1 Month gone so fast

I just realized I have not posted for a while, the kids have been sick and of course they do this seperately.  So we are all still working hard with the Pink and Blue series.　We are just about at the end of the Pink series so I am going to introduce the Green series after Christmas.

We are doing some Christmas activities so I will post these in the next few days.

Izzy discovers her world!

  These are a few videos of Izumi who has started to crawl this week.  The first where she is concentrating on a small wooden ring and the second video she is climbing on a chair.  She has discovered the world is hers for the taking and is determined to explore everywhere and everything within her reach. 

This may be my number 4 but the pressure is still on when it comes to babies and small objects. AGGHH

Rei and Missing Middle

Here Rei is working on putting the correct middle letter onto the word and picture cards.  The noise you can hear at the beginning is an aeroplane overhead.

I love that when Rei has finished her work she quietly just packs away and places it back on the shelf.

Cai's school show

Today we went to watch Cai's school show, I know this has nothing to do with his English learning but I hope you enjoy. He is in the back row on the right side and second in.  You can see that he really enjoyed himself.  He speaks at 3.20.

Weaving

Rei really enjoyed this activity yesterday. 

We used thick Blue paper folded in half, we cut lines to about 3cm of the edge of the paper.  Rei opened the Blue card flat and began weaving her colored paper in and out.

Blue series - Cai

Cai is using the top part of the shelves, he can use the lower pink series shelves also if he wants but he tends to stick with the top Blue series shelves.  We do not have much space so I am using 2 little set's of draws to keep Cai's Blue series in.  They are very beautiful as well as handy.

The brown pot on the top contains 4 and 5 letter words and is used for reading and also with the movable alphabet to spell the words.  The 3 draws contain beginning, middle and ending cards.

The top yellow basket contains Blue series spelling cards and the white basket contains frequently used words written on hands and the children can call out the words as you hold up each hand (I will demonstrate later).  The 2 lower trays contain 2 letter missing beginning and endings.

The top 2 draws contain word and picture match, the third draw contains pictures and 2 letter sounds like pl, cr,fr and Cai will match the pictures to the beginning sounds.  The last draw contains pictures that end with double L, Cai spells them out.

Pink series = Sakura and Rei

So these are the shelves that contain the Pink series, Sakura is working 3 times a week with these shelves, she gets to choose the order in which she does them but she completes all the activities.  We have a work sheet with a list of all the activities on the shelf and when an activity is competed we put a stamp to show it has been competed. 

There are sentence cards and spelling cards all using phonic 3 letter words.  There is a basket of 3 letter words that is used with the movable alphabet.

This top shelf has a basket containing  phonic 3 letter pictures cards which the girls will spell out using the movable alphabet.  On the tray are spelling cards and the dish contains the letter cards for them to spell out the pictures on the cards.  The lower shelf baskets contain missing middles and missing endings.

The top shelf contains Rhyming cards and a Domino set.  The lower shelf contains missing beginning cards.

The top draw of the box contains colors and their written names, the second draw contains numbers to ten and their written names and the lower draw of the box contains the months of the year.

The new shelves

Okay so the new system seems to be working, I am only using Montessori's method.  Sakura and Rei are using the Pink series and Cai is working with the Blue series.  Here are some photos of the shelves.......

I wish I had more space but our room is so small I can only use this space.  Luckily Montessori's style is so organised with everything having it's own place I think it is working.

Bizzy Izzy

I was very happy to find this activity for Izzy, It is a small wooden ball that she puts into the hole and it comes straight back out through the holes in the side.....well she is supposed to put the ball into the hole, but here is what actually happened............

Okay...a ball and a box...

 UUGGGG don't want eat this...

 OOHHH this looks good....

 BORING MUM......

 Okay, the ball is cool...thanks Mum

Teaching your own kids is very hard!

So far we have been trying to do an hour everyday...but it is not working, we are just getting upset and frustrated.  Rei is easier because she is home with me all day but Cai and Sakura are in Japanese school all day.  They come home at 3.30 then want to play out till 5.00, bath, dinner and finally English and Japanese homework.  It is already 7.00 usually and my time to wind down with 7mth old Izumi plus their daddy is usually nearly home.
 Not working....so we are going to try Monday,Wednesday and Friday they will not play out after school and work with me from 3.30 to 5.00........Tuesday and Thursday is all theirs and mine to actually.
So we will stick with challenge Friday and keep learning vocabulary through the week,  Monday we will work on  how a sentence is made (we have already started nouns) and Wednesday we will work on handwriting.
If it does not work we will change again, it is hard trying to work with 3 children of different ages and levels, trying to find interesting and fun ways to help them learn. I don't want them to hate learning, that is not what my Montessori training is about.  I want to give them activities that make learning English interesting and fun.   They spend their whole day in Japanese school sat behind a desk in a be quiet and listen atmosphere, don't ask questions or disagree just follow.  I want to give them a passion and interest for reading and learning.
I will keep you updated on this new routine..wish me luck :)

