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Tag: Grace and Courtesy

The Most Important Montessori Lesson

I love what a Montessori education does for a child’s love of learning. I love the enthusiasm that it engenders. I love to watch the understanding that dawns on a child as a concept makes sense for the first time.

Montessori children learn to read – often very early. They learn their numbers – not just counting but understanding that seven is one more than six and not just because it follows six. They begin to add and subtract, even multiply and divide. They learn about leaves and leaf shapes. They learn about zoology, geometry and time. There seems to be almost no end of the surprises of what our children learn.

It is ironic, however, that the most important lesson does not appear on a progress report. Montessori is the only educational philosophy that builds its structure on the lessons of grace and courtesy. The individuality of the classroom can only succeed if each child exercises care and consideration for his or her classmates by taking turns, helping each other, encouraging each other and teaching each other. Grace and courtesy sets the tone for the classroom. The quietness and the serenity allow the concentration that precedes significant accomplishment. Learning well the lessons of grace and courtesy will make your child stand out for the rest of his or her life but even grace and courtesy are not the greatest lesson.

The great lesson is the ability to positively control yourself. Most of us grew up with “self-control” meaning to do exactly what someone else told you to do – “be quiet, don’t, stop, no, don’t move” etc. The great Montessori lesson (and the one that takes great effort and often a lifetime to master) is self-control. The mastery of self-control leads to making wise choices. Wise choices come from focus, determination, knowledge and controlling your self. The way you learn to make wise choices is to be allowed to make choices (and live with the consequences.) And then, to make a better choice –living with the consequences until you have practiced enough to begin to make wise choices the first time.

Traditional education does not afford a child the opportunity to exercise real self-control, make independent choices and work through them to a successful completion. Traditionally, if you fail a test you move on. In Montessori, you strive for mastery before you move on. In Montessori you progress from strength (mastery) and not weakness (failure.)

This same wisdom applies to the lessons of grace and courtesy – learning how to deal with people – and when you offend, learning how to make amends and not brush it off.

The lesson (and benefit) of self-control is that it concentrates your power and enhances your achievement. Self-control is essential to making wise choices. Without self-control the child is subject to every interior whim and outside influence. Self-control helps focus the child to be able to make wise choices.

The most important lesson in Montessori education is not an academic one but one of self-control and focus. Your child will gain many academic skills in Montessori but the greatest lesson is self-control and with it the ability to make wise choices.

Edward Fidellow

www.crossmountainmedia.com 

International Day of Peace, 2021

The International Day of Peace, sometimes unofficially known as World Peace Day, is observed annually on the 21st of September. It is dedicated to world peace and specifically the absence of war and violence. For a number of years now, FMSL has celebrated this important day.

This year, in honor of International Day of Peace, our students and staff gathered on the field to celebrate together.  Jenn Carrino, a toddler teacher from Stars, spoke to us about peace and then we sang and signed Light a Candle for Peace.

The 6th years from Uinta carried the Peace Dove and led us on our Peace Walk.

We are honored to support Dr. Montessori in her desire to teach peace to children around the world.

Spring Cleaning as Brain Food by P. Donohue Shortridge

The holidays have come and gone and spring is just around the corner.  This might be a fine time to consider sorting through your children’s possessions.  If you take a close look at the sheer volume of your child’s books and toys, you may determine that just like adults he uses only a percentage of them.

Thinning the herd, so to speak, offers much to recommed it; Its a lot easier to find things if there are fewer things to find.

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A place for everything and everything in its place is a cliche’ based on sound thinking.  Our brains seek order, harmony and beauty in the world, your child’s brain seeks it out too.

Additionally, there’s an essential developmental incentive to clear the clutter out of your child’s life.  Providing external order for your child allows him to organize his thinking.  He’s already taken in so many impressions of the world and now he is categorizing, sorting, grading and matching all these impressions.  (cognitively grasping same and different as well as one-to one correspondence are pre-math and pre-reading skills.) It’s confusing, harder to make sense of everything when, right here in his room the crayons are randomly hanging out with the dolly blanket and Tonka truck wheel, if you will.

