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Transitioning from the Toddler Community to the Children’s House

Transitioning from the Toddler Community to the Children’s House

Written by Michelle Donohue and Kim McCaslin, Toddler Guides

“Thus it happens that at the age of three, life seems to begin again; for now consciousness shines forth in all its fullness and glory. We observe that a child occupied with matters that awaken his interest seems to blossom, to expand, evincing undreamed of character traits; his abilities give him great satisfaction, and he smiles with a sweet and joyous smile.” – Dr. Maria Montessori

Children grow and develop so quickly, and it is a remarkable and wonderful time of change as your child begins to look and act less toddler-like and more like a preschooler. They are getting ready to make the leap to Children’s House!

For any parent, the transition from the Toddler environment to the Children’s House environment may feel daunting. But rest assured that our Guides are here to make sure the transition goes smoothly. Because there are a few months before the transition to the Children’s House, there are a few things you can do now with your child to support their needs until school begins.

Socialization

Socialization is still an important milestone for your preschooler, and the summer can be a great time to connect with other families so your preschooler can continue to build relationships with peers. Social events and playdates are encouraged. It’s so comforting for your child to see familiar faces on the first day of school!

Familiarity

Start having conversations about the new classroom and Guides. You may want to visit the campus a few times during the summer months if your child is not already signed up for our Summer Program. We also host a classroom walk-through the week before school resumes so that your child can visit her new classroom, say hello to the Guides, and meet new friends. All of these strategies will help ease your child’s anxiety as we get closer to the new school year.

Practice

Your child has been building her concentration and strengthening her memory with work in the Toddler environment. Over the summer, you can continue to provide activities for them that have multiple steps and encourage your child to finish each to completion.

Food Preparation

Our Toddler and Children’s House students find great joy in food preparation. You can extend this practice into the home by having your child help set the table and cook with you. Not only do they get involved and excited about cooking their own meals, but this work gives children practice with sequencing and helps strengthen their fine motor muscles that will later help with writing.

Dressing and Undressing

Your toddler has been practicing simple steps of caring for themselves including putting on their shoes and coats, dressing, and undressing. Plan a little extra time in the mornings and evenings to allow them the independence to work on these skills. In Children’s House, they will need to independently put on their socks, shoes, coats, and other clothing items. 

Memory Games

Memory games are fun to play, too! Gather things around the house and ask your child if they know where they belong. This game continues to establish an internal sense of order. Other great games include naming rhyming words, practicing the sounds that letters make, and “I Spy.” And don’t forget to sing and share stories with each other! (You can talk about sequence – which comes first, second, and last. For example – the seed/sprout/plant.)

Care of Self and the Home

Children love taking care of the home, such as dusting, vacuuming, washing windows, feeding the pet, and helping with laundry. These are activities they will continue to practice during her time in Children’s House.

Toileting

One of the requirements for our Children’s House program is that the child be fully toilet independent.  This means that the child is able to identify when they need to use the bathroom, pull their clothes down, wipe clean, and re-dress themselves. To support families in this transition, Toddler Guide Danuta Wilson led a webinar on working with your children to enable them to become toilet-independent –  Watch the webinar here. We also have a helpful blog post on how to setup your bathroom for your child’s independence here. We encourage you to be in partnership with your child’s Guide in the spring months around toileting efforts so that your child becomes fully independent in the early spring and the skills are solidly in place before the end of the school year.

Connect with your child’s Guide

Your child’s new Guide will call you over the summer to learn more about your child and answer any question you may have about the transition. The first few weeks of school your child will have both emotional and social support from the Guide. As in the Toddler community, there will also be support with separation if needed. One of the perks with a mixed-age group is that the older children will help show the younger children what the expectations are of the classroom. And you can expect your child to come home very excited about all exciting work they are doing!

Learn more about Greenspring Montessori’s Children’s House program here.

Learn about the Children’s House Curriculum

The Children’s House classroom will offer your child a new environment to meet and challenge them. They will be among a larger group of peers and they will have many new and inspiring materials that build upon their experiences in the Toddler Program. 

Practical Life

Practical Life and Sensorial exercises are a large part of the Toddler Montessori curriculum and are present in the Children’s House classrooms as well. Students coming from Toddler classrooms are very familiar with these works and the manner in which they are presented. This familiarity helps the children quickly become comfortable in their new classrooms. Some familiar Practical Life works include pouring, sponge transfer, spooning, and tong activities. Care of the environment is also familiar, with works such as window washing, cloth washing, cleaning up after lunch, table scrubbing, and caring for plants. All of these works are present in Toddler classrooms but are expanded on in Children’s House.