Making a soft block for Izzy

Not a lot of money around at the moment but luckily all of Izzy's toys are easily found around the house.  I wanted something soft for her to hold and throw around with her brother (he wants to play catch with her but his baseball is a wee bit hard!).  So some cotton material, needle, thread, stuffing and dada....one soft block.

Halloween - Rei

Challenge Friday

Last week we tried something new, I gave the children a list of words and they had to practice reading and writing the words all week and we would see how many they remembered on Friday.  Just for entering the game they got an ice cream, I made it very clear to the children that the results were not important, just to try their best and have fun playing a game together. They all played and got about 80% of their words right, so I was very happy.  We will continue "Challenge Friday" every week for as long as it works.

I began reinforcing Cai's knowledge of Nouns and introduced Nouns to Sakura.  We started with basic Nouns then moved onto Proper and Common Nouns and also Singular and Plural Nouns. Cai remembered them all, Sakura was so good, she understood at once  that a Noun was a place or a person and soon  grasped that a thing is also a Noun.  We will work all this week on Nouns.

They both work so hard in Japanese school I am trying not to push them to hard and to make everything I am teaching them fun and interesting. 

Movable alphabet - writing a sentence

Here Rei is reinforcing all the work that she has done with this reading book.  She is using the movable alphabet to write the sentence from the book.  She is reading the word, choosing the right letters and then positioning the letters to form the word, she continues until the sentence is complete.

Rei's joke

Me and Rei were walking to the supermarket this week and she said
"Mum what is half of 8"
I said "You know the answer Rei.....yes"
"3" she said
"Ohh nearly it is 4"
"No its 3" she said laughing
"If you cut 8 in half its 3" 

Okay I got it ...look at the figure 8 and if you acually cut the 8 in half the right side becomes a three.

I asked who had told her the joke and she said no one...Rei made her own joke..cool

Different ways to read a book

I printed this book for Sakura then cut of the sentences, I mixed them all up then she had to match the sentence to the picture.  She then just took the sentences and read them.

Basket of fun

Me and the girls made a basket of fun for Izzy......we thought about color, size, sound and texture...
Her favourite is a small whisk from the kitchen.

Ice cube

Rei put an ice cube on Izzy's tray, Izzy had so much fun touching and trying to pick it up.  She got a hold a few times then dropped it.

Reading and Writing your own book

 

This activity is to encourage Rei with reading and writing and connecting them together. 
Rei has just started reading this book and so to encourage her I printed the picture side of the book and asked her to write the sentence that matches the picture.  She has the book infront of her so she can find the matching picture and copy the correct sentence.
When Rei finished we stapled the pages together and made her own book.  Rei will then be able to read her own book and hopefully this will encourage her writing skills because if she cannot read a word it will be because of her own writing.   

The small movable alphabet

I have kept the movable alphabet in a small easily moved box, there are enough compartments for each letter of the alphabet.  There are are least 5 cards of each letter in each compartment.  Rei is using them to sound and spell 2 letter words.  She then writes them into her activity book. 
This is an alternative way to interest Rei in writing,  she will often sound and spell her own words when using the moving alphabet.

Sakura is praticing her writing, she has not written for a while and is a bit rusty.  She was getting frustrated when writing with paper and pencil as the words were not as clear as she wanted and she was constantly erasing the words, so using the message board and easy wipe pen from the kitchen is perfect.  She writes and practices her words on the board before using the pencil to write the words in her activity book.

The classroom - Top Shelf

This is the top shelf of their classroom,
The pockrts on the wall hold their activity books

Top Shelf - left to right
The magnet activity - seperate magnetic from non magnetic items then use the magnet to see if your right
Japanese money for Rei to learn the value of each coin
Basic colors and theirs written names - match the color to the name

Lower Shelf - back row left to right
Puzzle
Body parts
Puzzle
Write the numbers

Lower Shelf - front row left to right
Match the phonic words to their matching picture cards
Using a compass
Match the numbers to their written word

d,b and p

This activity is in 2 parts, the first has a basket of objects each beginning with d,b or p.  Rei puts the letters  out then matches the objects to the letters.

