Adolescents’ upcoming Odyssey trip.

One of the key outcomes of Microeconomy work is what Dr. Montessori referred to as “valorization of the personality.” This is her term for an Adolescents’ process of realizing they are useful and capable of great effort. Participating in real economic activity also serves a first step towards economic independence and allows them to measure the worth of their activity against an external standard.

Adolescents “…derive great personal benefit from being initiated in economic independence. For this would result in a “valorization” of his personality, in making him feel himself capable of succeeding in life by his own efforts and on his own merits, and at the same time it would put him in direct contact with the supreme reality of social life.” (From Childhood to Adolescence, p. 65)

Montessori observed that there is more than the intellect that requires nourishment during Adolescence. She saw the importance of adolescents having opportunities to be useful to their peers, to be valorized through their own labor, and to join in the actions of society.

The Importance of Classroom Agreements

Classroom Agreements for the Mulberry Lower Elementary class (ages 6-9).

Peace education is a major component of the Montessori classroom. In our article titled “Peace Education for All Ages,” we have discussed how mixed-age classrooms, the prepared environment, community meetings, and role-playing all support the development of conflict resolution skills.

Another tool that we use in Montessori classrooms starting in the Children’s House (ages 3-6) is the practice of creating Classroom Agreements. Rather than an adult presenting a list of rules and expectations, the children collaborate to create a set of guidelines for how they would like the classroom to operate and how they will treat one another. The Guide and Assistant ask the children to envision what they will need to contribute to create that environment. They provide coaching so the children phrase things positively (such as “We will…” rather than “Don’t…”). Typically we work on this during the first week of school each year, as this is a beautiful community building opportunity and sets the tone for the entire year.

Classroom Agreements for the Willow Children’s House class (ages 3-6).

The children sign the finished product and it is posted in the classroom. Students are invested in these commitments in a different way when they help to create them. I have observed a Children’s House student say to a classmate, “Remember, in our classroom we use kind words,” and point to the agreements posted on the wall. Just another example of the classroom belonging to the children. Dr. Maria Montessori coined the phrase Casa dei Bambini in Italian, which translates to ”the Children’s House”.

Our Upper Elementary students call their Classroom Agreements a “Classroom Constitution” in order to connect it to our nation’s constitution, which is an evolving document – revisited, studied and revised as needed. The Upper Elementary students revisit their Classroom Constitution at the beginning of every community meeting. During these meetings, they discuss challenges faced in the classroom or on the playground, brainstorm solutions, and find resolution as a group. When the group decides that a change or addition is necessary, they amend their Classroom Constitution.

Classroom Agreements for the Ginkgo Upper Elementary class (ages 9-12).

Montessori students build upon these early experiences of responsibility and ownership to become leaders, problem solvers, and involved citizens.

Read more in our article titled “Peace Education for All Ages”.

April 2022 Capital Project Update

The Elementary Village began to take shape this spring, with framing completed, trusses installed, and roofing started. April showers have made the construction a bit more challenging, but the children have been fascinated by the many cranes and different construction equipment on campus.

It is such a joy to see the building begin to take shape. After the roofing, siding and windows will be installed. Then the exterior construction will slow down, with specialists working indoors on the plumbing, electrical, and drywall.

Right now we expect the project to be completed at the end of September and hope to move in during October 2022. Needless to say, our staff is excited to move in as soon as possible! We will keep you posted as we know more.

See photographs of our recent progress below:

Upper Elementary Outdoor Exploration at Echo Hill Outdoor School

In April our Upper Elementary students went on a camping trip to Echo Hill Outdoor School. Echo Hill Outdoor School is located on the Eastern Shore of Maryland with 242 acres of forests, meadows, and freshwater shrub swamp bordering a mile of sandy beach on the Chesapeake Bay. This trip was a great opportunity for the Upper Elementary students to live close to nature and learn about our environment and our place in it.

The students enjoyed many interesting classes like swamp biology, how to experience the environment through all our senses, wilderness survival, and bay biology. In bay biology, the whole class joined together on a small working boat and experienced firsthand the living creatures of the Chesapeake Bay. They collected fish and micro-crustaceans and discussed the ecological value of an estuary like the bay. They even found a freshwater eel which the students had a chance to touch.

The trip also provided ample opportunities for community building as well. On the last night, the class participated in a campfire story and an escape room challenge before sharing their gratitudes from the trip. The students came home tired and happy.

Dual Language Learning about Monarch Migrations with Journey North

Throughout the 2021-22 school year, our Spanish Dual Language Children’s House and Lower Elementary students joined students and scientists across North America to track the monarch butterfly’s migration to Mexico with Journey North.

In October, the children learned about the monarch butterfly’s lifecycle and migration, then sent butterflies to other schools and wrote about what they’ve learned in English and Spanish. Many of our classrooms were home to monarch caterpillars. Children learned about what the caterpillars eat, bringing them fresh milkweed. It was a wonder to observe the amazing life cycle of the monarch! One crafty caterpillar managed to escape the enclosure and decided to attach itself to a shelf and enter the chrysalid phase. The children were so careful not to disturb the chrysalid, which hung precariously suspended on the shelf. They later watched the caterpillars form chrysalises and later emerge as butterflies. ⁠
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As the butterfly migration progressed from September to November, students began learning about the migration. They discovered that a fragile butterfly can travel hundreds of miles to find its winter home deep in central Mexico. Students learned how monarchs connect people across North America as they migrate across international borders.⁠

The Willow Children’s House class has been working to create a garden for pollinators and to serve as a Monarch Waystation. They planted the monarch host plant swamp milkweed, along with goldenrod and purple coneflower. Most recently, they sowed sunflower seeds and zinnias to supplement the perennials in the garden and boost the nectar available for pollinators. They hope this garden provides a nourishing habitat for many pollinators, especially the amazing monarch.

The Dual Language third year Children’s House students and the Lower Elementary students worked with Sra. Marcela and the Journey North program to participate in the symbolic migration of the monarchs. They made and sent a Symbolic Ambassador Monarch to the children who live near the monarch’s overwintering sanctuaries in Mexico. We hope that our Symbolic Ambassador Monarch will build bridges of communication between youth across North America. These Symbolic Monarchs represent our shared love of monarch butterflies and shared interest in protecting monarchs.⁠

As a culmination of their work with the monarchs, the children celebrated Mariposa Day in April! They recently received butterflies from children from different places around the US. To celebrate, they made 3D butterfly cards!

This is just one example of the interconnected curriculum in Montessori classrooms, uniting language, art, and science together in a tangible way for our children.