It’s hard to believe, but it’s the last few days of the school year….it’s not an easy thing to say goodbye to all the little people who are moving on to ‘big’ school after spending the year getting to know them and being part of their wonderful journey of growth & learning, but they’re heading in the right direction, and it’s an exciting time for them and for us all! With that in mind, this short week will be a relaxing and calm(ish!) one; we will be having a teddy bears’ picnic, dressing up, looking through our end of year All About Me photo books, group projects and most importantly, spending precious time with the children before finishing up with a party on Wednesday!

Many thanks to all of you who helped us out throughout the year whether by coming on nature walks/ sports day/ school tour etc, or coming into school with your child to read a story or celebrate their birthday, or in general just being such a supportive part of your child’s preschool experience! If you don’t have a child returning in the near future, we hope that you & your child will continue to visit any time – this year we had the first transition year student on work experience who is an ex-pupil of the Montessori, & 3 other secondary level ex-Montessori pupils also on work experience, so there’s no excuses – we can always find a space for your children!!

Teddy Bears’ Picnic

If you go down to the woods today,
You’re sure of a big surprise…
If you go down to the woods today,
You’d better go in disguise!

For all the bears that ever there was,
Will gather there for certain,
Because today’s the day the
Teddy bears have their picnic!

Our last full week in The Children’s House!!!! What a quick year it’s been….and we’re going to make the most of the time we have left!! After a wonderful week last week celebrating grandparents, philosophising about change and of course having our annual Sports Day, this week we will be focussing on the children’s emotions and possible concerns in a positive way; we will be making worry dolls, a traditional Guatemalan peg doll that the children can confide their worries in and the dolls are meant to take the worries away. We always reiterate to the children that they should always be able to tell their parents/guardians/teachers about their worries, but if for instance they are awake in the middle of the night and need a bit of comfort, the worry dolls are a lovely support. We will also be doing some mindfulness during the week, and getting the children to come up with different strategies they can use when they are feeling a bit worried or stressed – like deep breathing, yoga, jumping up & down….whatever suits that particular child to help them regulate their own behaviour and give them control!

We are continuing to learn sign language after huge success with If You’re Happy and You Know It last week – this week your children are learnign how to sign 5 Little Monkeys!!

5 Little Monkeys

5 little monkeys jumping on the bed,
1 fell off & bumped his head!
Mammy rang the doctor and the doctor said –
‘No more monkeys jumping on the bed!!’

4 little monkeys…

3 little monkeys…

2 little monkeys…

1 little monkey…

This week in The Children’s House we are celebrating grandparents, and asking if any of the children’s grandparents would like to join us during the week and show us photos of when they were children, or read a story at circle time, or anything they like at all!! We will also be doing some art for Father’s Day, as well as doing the musical instruments and later in the week philosophising about change that is coming for next year – some children are moving to different classrooms within the Montessori, while some children are moving to different schools, so we will be discussing why change happens and how that makes us feel.

Also this week, we are learning some sign language!! We are using Lámh, which is a signing system used in Ireland by people with intellectual disability and communication needs, and one of the children is currently using this system so we thought we’d all learn it together! So we’re signing the song If You’re Happy and You Know It – by the end of the week your children should know how to sign ‘happy’, ‘sad’ or ‘angry’, so just ask them to teach you

If You’re Happy and You Know It

If you’re happy and you know it clap your hands,
If you’re happy and you know it clap your hands,
If you’re happy and you really want to show it –
If you’re happy and you know it clap your hands!

If you’re sad and you know it wipe your tears…
(sign for sad: pass hand down over face making sad face)

If you’re angry and you know it stamp your feet…
(sign for angry: draw index finger across forehead making angry face)

If you’re happy and you know it clap your hands…
(sign for happy: 2 thumbs up)

Welcome back from the long weekend, hope you all had a lovely break! It’s only a short week this week but we’re going to pack a lot in – drama, science and cooking! We will be acting out the dramatic poem of the big bad wolf, and making homemade pizzas, and then at the end of the week we’ll be doing an experiment to demonstrate the power of our lungs using straws, cotton balls and marbles – it’s going to be a lot of fun!!

The Big Bad Wolf

I’m a big bad wolf and I look for things to eat –
I don’t like leaves and berries; I only like meat!
I see those little piggies – am I dreaming, or awake?
Those chubby little creatures…
What a dinner they will make!!

Well it’s hard to believe, but this week is the start of June, and our last month of school for this year….how time is flying by!! Thank you so much to all the parents who came with us last week on the school tours to Lullymore – we couldn’t do these trips without you, and it was great to have you there to experience the excitement of it all!!

