Montessori Writer

Dealing with separation anxiety is difficult on all involved. It hurts the parent and the child, and can make the teacher feel very uncomfortable, as well. Even worse is when the separation anxiety continues even into the second semester of the school year.

I may not have my own biological children, but I have felt the guilt and the tugging of the heartstrings when leaving behind a screaming, crying child. I used to nanny three wonderful children every summer. The one day, as I was leaving the five year-old boy at his summer camp, he grabbed ahold of me and was screaming and crying, “Don’t leave me, Miss Andrea!” I knew that he was going to be fine as soon as I left and he got involved in something. Unfortunately, the young girls who were working the camp didn’t listen to me when I was telling them to just take him, so my farewell was prolonged a little longer than I would have liked. I finally returned to the car where his sisters were, with tears in my eyes and a lump in my throat. When I returned to pick him up later that afternoon, I was told he had stopped crying within about two minutes of my departure. I had figured as much.

The hardest thing for parents to understand is that quite often that screaming mess of snot hanging on their leg is truly going to be okay. Children are very good at convincing their parents that they are going to be miserable all day. And quite possibly right in that moment, that is what they truly think. But chances are, the child is going to calm himself within a few minutes of the parent’s departure. And all will be fine.

I have been working with children for quite some time now, over 20 years in various capacities. I have a knack for knowing them inside and out. And I promise you, when I say a child is going to be okay when the parent leaves, I am telling the truth. If I truly felt that a child needed more time with his mommy before she left, I would tell her that. If a child continues crying for an excessive amount of time and isn’t able to stop, then I would call the parent in for a conference.

I do still have a couple of criers who approach my door in the morning. Some of their parents are really good at giving that last hug and kiss and just leaving, trusting me that the child will be okay. Others still refuse to leave, and get upset when I tell them to just go. They are convinced that the child is miserable all day, even if that child gets into the car with a smile on his face. Or, they prolong the goodbye, which does in turn make the child cry even longer. Some give in, and take the child with them. I worry about those parents, because the child is getting what he wants, already at such a young age. He is never going to learn to separate that way.

So, I beg of parents, please trust what the teacher says. Create a special goodbye ritual with the child, that stays within the parameters of the classroom. Listen to the teacher when she says, “Ok, one last kiss for mommy, then it’s time to come in!” Hang out in the office, or call in later to check on the child. Be careful about peeking in, because oftentimes, other children will see you, alert your child, and the crying mess will begin all over again, even if he was just contentedly working right before that moment. Ask the teacher what her plan is for dealing with your child and his tears. Try reading a book, such as Bye-Bye Time by Elizabeth Verdick. Reassure your child that you are going to come back. Tell him that you have to go do some things or go to work while he does his work. And trust that if there is really a problem, the teacher or the administrator will call you.

If the anxiety seems to continue, consider having the school’s social worker or psychologist do an unofficial consult. Discuss it with your pediatrician. Sometimes, unresolved separation anxiety could indicate a more serious problem, but it is usually just a prolonged phase. And again, trust the child’s teacher. Chances are, she knows what she’s talking about!

Yesterday, I was making huge changes to the Montessori Practical Life area, as I always do in January. I’m adding the bigger cleaning projects, and a lot more water work. We waited longer than usual this year, because we have so many three year-olds who needed more time to normalize to classroom rules.

I got to the shelf that used to hold all of the food preparation works, and I realized how much I am missing it! I was hoping that by now, we would be able to start getting it out again, but I realize that isn’t going to happen.

It really makes me sad, because food preparation was one of the greatest parts of my Montessori classroom over the last couple of years. It’s a great avenue for food tasting, nutrition, and so many other practical life skills! The concentration the children develop while focusing on preparing their food, the independence of making their own meals when hungry, the fine motor skills and coordination required to manipulate the tools, the grace and courtesy skills learned when preparing a snack for a visitor….*sigh* And then, all of the skills learned in dishwashing afterwards….

I know I have mentioned it before , but I have to say it again - hygiene.  The children had to wash their hands, prior to starting ANY food preparation work. Even if you just had a bagel, you must wash your hands again before starting to prepare shredded cheese. (Chances are, you licked your fingers when eating, plus it reinforces the concept of washing hands prior to preparing food.)