So here are some strategies you might consider:

  • Go through the books.  If he has long since cared about Pat the Bunny, it’s time to remove it from his shelf. Likewise anything that is torn, tattered and colored on.  What should remain are only those that he is now reading or is about to advance into. House the books on shelves just like in the library rather than piled one on top of the other or randomly scattered among other phylum such as toys and stuffed animals.
  • The impedement to finding a toy when one wants it is the toy box.  No matter how cute, inexpensive, convenient or cherished, the large universal receptacle does not lend itself to everything having a place. Shelving is the best.  Categorize the toys by type; each toy deserves a lidded box, then shelved.
  • Discard or repair anything that is broken or missing a part. Wash the comfort-blankets and stuffed animals, otherwise discard them.
  • Four puzzles will be used more often than fifteen.  Likewise dolls, toy cars, stuffed animals, Lego sets, board games and coloring books.  You get the idea.  Young children can easily get overwhelmed with too many choices.
  • If your mom sent something that you may have determined is inappropriate, give yourself permission to remove it.  You are the final arbiter of what is appropriate for your child.
  • If you are having a harder time than your child letting go of some of his possessions, that’s ok.  You get to cry about it, but certainly not in front of your child…and pare them down anyway.
  • Create a place in the garage for your child’s outdooe equipment such as balls, scooters and anything else you’d rather not have your child using indoors.

Here are a few more considerations:

Your child wants to, and for his optimal development needs to be responsible for his own possessions. Make sure that he can put every toy away where it belongs.  Don’t make the tub for the blocks so heavy he can’t move it into place himself. Is there a home for his trains? Bags, totes and backpacks all deserve wall hooks hung low enough for your child to hang up by himself.

You probably already have a child-size table and chairs.  A child-sized rocker and/or a reading chair might be nice.  How about an easel for chalking, painting and drawing? Generally, the younger the child, the more he wants to make large sweeping circular arm motions.  You might even consider getting some butcher-block paper for large mural creation.

Sibling fights can be minimized if each person in the family, no matter the age has personal property rights.  If your five year old doesn’t want to share some of his toys with your toddler, I suggest that that is his right.  However, you might work with your five year old to go through some of his possessions and together determine which toys he might be willing to share. Further, many of his no-longer-used toys can be ceremoniously bequeathed to his younger sibling. His most prized possessions, however, should have a place in his room.

Every activity (just like life) has a beginning, middle and end.  Teach your child how to get something out, use it in the place designated for its use and then put it away.  If he moves on to the next thing before putting the last activity away, you can say, “in this house, we always put our belongings away.”

And finally, the most effective way to gain his cooperation is to model what you teach.  Maybe it’s time for some spring cleaning of your own.

Written by Donohue Shortridge

Donohue, a Montessorian since 1980 speaks and writes on topics related to children and their families in the American culture. pds@pdonohueshortridge.com

 

Our COEEF Girls are Growing Up!

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Montessori Community School sponsors the above beautiful girls. These girls have been growing up right before our eyes! We are so proud of their accomplishments and continue to support and encourage their goals and dreams through the COEEF Program.

Our girls have written lovely letters we would love to share with you. COEEF-GIRLS-2014.pdf. Please watch for our fundraisers this spring to continue supporting these amazing girls.

 

 

Help me do it myself! The drive for independence.

The biggest challenge parents face is their children’s drive for independence. A toddler or a preschooler’s drive for independence is even fiercer than a teenager’s. While a teenager may be looking to undo parental control your preschooler is looking to share control. They are trying to become part of your world by taking responsibility for their own actions.

This drive for independence is slow and messy. Learning to walk – the first great independence is full of falls and scares (more for Mom than for baby). And it is a slow and unsteady success. Even when they accomplish vertical independence their rate of locomotion impels us to pick them up and carry them if we want to get anywhere now.

Learning to feed oneself is a second (and very messy) independence. Graduating from hands to utensils is a major success of coordination and development. Again, if we want to finish dinner before breakfast we wind up feeding our child.

The third independence is the ability to communicate – to be able to share desires and wants. Ironically, after Ma Ma and Da Da often comes the independent word No.

The fourth independence is often the ability to dress oneself. It is often a laborious, time consuming frustrating adventure trying not to get your head in your sleeve or putting your pants on backwards. (“What do you mean I have my shoes on the wrong feet?” “These are the only feet I have.”) Stripes and polka dots are just fine together – blinding maybe – but fine. This is about independence not aesthetics or style.

