Lyonsgate Weekly Update | Friday, Nov. 22, 2019

Good Afternoon Lyonsgate Families,

Don’t forget there is a PA Day next Friday, Nov. 29, for the Parent-Teacher conferences. Childcare will be available during your conference time. If you still need to sign up for a Parent-Teacher conference time, please click here.

Your children’s Montessori guides have updates about the progress in the classrooms now that we are heading into the final weeks of the fall term. It’s important that we keep you up to date on the overall progress of the classrooms, as well as the individual progress you will learn about at your conference next week. Be sure to give them a read!


Toddler

Three months into the school year, the children are settled and personalities are blooming. The layers of uncertainty have shed; the children have realized that school is simply a new routine and that the morning separation does not last forever. Personalities are certainly unfolding — the empathetic child, the classroom leader, the comic relief, the performer; all personalities that embody this year’s Toddler community.

It is hard to believe that we are speeding towards the end of the first term. It is heartwarming to see how far the children have come — gross and fine motor skills are refining, language explosions are occurring, and a heightened sensory awareness is developing. The most impressive development in a new Toddler class is language —the frustrations and uncertainties that were portrayed through tears are now verbalized. Updates are provided daily, from what was purchased at the grocery store to the weekend activities. It is refreshing to relive the importance of language and communication through Toddlers — to understand and to be understood is truly what we all desire. As we are getting ready to wrap up the first term, this week’s update serves as a reminder that time truly does fly and little moments need to be captured and cherished.

I look forward to speaking to you all next week about your child’s development and share commonalities observed in the past few weeks.

Note to parents: Thank you for your due diligence in labeling all of your children’s clothing. In order to decrease clutter in the cloak area, please ensure that a minimalist approach is embraced — one jacket/snow pant/ snowsuit per child. If you are sending your child to school with an extra pair of winter accessories (mittens, hats), please ensure that they are enclosed in a backpack/reusable bag. The children are excited about self-dressing and a cloak area full of preventable obstacles creates frustrations for them.

Thank you for the weekly donation of flowers (signup sheet can be found at the school’s entrance). The beautiful variety of colours has been quite the topic lately!

Have a great weekend everyone!

Ms. Dee.


Casa South

We hope that everyone is staying happy, healthy and warm during these dark days!

An article came up in a Montessori group I am a part of and I thought I would send it your way! I found it very interesting and I hope you do too! Click here to access “Against the Sticker Chart”

I am looking forward to the upcoming parent teacher conferences and am excited to share what your children have been up to!

Miss Moffatt


Casa North

Hello Casa North Families!

Thanks for another great week. As we have officially reached winter weather your children have been diligently practising zippers, snaps, hats, mittens, snowpants, boots, and more! It has been beautiful to see their camaraderie and cooperation.

The classroom has been abuzz with work this week. We have seen third years presenting to first years, children tasting new foods like hummus and persimmons, and some large group activities that encourage teamwork. I have observed some new social bonds being formed as well, which is lovely to see! The social dynamics ebb and flow and can shift the culture of the classroom as a whole.

Thank you for signing up for Parent-Teacher conferences next week. I look forward to being able to sit down with you to discuss your child’s progress so far. If you have yet to sign up, there are still a few slots left. Bundle up, and we will see you next week!

Warmly,

Miss Boyle


Elementary

In the first months of school the students often congregate outdoors for language work, drama, and botany. As the weather tends more and more toward damp and cold, the students have been drawn back into the classroom and work with the physical Montessori materials. Every classroom community experiences its fads and bursts of interest in certain subjects, and lately at Lyonsgate the Elementary students have re-engaged with geometry.

Our most tactile learners have been naming 3D solids, discovering how they move in space, and identifying their 2D equivalents. Using the divided metal inset material, they can visualize and test comparisons of size, shape, and equivalency. They can also use the insets for geometric art explorations by tracing and colouring to create design work. This work also connects with their visual arts study of different types of lines, shading, and use of complementary colours or monochrome. Other children are investigating different types of angles and the varieties of triangles that can be created by different lengths of side. Using the Constructive Triangles material, they discover which types of pre-set triangles can be combined to build other polygons, and then build each type of triangle themselves using the Montessori Box of Sticks material.

As students move through the Elementary years, their love of words and ability to reason combines with their powers of imagination, enabling them to connect the materials to drawings and text. They work with diagrams and precise definitions to develop their vocabulary, review and retain the information, and support higher level thinking and communication about geometry. Conversely, they also use what they have learned in geometry to represent word functions, diagram sentence structures, and illustrate the shape of a story’s plot.

Work in geometry guides students to take the world around them and put it on paper. Once they have learned to represent what they see, they can then illustrate what they imagine. These are the seeds that may germinate one day as part of a child’s cosmic task. Maybe they will grow into careers in physics or innovative engineering. Possibly they will blossom into an artist’s or architect’s hand. Hopefully it will be the gift of being able to sketch out a dream and imagine how to make it a reality, whether it’s a noble plan for getting clean water to a community in need, or the personal joy in building the very best backyard tree house ever.

Marissa

Parent Notes:

  • Now that Locke St. has re-opened we have had a request from the crossing guards to please guide children to cross at the crosswalks. We all got used to running across Locke depending on the construction obstacles and they have asked that we all get back into the habit of crossing with their safety assistance.
  • Reminder: school photo orders, either paper forms or online orders, are due on Monday, Nov. 25.

Coming Up

Please remember to make good use of your Lyonsgate calendar for up to date information.

  • Parent Observations: next week is the last week of observations for Casa and Elementary families. If you have not signed up for an observation time slot yet, please do so using the following links:

 

 


  • Parent-Teacher Conferences: take place on Friday, November 29; there are also a few afternoon/after school time slots during the weekdays leading up to the Friday. There is no school on Friday, Nov. 29, but childcare is available during your conference time. Click here to select your child’s class and a conference time.

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