Then, they had to scrub their dishes. We were very diligent about making them aware of clean dishes versus dirty dishes. They need to scrub dishes almost as long as they scrub their hands, to make sure all of the germs are gone. Our children were cleaner and more hygienic, in my opinion. I also think we had less illness over the last couple of years than we have had this year.

My hope is that I can resurrect the program again soon. My parents were always quite good about contributing to the food preparation program, by tweaking their choices for the classroom snack sent in. I would hate to lose that completely, as it took some time to build that up. We shall see!

For Day 2 of the work rings, I added a couple of cards for a couple of children, further dividing the areas. I was impressed that they all walked right in, did their story writing, then went straight for their work rings. A few of them even tried to skip their story writing, to go directly to the work rings!

They are really enjoying the “scavenger hunt” around the room, to match their cards to the work areas, and showing each other what each card says. I think it is also indirectly aiding their reading skills as it develops their work ethic.

Ah…the young ones…

So, we have these two little girls who carpool, and are usually the last ones to be picked up. They are sitting on the bench, almost five minutes after everyone else is gone. We start talking about what they got for Christmas (mp3 player, camera - hello, they are 4!!). The one pulls out her Barbie princess cell phone (not real, surprisingly enough). Her friend says, “Call your mom, she’s late.” The first one punches a bunch of numbers, listens for a minute, then hangs up. “I dialed the wrong number!”

Children crave guidance, and Montessori education allows for freedom within limits. Elementary classrooms utilize a work plan of sorts, and some early childhood classes like to use them, too. I do not like the work plan that is written out for my kindergarteners, so today I came up with a new plan of action. I call it the Work Ring.

I color-coded every area of the classroom and wrote its name on a card, then labeled them all.Then for each child, I put corresponding cards onto a book ring. Each child has a set of cards tailored for his or her ability level, yet the cards cover the entire classroom. I told them they have a week to go through the entire set of cards.

To start, I put the cards in rainbow order. Being creatures of habit who crave order, most of them decided to tackle the cards in order. A few decided to skip ahead, but they know they are to try a work indicated by every card on their Work Ring.

For the first day, this group of children was very excited to use their Work Rings. I am contemplating adding more cards, to have the children revisit different areas, unless they do that on their own. I am also considering occasionally mixing up the cards, to give them a different order to follow, if that is necessary. But for now, I am going to leave it the way that it is, and observe to see what happens.

Question for the day:  What method of work plans do you use, if any at all?

Ah, the end of winter break has, alas, arrived. Today is Saturday, January 2nd, which means the day after New Years, which means that Monday is back to work.

This year, I am grateful that NY hit on a weekend. Other years, we go back to school immediately on the 2nd, which always puts a damper on my festivities. See, I usually try to go visit friends and family out of town, and trying to drive the day after a NYE party is, well, difficult.

So, with the NY holiday, people are always trying to come up with some NY resolutions. I generally do not participate in such festivities, because the likelihood of truly following through with all of the things one wishes to change is difficult. I already commented on my writing goals and other things in my thoughts blog. Here, I can focus on a couple of my Montessori thoughts.

I believe that all Montessori educators need to take a step back and reflect on giving the classroom back to the children. A fellow Montessorian and I got together over break, and one of our many topics was how many teachers keep trying to do for the children, instead of allowing the children to come to discovery on their own. We get too caught up in our own personal pats on the back, or our own desires, and forget that the Montessori education is really supposed to be about the children.

Ironically enough, @AMIUSA published a Maria Montessori quote along these lines on NYE, just as I was searching for a quote to use in my Montessori Education Examiner article for Thoughtful Thursday.  This is what they posted:  “So here begins the new path, wherein it will not be the teacherwho teaches the child, but the child who teaches the teacher.”

A couple of other great quotes are also on the page, that echo these sentiments:  “One test of the correctness of educational procedure is the happiness of the child.” 

“The child… often suffers, not from too much work, but from work that is unworthy of him.” 

“‘Wait while observing.’ That is the motto of the educator.”

I have been trying to reflect on such statements, while also trying to reengage in my Montessori writing across the various websites, hoping to be re-inspired to do what I love to do, and what has been a part of my being since I was a young child.

May you find such inspiration, too, this New Year. Give the classroom back to the children, and experience a new sense of wonderment.

This time of year is always difficult, whether you are a Montessori educator, or teach in public, private, or parochial schools.  Though the majority of our society seems to celebrate Christmas, there are other holidays within the same season.  Most of our multicultural schools have children from many walks of life, and we strive to include everyone somehow.  In previous years, there was a Festival of Lights, but that was before my time here.  My first couple of years, we used to sing a lot of Christmas songs, and added a few Hanukkah songs.