The fifth independence is usually potty training. Children have their own timetable and level of comfort with the process. We often think they are trained when we constantly ask them if they have to go potty. This independence is achieved for their convenience not for ours, even though it is our convenience that pushes the training. My wife always shared with anxious parents that she had never been to a wedding where the bride or groom walked down the isle in pampers. Relax!

Their independence is bought at the cost of our time. Their fight for independence is against our schedules, against our limited flexibility in our day. They don’t mean to slow us down, they just want to do it themselves. They don’t mean to make messes (which takes time to clean up) they just want to do it themselves. How are they ever going to pour milk from the gallon jug unless they try (and try and try and try?)

The challenge of childhood independence is that it is never perfect. They can’t sweep a floor as well or as quickly or as thoroughly as the adult. But how will they ever learn unless they try? “I will just wait until they are older” is a proven recipe for unmotivated, incompetent, uninvolved teenagers who then resent the end of a ten or fifteen year ride of being served with no responsibility attached.

“Help me do it myself” is the foundation of adult responsibility birthed into our children long before they can do it by themselves. “Help me do it myself” is the great gift parents give their children. It is not only the accomplishment of the task that affects the children – giving rise to feelings of competence but it is the feeling of confidence that comes because they know that we believe in them. When we tell our children that they can achieve anything they set their hearts and minds to – they believe us because we have been their cheerleaders for independence and success.

 

Edward Fidellow

www.crossmountainpress.com

 

 

Fill-the-Pack Holiday Giving Project

This year, Montessori Community School particpated in a service learning opportunity that touched the lives of many by supporting a local charity.

This year, after looking into many areas of need in our community, we participated

in the Fill-the-Pack Project created by the Homeless Youth Resource Center. This relatively new program provides a way to get some basic survival necessities (toothbrushes, toiletries, hats, gloves, and blankets are just a few of the items in the packs) to teens that are living on the streets of Salt Lake City.

MCS provided two backpacks for each of our classrooms to fill with items from the Homeless Youth Resource Center needs list.There was such a wonderful response from our students and families! We were able to fill and deliver 24 backpacks plus many other various items that were brought in and donated. Imagining these teens out on the streets trying to make it- these backpacks were truly a heartfelt, supportive gift. We know our community felt the spirit of giving when one family filled two backbacks on their own and many students were talking about how grateful they are to have families supporting them and warm beds to sleep in at night. Our students kept trying to fit more and more into these packs. Their kind hearts and generosity was overwhelming.

Thank you to all the MCS families who helped with this tremendous project and learning opportunity. To find our more about the Homeless Youth Resource Center, please check out the following links:

 

 

ALMOST ABLAZE – Teton Gravity Research

Awarded “Film Of The Year” at the 2014 International Freeski Film Festival, TGR’s Almost Ablaze is a global odyssey combining state-of-the-art cinematography and the most progressive riding on The Planet. Experience a new level of sensory overload as each athlete is wired for sound, immersing the audience completely in the moment. Watch as athletes push the edge to realize a heightened state. Special screening at the Tower Theatre at 7:00pm on Wednesday – December 3, 2014. [ read more… ]

Every ticket holder will receive a Powder Mountain 2-for-1 Day Pass at the event.

Movie trailer here: www.tetongravity.com/films/almost-ablaze

On October 10th, just before 9 PM, a 48″ water main pipe broke on Foothill Blvd sending over 2.5 million gallons of water down 1700 South. The Montessori Community School was one of the unfortunate victims of the flood. The lower level classrooms, and the maintenance room were flooded and nearly 100 students have been displaced. It will take 6 to 8 weeks for all repairs to be completed. Please join us for our fundraising event featuring the Teton Gravity Research Movie: Almost Ablaze. All ticket proceeds will go to the MCS Flood Relief Fund.

 

 

                                                                               This event has ended
                                                                      This event is no longer available
We recommend pre-purchasing your raffle tickets. 
See some of the raffle items available here

Almost Ablaze – December 3, 2014Doors Open at 6:45pm for Raffle

Tower Theatre
876 E 900 S
Salt Lake City, UT 84105

 