Sensorial Materials

Sensorial exercises are introduced in the Toddler environment, including color matching, smelling jars, observing various sounds in the environment, and tactile works such as sand, soil or water. Work in the Children’s House expands on this knowledge and adds materials not present at the Toddler level including the Pink Tower, the Brown Stair, Red Rods, and Fabric Swatches. The children feel comfortable and ready for these new materials because of the foundation they built in the Toddler environment.

Language

Children ages 3 to 6 are in a sensitive period where their language skills grow astronomically. The Children’s House environment provides a rich spoken language environment which opens the door to later writing and reading. During their three years in the program, children explore grammar and syntax through a variety of materials to introduce writing, reading, and the parts of speech.

Math

Children in this plane of development learn best through concrete, hands-on exploration. For this reason, all mathematical activity in Children’s House makes use of concrete materials that allow them to explore a concept.

Geography

Unique to the Montessori classroom, the geography curriculum introduces the child to physical geography with concrete hands-on materials that emphasize the area from a sensorial perspective. Cultural geography is introduced through images and stories of their culture and other cultures around the world.

Science

Like in the Toddler classroom, children’s natural curiosity is stimulated through discovery. Children observe daily in the classroom and outdoor environment, with many lessons that connect back to the world around them. Science study in Children’s House provides an introduction to logical thinking with lessons that allow children to observe a phenomenon and relate it to others.

Art and Music

The Montessori Children’s House program sees art as a continuing process in conjunction with the day-to-day work. Children work at their own pace in the classroom using a variety of media to stimulate choice and innovation. Singing songs is a daily activity that encourages children to develop memory, language, pitch, rhythm, and movement. This expression of joy brings the children together as they build early musical skills, including rhythm, volume, and tone.

Spanish Enrichment

In Children’s House, our students work with the Spanish Enrichment Guide during the week. Children explore Spanish using songs, games, finger plays, stories, and short activities to build vocabulary and expose them to the Spanish language. 

Learn more about Greenspring Montessori’s Children’s House program here.

The Importance of the Three-Year Cycle in Children’s House

The Importance of the Three-Year Cycle in Children’s House

Montessori classrooms are designed as a three-year cycle; the mixed-age grouping is very intentional. Dr. Montessori studied how children move through cycles of development, building upon that which came before.

The Children’s House years can be broken down into the following structure for many children:

First Year of Children’s House – from age 3 to 4

  • Learning routines; learning to be part of a community
  • Building a work cycle; growing in concentration; increasing in independence
  • Attention is largely inward; self-focused
  • Looking up to older peers, as one would an older sibling
  • Learning through hands-on experiences and observation

Second Year of Children’s House – from age 4 to 5

  • Building foundational skills; period of academic rigor
  • Learning to organize and create order
  • Strengthening bonds with peers; can both serve as a mentor and receive guidance
  • Learning through experimentation and observation
  • Building confidence

Third Year of Children’s House (kindergarten) – from age 5 to 6

  • Practicing, refining, and mastering; skills are put to use with “big work”
  • Leading in the classroom and among peers
  • Managing work choices and self-reflecting
  • Developing strong peer bonds, relating comfortably to teachers and adults
  • Turning outwards, confidence soars!
  • Developing interest in and begins to understand larger matters relating to our world
  • Learning through teaching, experiencing, reflecting, and talking — lots of talking!

Strong Foundations
Much of the exercises in the beginning not only help the child achieve a direct, immediate goal, but also serve an indirect purpose of laying the foundation for future work and learning. For example, the math material is a series of exercises that guides the child starting with the most concrete and basic introduction to numbers and quantity. Over the following three years, the lessons build upon themselves, adding layers and moving toward abstraction. This concrete understanding of mathematical concepts builds until the child is eventually able to add, subtract, multiply, and divide — with a deeply ingrained understanding of what those operations mean — using only pencil, paper, and their internal processing.

Social Development
Each child benefits from being exposed to those who are older, and younger, than they are. Younger children quickly learn how to behave from watching the older children as role models. They also see the older children working on the more advanced material, which piques their interest and curiosity. The older children, in turn, benefit from being mentors to the younger ones. One of the best ways to internalize knowledge is to explain it to others, and often an older child will help teach certain concepts to a younger child. These opportunities help the child build confidence and self-esteem.

It All Comes Together
Montessori is a sequential program that moves from concrete to abstract; from simple to complex. This can most easily be seen in the math and language materials, where a foundation is rst laid and then built upon, but it exists throughout the classroom. By the end of the third year of Children’s House (Kindergarten), it is not uncommon for children to be reading and doing complex math operations. They laid the foundation for this development with two years of counting, sorting, and hands-on experience with math: numerals, quantities, thousands, hundreds, tens, units, and more! Not to mention two years of sounds, letters, tracking from left to right (the entire classroom and all lessons are organized this way), and a language-rich environment. Practical Life activities (scrubbing, polishing, pouring, sewing) have instilled the importance of organization, completing multi-step activities, and attention to detail. And the Sensorial materials that have trained their eyes to discern slight variances in shape, color, size, texture, and even smell and sound. Science and Geography lessons and materials that provided a foundational understanding of our Earth and our natural world. Kindergarteners are enthusiastic writers, readers, animal lovers, passionate recyclers, math lovers, and budding scientists! They are ready to launch into the Elementary years with confidence and drive.

