Blog

The Chinese New Years celebration starts with a reunion with family on New Year’s eve and extends the entire first month full of travels, visiting friends and partying. In that spirit Tong Le Children sang, recited a poem and reenacted a story to wish you and your family a Healthy and Joyful Year of the Ox.

Tong Le students wishing everyone a Happy and Healthy holiday season!

Band Accompaniment to 12 Days of Christmas
https://youtu.be/zAmXur31ZRc

You have a Beautiful Smile
https://youtu.be/DuW5uFEYgOI

What has eight legs and can jump 30 to 40 times its own length?

~ a jumping spider!

What has eight legs and eight eyes to help it catch insects?

~a wold spider!

What has eight legs and is the biggest and hairiest of spiders?

~ a tarantula!

What has eight legs, can walk on water, and catch fish to eat?

~ a fishing spider!

What has eight legs and is a shiny black color with a red “hourglass” shape on it’s abdomen?

~ a black widow spider!

What has eight legs, two big eyes, and hanging together with two bats?

~ the spider that I painted!!!!

Spiders have 8 legs, 8 eyes. Is it necessarily scary? Not to everyone! So why do we fill our children’s head that it is scary. Why give them a first impression that pushes them away from learning about this animal? Why close the door of their curious mind? We teach facts, encourage learning and exploration. The children can decide for themselves whether spiders are scary or not. This is how we Montessori!

Our 2020 Halloween theme is “occupation”. We thank parents and students for preparing wonderful costumes and speeches to share with the class. We have a construction worker telling us about his work, a mail man delivering mail to his classmates, a soccer player that is brave, two veterinarians who take care of animals, an engineer who makes cars, a fire fighter who puts out fires, a soldier that protects, a farmer who has a barn full of animals, a teacher who teaches and many students who love to learn. This is how we Montessori during Halloween!

Children writing about their profession.

Eco-friendly, non-waste Jack-O-Lanterns made of up-cycled newspaper.

Our wonderful professionals

The life cycle of the Monarch Butterfly is a wonderful event for the children to experience. They witness one of the wonders of life as it happens, taking in the changes as the caterpillar grows, enters the various phases of metamorphosis and eventually turn into a butterfly. They gain so much from this experience: patience, observation, appreciation of life, beauty. This sparks their interest in other work around the classroom: writing, coloring, crafts, stories… This is how we Montessori.

We had such a wonderful time observing the Monarch first hand, we did not want you to miss out. We made a short video for you, enjoy! https://youtu.be/dkcXb6vZGXE