An MCS Family shares their story

An MCS family recently shared their story about their new baby who was diagnosed with Severe Combined Immunodeficiency (SCID). Their story is unique as Calla is the first of the approximately 61,000 newborns screened for SCID so far in Utah to have a positive test result. Calla, sister to Tatum, has been in isolation at Primary Children’s Hospital since a few days after her birth and is awaiting a bone marrow transplant.
Logan and Jody, parents to Calla and Tatum, have been advocates and supporters of MCS even while their sweet new baby is staying the the hospital. They even recently spent the evening volunteering at the Halloween Carnival. We want to offer our love and support to Tatum, Logan, Jody and especially Calla. Their story is touching…Read more herehere  and here about SCID and about Calla’s upcoming transplant.
We hope that the surgery goes smoothly and that Calla is able to come home to her family soon.  The family feels blessed that Calla has remained healthy up to this point and we wish them all the best.  This is a great opportunity for us to teach our students the importance of good hygiene and care of self!
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A brief word to the MCS community from Logan and Jody:
We are very lucky that Calla’s illness was caught so early and we are holding our breath as we await her bone marrow transplant.  They found a 10/10 match for Calla through the National Bone Marrow Program, and we are incredibly thankful that somewhere out there an anonymous donor agreed to help save Calla’s life.  We’d like to encourage anyone who is willing to sign up for bone marrow registry at BeTheMatch.org.  We knew little about bone marrow donation before all of this started, and we were surprised to learn that the process is quite easy: initially you’ll just send a cheek swab, and after that there is a ~1/500 chance over your lifetime that you’ll be called up to donate and save someone’s life!
Register at BeTheMatch.org.
Once Calla has received her transplant and the family is settled they hope to organize a drive for potential volunteers and we will share further information about that as it becomes available.

Lost and Found

Luckliy, we have not found any elephants or chickens, but we have found some very nice jackets, coats, towels, books,  lunch tupperwear, and many other various items. You may find all lost and found items on a table in the lobby.
Our lost and found needs your help! Please stop by and see if anything belongs to you.

Why is Grace and Courtesy a big deal in Montessori?

As you may already know from your communications with your child’s teachers, MCS classrooms begin the year with a heavy emphasis on our Grace and Courtesy curriculum.  The article below, written by Edward Fidellow, will help you understand the benefits of a Grace and Courtesy curriculum and might offer some ideas how to reinforce the lessons at home!

Happy Reading!

 

Why is Grace and Courtesy a big deal in Montessori?

Edward Fidellow

 

www.crossmountainpress.com

You cannot observe a Montessori classroom for even a short time without coming away with an impression that Montessori children are by and large very polite, orderly and impressively quiet and serene. This atmosphere is created by the lessons of “grace and courtesy”. Grace and courtesy – good manners, caring about each other, putting others first – are solid virtues that make possible the extraordinary academic gains of a Montessori classroom. Grace and courtesy is one of the non-traditional academic foundations of a successful Montessori education. It is significant even beyond the academic accomplishments that your child will achieve in Montessori.

Many lessons in Montessori (and life) are learned obliquely or indirectly as a by product of other lessons. (For example, in Montessori all of the lessons of practical life are really preparations for reading and writing.)

While the exercises of grace and courtesy are tremendously valuable all by themselves they also lead to four significant outcomes.

While the Montessori environment is a classroom of individual learners, each progressing as quickly as they can, it is also a community of learners who help, encourage and teach each other. The courtesy of using an inside voice so as not to disturb their classmates; the courtesy of walking so as not to disrupt the learning going on is just the beginning of creating a unique learning environment. Sharing the learning materials, waiting your turn patiently, preferring and helping each other transforms the classroom into an oasis of peace where concentration and learning can happen. Valuing community is a significant outcome.

Second, grace and courtesy leads to the most significant lesson in life – how to love. Love is the ability (and the desire) to put someone else’s needs in front of yours – wanting the best for them. Whether it is holding a door, letting them go first, or doing what pleases them, love is a great lesson (most often demonstrated in small actions and ways.) Grace and courtesy is the doorway to love.

The third benefit of grace and courtesy is the building of self respect. Interestingly, when we are kind and courteous to others we like ourselves better. The young child cannot articulate all the conflicting emotions that are part of growing up but the structure of grace and courtesy helps them enjoy the feelings that come from a calm and orderly environment. They are much more at peace with themselves when they are at peace with their neighbor.

The fourth benefit is that grace and courtesy contributes to the development of self control. Grace and courtesy give children an external set of markers that they internalize and practice which in turn leads them to change their own behavior. This is the first step to controlling themselves. Self control will lead to focus; focus will lead to accomplishment; accomplishment will lead to success.

Not a bad byproduct for “Please” and “Thank you”.