What’s New in Writers’ Workshop?

What’s New in Writers’ Workshop?

Writers’ Workshop is a program for our Children’s House Elders, and our Lower and Upper Elementary students, that supports their writing development. During weekly meetings, children receive lessons on the strategies of good writing. They practice writing narrative, persuasive, and informational pieces in real contexts, including nonfiction chapter books, persuasive letters, stories, poems, and more.

Children share and celebrate their written pieces with each other during each session. Children become familiar with and practice engaging in every step of the writing process: brainstorming, drafting, revising, editing, and publishing. They learn to give and receive peer feedback, as well as receive feedback from their Guide. The goal of Writers’ Workshop is to inspire, support, and enhance our young writers.

The model we are using is based on the work of Lucy Calkins and Columbia University’s Teachers College Reading and Writing Project.

Children’s House Writers’ Workshop

In Children’s House, our youngest writers are beginning to learn the foundations of writing practice. They have been focusing on adopting the identity and mindset of a writer and the students are excited as they prepare for an amazing milestone—publishing their own books! This rewarding experience will celebrate all their hard work, dedication, and creativity. Each student will take home their bound “published” book as Winter Break approaches. It’s a special keepsake highlighting their unique talents and will surely be a source of pride for them!

We have identified the following key  lessons and Steps of the Writing Process:

  • “We are all writers!” This is such a powerful message considering writing is very powerful and we are all capable!  
  • “Stories are everywhere”. This helps children to understand that 
  • “Envision” or “Mind’s eye”. This is the concept that we can see things in our mind’s eye even if the object is not in front of us.  We will practice this by envisioning one of the playgrounds in our mind’s eye and drawing a sketch of what that looks like to us and labeling specific things and people.
  • “Once we are done, we have just begun.” This process requires great patience, perseverance, and determination, which can be acquired through practicing this motto. 

A few of the books the students have enjoyed this year include:

Lower Elementary Writers’ Workshop

Writer’s Workshop is an additional opportunity for children to develop independent writing skills. Each Writing Workshop begins with a short mini-lesson, after this the children all work on their independent writing. Conferences with individual children or small groups are held in order to offer support and guidance. Writing Workshop typically ends with a time for the children to share their written work with their peers.

This month in Writers’ Workshop, the Lower Elementary students have continued to work earnestly on their penmanship, both in print and cursive. They are also writing acrostic poems in honor of the season, which we hope will be completed in time to send home before the holiday.  And recently we learned about portmanteaus; be sure to ask your child about it!

Upper Elementary Writers’ Workshop

This month in Upper Elementary Writers’ Workshop, the students finished editing the Buffalo Bob story (a Mr. John original) to help them understand that every character who speaks in a story deserves their own line on the page (no more dense blocks of dialogue for us!).They also learned how to summarize text with a story about cows (Did you know that cow dung is an efficient producer of fuel and biogas?). Finally, they moved on to Word Stories, where each child was provided with five random words or phrases to incorporate into a fictional story (talking snake, knight, jewels, robbers, Walt Disney World, hot air balloon, rollercoaster, shark….you get the idea).   
Grounds Day Fall 2024

Grounds Day Fall 2024

As part of our Allegiance to Nature at Greenspring Montessori School, our faculty and staff organized our annual Grounds Day event for our children and families.

Our Toddler, Children’s House, Elementary, and Adolescent classes took on various projects around our campus including cleaning, planting, and building a new compost collection bin, along with a special nature-based story walk.

Many families also worked to restore natural spaces on campus and make improvements to the outdoor environments. Thank you all for your dedication and support!

Fall in our Outdoor Environments

Fall in our Outdoor Environments

Toddler Outdoor Environments

Our Toddlers have been exploring their classrooms and outdoor environments with all of their senses. Our Toddler Outdoor Environments are thoughtfully prepared for the children to explore with natural materials and wild spaces to explore. Many of the materials promote gross motor skills, such as wheelbarrows, sweeping, pikler triangles, and balance beams. Additionally, works are put out for fine motor skills and concentration, similar to what would be found inside the Toddler classroom.