The second part has 18 phonic 3 letter words beginning with d,b or p and 18 cards with d,b or p written on them.  Rei lays out all the cards and adds the correct letter to make the word.

I keep the activity together on a tray, originally I was only using the objects and d,b and p cards, but Rei worked quickly with this so I introduced the word and letter activity.  I started with 6 words then at Rei's pace moved up to the full 18 cards. 
I will make cards with endings and middles.

Sensorial - Feel the numbers

This activity is to explore the senses, the sense of touch. 

The ping pong balls have white stickers on them, from 0 to 9, Rei feels and counts the stickers blindfolded.








 Working in order from one basket she feels and counts the stickers then places the ball into the other basket.

Rei started this activity with a blindfold on but removed it by the end.

High frequency words - word match

This activity is to help the kids remember high frequency words.  I think i will use this activity style a lot in the future as the kids enjoyed it so much. 

I choose 10 high frequency words and wrote them twice on seperate cards.
The kids then took turns in turning over 2 cards at a time.  Their goal was to find a pair and be able to say the word.  Because the words are new I am saying them and then the kids repeat them.  They remember the words quickly. 
I tell them to look at the whole word if they cannot sound and spell it.
I am playing at the moment as well, so at the end of the game if they know any of the words that I found then they can keep them.


    be
    and                                     
    I                                                                                       
    all
    me
    the
    like
    see
    a
    here
                                                               

                                                                                                                                                                                      

Numeracy - Measuring and recording

This activity was to measure the shapes using small

wooden cubes.  I thought that instead of just

measuring anything I would use shapes, so Rei learns about shapes as well as measuring.  I used a graph for Rei to record her measurements. .                                                                                                                                                        

Cai - Build up vocabulary

With Cai it has been a while since he did English, so I am starting slowly and doing 3 and 4 letter words and also high frequency words like the, and, I etc.

I want to build his confidence and gradually bring him back to the level he should be.  Cai has worked with nouns, verbs but I know this was a few years ago.  So I will slowly introduce them next week. 

Japanese vowels have a different sound to english vowels and as Cai speaks Japanese 90% of the time I am watching for any problems, I must say so far so good.

I am working only about 30 min daily with Cai this week but I will up that to 1 hour next week.  It is good Winter is coming as they will be home more instead of in the park with their friends.

Creativity - Sewing

Rei is sewing shapes.   I prepared a sewing box so that she can do the activity whenever she wants, also I keep changing the sewing cards, letting her explore her creativity.  I will soon add material for her to work with.  Cai and Sakura are also enjoying this activity. They have all learned how to use the 'needle threader'.

Classroom setup

So Rei started school this week……

This is what we have set up for her to use every day...
.
Alphabet recognition (sandbox letters, match picture to letter and visaversa, match the letters D,B, and
P to the objects)

Numeracy (Japanese money and Number recognition)

Color recognition with written names

Painting and threading pasta necklace

Sewing shapes

Threading laces through a board

Can you find the body part

Sound boxes

Clay

Everyday Living - Transfering Rice

This is Rei doing an activity for Everyday Living, she is 'transfering'rice from the first basket to the middle basket where she washes the rice, then transfers the washed rice to the third basket, she continues this until she has washed all the rice.  She can repeat this as many times as she wants.  Rei follows the order of this activity starting from when she picks up the tray to when she returns the tray as she found it.

Rei said "It was good".

Day 1

Okay I think I got this Blog thing going.  I am hoping to use this space to keep you all updated with the kids crash course in English.  As you know we have been in Japan for over 3 years and although they are fluent in Japanese reading and writing their English skills have slipped so much.  Verbally I think they are fine but as we are planning to take them back to the UK next summer I have a huge task ahead.

As you know I am training to be a Montessori teacher and I have completed all my course work and next summer will do my apparatus course in London and teacher training to become a qualified Montessori teacher.  I have worked in a Montessori school here in Japan.  I love it.

So as far as my teaching goes I am mainly based within the Montessori Method but if the need arises I will use whatever I need to help the kids develop.

 Cai age 9.-  Definately has the most work to do, but he is a quick learner.  He needs constant encouragement .

Sakura age 7.-  Not as much to do as Cai and is usually up for learning something new if it looks interesting.

Rei age 5. - Rei is homeschooling with me so I will give her a range of activities within the Montessori curriculum, Everyday activities, Numeracy, Literacy, Creativity, Cultural and Sensorial activities.

Izumi 6 months. -Izumi will be working with her Montessori skills the same as Rei.

I want to keep you up to date with their work and will try to put photos to help to exlain what I am doing.

XXXXXX

testing

Okay this is testing testing.....