The Pink Tower and The Post Office

It has been another great week in the nursery, hard to believe we are into the latter half of our first month back.

We are all truly settled now and enjoying the return of our extracurricular classes.

Ballet on Tuesday was much anticipated by all our budding ballerinas. While it does give our petite prima donnas a chance to don their fantastic pink tutus and wraps, it’s not just the girls that benefit.  Ballet refines the gross motor skills of boys and girls alike. Rhythm, music, movement, balance and coordination are all core aspects of the senior nursery ballet classes.

Drama on Wednesday is a roaring success, quite literally! The return of Esther saw the junior and senior nursery class visit “Chocolate Land” and “Monkey Land” they all drew their tickets, packed their cases and boarded the imagination express to explore the wonderful lands.

Music on Fridays is always a treat. Especially this year as we will be gearing up for the Big 20th Anniversary Christmas Musical. Keep in touch for more news on that!

Even with all our great extracurricular classes we had more than enough time to get into our Montessori curriculum.

The junior nursery class are really immersed in the culture and animals of the Australian Continent.

Junior Nursery Continental Australia

They started by painting the continent it’s Montessori key colour brown. Once that was done they began to add their cultural art items. Including the cutest Koala Bear’s, some pretty dazzling boomerangs and spectacular snakes!

We were all very proud of our new nursery juniors, who range in age from 2yrs 2 months to 3yrs. This week one of our youngest students completed the first in the sensorial curriculum, the pink tower.  It really is a great moment to see a child understand and internalize the lessons of the Montessori materials, as each lesson builds the child’s confidence and cognitive abilities.

My First Pink Tower.

The pink tower is a beautiful material, and gives so much to the young learner. There are 10 cubes in graduated dimension from 1cm to 10cm. In carrying and sorting, grading and building the tower the child develops coordination, concentration alongside visual and sensorial discrimination of size.

Our “big school buddy” Emma came to visit on Thursday and she began a new literature project with the junior nursery class. The Gruffalo.

If you havent read Julia Donaldson’s classic children’s tale, get to your local bookstore quick and enjoy it for yourself. Emma brought a fantastic Gruffalo pop up theatre book and we recreated the story as we listened to the Gruffalo song. Then everyone made their own Gruffalo mask, complete with prickly purple spines and tusks! Have a look below, click on the image to zoom in and see all the detail.

Junior Nursery Gruffalo Wall

With all the news from the Junior Nursery Class, lets not leave our Senior Class out of the updates.

We are still continuing on our Asian expedition.

Now you see it..... soon you wont!

This week we made sushi.

Many hands did indeed make light work, both of the creation and the consumption of our sushi. It vanished so fast we hardly had time to take photos.

Everyone enjoyed spreading the rice on the nori, laying the cucumber, mango or tuna and rolling the maki.

Enjoying the maki.

Then we all enjoyed a piece with our lunch, accompanied by pickled ginger, soy and some even ventured towards the wasabi. A real treat for our developing taste buds.

Next week we hope to explore the beauty and diversity of Asian architecture. Come back at the end of the week to find out what we discover.

Not to be outdone by our little neighbours in the junior class, the senior class have been creating their own fantastic interpretations of the animals of Asia. Our chosen animals are the Golden Monkey and the Giant Panda!

Our Golden Monkeys

Our Giant Pandas

We also began our Role Play area this week with the Post Office.

Role Play is important for young children. Role playing encourages the use of critical thinking Participation in role-play allows students to make decisions, and through the feedback received, see the results of their actions, and can therefore learn how to adjust words and actions to produce more successful outcomes. It also teaches many lessons that are needed in society, such as competition, cooperation and empathy.

The Post Office is a great hit and we will be expanding its tasks this week. So far we have been posting letters, emptying the letter box and sorting the post for delivery.

We have two functions of sorting, either by shape or by stamp colour. We take turns posting, collecting and sorting. Children work in pairs at the role play area and everyone ensures they get their time to get into the role.

In the coming days we want to create our own postcards and take them to the local post office to send to friends and family as a keepsake of our time in the Nursery.  Before we do, we have to practice our stamp buying, and our post office etiquette in our role play area.

Hedley Park P.O

Finally, perhaps you may have seen our 20th Anniversary write-up in the Metro Herald on Friday 17th? If not, or if your copy got wet in all the sudden rain showers we’ve been having, worry not, here is a pdf copy to read at leisure.  MetroHerald 17-09-10

It is with that note, that we await the beginning of a new week in Hedley Park Montessori, I wonder what we will learn this week!

Thanks for popping in to catch up, if you have something to tell us feel free to comment. We’d love to hear from you.

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Have a great week

From all the staff and pupils of the little school!