Children’s House Outdoor Environments

Students in our Children’s House Outdoor Environments have been immersed in a rich journey of discovery. Since the first day of school, we have been enjoying our explorations of the beautiful grounds on campus. Strolling by the dogwood trees, pine trees, fig trees, and colorful zinnias brings the children so much happiness and they are able to explore the campus with all of their senses. We were grateful to experience two weeks of rain, which welcomed an abundance of salamanders, slugs, worms, and even an amazing giant toad! The rain was a welcome gift for our plants as well. We eagerly await the stunning array of colors that autumn will unveil!

The children have been discovering the art of effectively using our garden tools, which can be quite a journey for our youngest Children’s House students. Through dedication, guidance, and the help of elders in the classroom, the children discover a passion for digging, raking, and utilizing garden tools.

With regular visits to the nature center, we enjoy feeding and engaging with Ivan, having snake-handling lessons with Nessie, and discovering the many different creatures that reside there. 

The children in the Dogwood and River Birch class have been nurturing our Oak Tree Nursery, with four white oaks grown from acorns that are thriving in pots. They also have been enjoying the process of herbal tea making, with herbs from our herb garden! Mint tea with honey is a fan favorite. 

Sit Spots

Starting in Children’s House, students participate in Sit Spots outside in all weather – a place where the child can sit for five minutes away from distractions to observe nature and enjoy time in quiet reflection. Sit spots are a way for our children to try out a new way to enjoy the world around them – observing the sights, sounds, smells, and touch of the natural world.

Elementary and Adolescent Outdoor Environments

Our Elementary and Adolescent students have been exploring the Outdoor Environments, our campus, and even venturing out to learn about the greater Chesapeake Bay watershed.

Lower Elementary

In Lower Elementary, students grew a large harvest of radishes as the weather began to cool. They sold the radishes to the community to benefit the victims of Hurricane Helene. Now they are setting their sites on the colder winter months ahead and working to build a low tunnel over their raised garden bed to protect their winter lettuce.

Lower Elementary students continue the practice of Sit Spots, heading outside each morning in all weather conditions for five minutes of reflection and observation.

Upper Elementary

In Upper Elementary, the students visited Echo Hill Outdoor School for an immersive three day trip. They had the opportunity to explore the Chester River by boat, complete a ropes course, and enjoy many team-building activities. See photos and learn more about their trip here.

 

Adolescent Community

Our Adolescents have been working to improve our campus rain garden, pulling invasive weeds and making way for native plants to thrive. They also ventured out into the Baltimore community to volunteer with NeighborSpace Baltimore to clean up local pocket parks, add native plants to rain gardens, and run tests in a local stream. The students loved meeting a local Baltimore artist and learning more about these communities. They had an opportunity to see firsthand how environmental justice can serve city residents with improved access to multi-use green spaces. ⁠

 

Celebrating Latin and Hispanic Heritage Month

Celebrating Latin and Hispanic Heritage Month

Latin and Hispanic Heritage Month is observed from September 15 to October 15 each year in the United States, and celebrates the histories, cultures, and contributions of people of Hispanic and Latin American descent. The month recognizes the rich cultural heritage, traditions, and achievements of Hispanic and Latin communities, who have significantly influenced U.S. history, arts, politics, and society. It also serves as an opportunity to honor the diversity within these communities, which include people from various nations in Latin America, the Caribbean, Africa, and Spain.

During September and October, our Spanish Dual Language team created many meaningful ways to engage our community, including a special map for students and staff to document their own Latin and Hispanic heritage, a whole school Independence parade celebrating the independence of seven Latin American countries, and many lessons on the rich histories of the many communities that make up the Spanish-speaking regions of the world. Click on the link below to see photos and learn more about this amazing work.

Latin Independence Parade

Latin and Hispanic Heritage Month begins on September 15 to coincide with the Independence Days of several Latin American countries, including Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua, followed by Mexico’s Independence Day on September 16, and Chile’s on September 18. Our Spanish language Guides and Partners led a celebration of the seven Latin American countries commemorating their independence in September – Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Mexico, and Chile.

We enjoyed music from each country as our children paraded the campus with the flags they created. Children loved learning the meaning behind many of the flags of Latin America and creating their own to share. ⁠This was a beautiful way to commemorate Latin and Hispanic Heritage Month with our community!

 

Latin and Hispanic Heritage Wall

Additionally, during Latin and Hispanic Heritage Month our Dual Language team created a map of all of the Spanish-speaking countries. Children’s House students researched the countries and cut them out for the map. Then students and staff were invited to create a personal bio to pin to the countries where they share heritage and history. It has been a joy to learn more about others in our community and celebrate the beautiful diversity of our Spanish-speaking community. 

Thank you to the Dual Language staff for coordinating these efforts. You have helped to create a beautiful and meaningful celebration for our children, families, and staff. 

In addition to the planned celebrations, students also made Salvadorian papusas during their Spanish enrichment class – yet another beautiful way that our Spanish team brings culture alive in the classrooms!