This week as well as talking about May ending and June starting, we will be discussing what makes us all different as individuals, and the children will be doing self-portraits; they previously did self-portraits in October when we were learning about emotions, so it will be lovely to have the 2 to compare! We will be encouraging the children to think more about others by doing an empathy game – where we describe one of the children by what motivates them or what is important to them, their likes and personality, and the children have to guess who it is – in this way they are seeing each other as more than just another child in the classroom, and looking outside themselves, which is sometimes hard to do at this young age!

1, 2, 3, 4, 5

1, 2, 3, 4, 5 once I caught a fish alive,
6, 7, 8, 9, 10 then I let it go again.
Why did you let it go?
Beacuse it bit my finger so –
Which finger did it bite?
This little finger on my right!

It’s all about the farm this week in The Children’s House! The children will be looking at animals on the Montessori farm, learning the names of baby animals, pretending to be different animals and acting out how they move, sound, etc….and preparing for one of the highlights of the year – the school trip to Lullymore!! During their trip to Lullymore Heritage and Discovery Farm, the children will go on a train trip through the Bog of Allen, visit the pet farm with many different animals, have a guided tour through the wooded area and fairy village, and play in the outdoor/indoor play area as weather dictates, as well as picnicking there, and of course the main event – going on the bus!!! We can guarantee that some children will pass out on the way home from exhaustion brought on by over-excitement from it all!!

Please ensure that your child brings a packed lunch, is wearing weather appropriate clothes…and it looks like you will have to apply sun cream before they go!

We will be discussing all about growing up this week, with the school year moving on swiftly & a lot of the children getting ready to go to primary school next September. With this in mind, we have arranged for the older children to go on a visit to Sallins primary school where we get a little tour of some of the school – we are shown the library, fish tank, the playground full of children at break time, and we get to see one of the junior infants classes and learn vital information such as where the toilets are! Children can often become nervous at the thoughts of transitioning from the safety of preschool, and we find the visit to ‘big school’ really does a lot to reassure the children about this change, and opens up lots of conversations about it. Also, learning seemingly unimportant facts such as the location of the toilets can take the stress away from children about having to ask their teacher in school if they are shy or embarrassed about these sort of things. It is an exciting time for your children and we always focus on the positivity of this step in their journey in learning, even though we are dreading them finishing up with us as we will miss them so much!!

Also this week we will be focussing on being healthy – having just received our Healthy Ireland Smart Start award in recognition of the work we do promoting the children’s health and well-being, physically & emotionally! So we will be talking about how the children are all growing, what makes them special, and we will be making healthy smoothies with spinach and fruit during the week. We will be continuing on with the group project of the children’s own maps, and also their All About Me books.

I Am Special

I am special, I am me (point to self proudly)

I have two hands and (raise hands)

two eyes to see (point to eyes)

A nose to smell (point to nose and sniff)

and my ears hear well. (cup ears)

A mouth to talk (mimic talking)

and two legs to walk. (walk in place)

But that’s not all because you see,

I am SPECIAL, I am ME! (point to self proudly with both thumbs)

I am special as I can be because no one looks or acts like me.

I am one person, myself, me and that’s the way that it should be

This week at The Children’s House we will be studying music; we will start by looking at examples of how music is written, and then listening to different types of music,  introducing the idea of how music can cause us to feel different emotions. During the week we will be trying out different musical instruments e.g. drums (percussion), guitars (strings) – so if anyone has any brass or woodwind instruments please feel free to bring them in to show us!! We are also inviting family members in all this week to play instruments with us, sing songs or nursery rhymes, or anything musical at all!

Later in the week the children can bring in recyclables to make instruments out of e.g. plastic bottles, tubs, Pringles tubes…we’ll be using our imaginations! Finally at the end of the week we’ll be philosophising about why certain pieces of music can make us feel happy, sad, calm etc. It’s going to be a really fun week!!

The Dingle Dangle Scarecrow

When all the cows were sleeping
And the sun had gone to bed,
Up jumped the scarecrow
And this is what he said:

Refrain
I’m a dingle dangle scarecrow
With a flippy floppy hat!
I can shake my arms like this,
I can shake my legs like that!

When the cows were in the meadow
And the pigeons in the loft,
Up jumped the scarecrow
And whispered very soft: Refrain

When all the hens were roosting
And the moon behind a cloud,
Up jumped the scarecrow
And shouted very loud: Refrain