With our new music teacher, who has now been with us for three years, we finally have a more multicultural feel.  One of the new songs is the African Noel, which uses the African drums to maintain the beat, while the lyrics are a simple, “Sing noel”.

Another great song is the Chinese song “Go A Tin”.  The children use rhythm sticks in between verses.  We also added “Feliz Navidad” this year, as well as doing our Hanukkah songs.  Also, to represent our children from India, one of the mothers taught our children the Diwali song.

Following their half hour sing-a-long (which I did this year instead of a performance because they are so little), we had refreshments in our classroom.  The parents were great, and brought prepackaged cheese, crackers, fruit, veggies, and cookies.  This was a slight change from the past few years, when our children actually prepared all of the food ahead of time.  But as I discussed before, we have had to keep the food preparation activities out this year, as a precaution against the H1N1 virus.

What amused me the most about my children this year is that they came back into the classroom, simply grabbed one cookie, then all went to choose work!  One poor child wanted to do a map, but there wasn’t enough space for him to do it.

So now, my party ended 1 1/2 hours ago.  Most of the children went home, but a few are sticking it out for the rest of the day.  We’re going to cheat and put on some movies.  I can guarantee they may almost all fall asleep!

How do you celebrate the holiday?

As we all know, I have a thing for Eddie Vedder and Pearl Jam - they make me happy.  We listen to contemporary music frequently in my classroom in the afternoons.  Today, we were listening to Jack Johnson In Concert.  Track 12 came on, which is his duet with Eddie Vedder, “Constellations”.  The song is just amazingly beautiful, gives me chills, often provokes a tear, and makes me terribly happy at the same time.

Because it was the end of the day on Friday, I started singing along and dancing a little bit while straightening the room.  The kids, who for some reason have been obsessed with whether or not I am married today, told me that I needed to “Marry that man” because he made me so happy.

Good kids - I have trained them well!

Alas, Eddie proposed to long-time girlfriend and mother to his two daughters, Jill McCormick, this week, so I guess that fated trip in Albany wasn’t stirring enough on his end.

My assistant came up with a great holiday project this year. They kids are making their faces into ornaments. First, they have to look in the mirror to determine what shape their face is, then choose a corresponding shape from the metal insets. They then trace the shape on a pre-cut circle and use multicultural markers, construction paper, yarn, etc., to make their face.  On the back, she is putting real pictures of the children for reference. Then it is labeled with the school name and year.

They’re really stinkin’ cute and child-driven!

Kudos to Karen!! 

When working with young children, it is inevitable that they are going to say somethings that cause your jaw to drop or to have to duck so that they don’t see you laughing. In the last two weeks, my kids have notoriously contributed some verbal jewels that I just need to share.

The most jaw-dropping of them all comes from a young boy who turned 3 years old just a few weeks ago. He is very sweet and very verbal, and we were warned from the beginning that he had developed a tendency to drop a couple of choice phrases here and there.

He started out by screaming, “G*dd@mm!t, I want my mommy!” when having one of his daily bouts with separation anxiety. Then, yesterday, he came over to the story writing table and started straightening the papers that were in front of me.”Hey, Miss Coventry, I’m f***ing straightening your papers!” I could not believe what I had just heard him say, so I asked him to repeat it, which he did, clear as a bell.  I kept hoping that he was really trying to say something else, so I did ask him two more times.  When I asked him to tell my assistant, he suddenly changed his phrase, dropping the adverb completely.

Today, he simply said, “What the hell?”

Another one of my three year-old boys came up to me yesterday and said, “Miss Coventry, I am going to fart on you!”  I simply said, “No, you’re not,” and went to turn away.  He replies, “But I have a fart in my butt!”  I walked away.

My favorite story, though, is the cleanest one, and honestly the funniest.  When I shared it with her parents at our conference, the three of us honestly had tears streaming down our faces.

One of my kindergarten girls comes into class a couple of weeks ago, stomping angry.  She marches up to her best friend, also a K, and says, “I’m very mad at you, because you didn’t answer when I called you on my imaginary phone last night!”  The other child nonchalantly replies, “I’m sorry. I didn’t hear it ring.”

These are the moments that keep teaching interesting……