Donna's Bumblebee Room
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Buzz from Donna……
I must admit that this class has some of the nicest children I’ve ever worked with. I love seeing how patient they are with each
other. It is endearing to seeing how kind the older children are to their younger counterparts. I love seeing how the younger
children interact joyously with children their same age.
KimberAnn, Nola and Amelia rush to give goodbye hugs and kisses to Max when he goes home before lunch. The girls also
claim that he calls them “Mama”.
Our class produced a progressive story for our school auction and we are writing it on paper and illustrating it. Some of the
younger children’s writing skills aren’t there yet, so Shiven, Tommy and Owen have offered their expertise in this area to help
them.
Abram and Max are so happy to see each other at school. They exchange hugs and even kisses daily! Some days you can
find them working together on building with the prisms of the Broad Stair. Max was given a lesson on the Binomial Cube
where he takes out the 8 prisms and figures out how to put them together correctly in a cube form. I showed Abram how to
mix colors with our Color Wheel work.
KimberAnn has been so helpful, not only to the younger children but to me as well. We are decorating and painting a
wooden toy chest for our school auction, and she drew and painted all of the grass on the box. When she is not doing art
activities she is reading voraciously with the goal of moving onto The Ice Cream Book. She also finished pin-pricking and
labeling the US Map.
Charlie still sees herself as a younger child, but she is slowly discovering that she can be of assistance to the younger ones.
She will console Eliana or Iyla if they are crying. Charlie has learned quite a few letter sounds and is starting to hear the
words they form when put together. It is also sweet to overhear Charlie and Aiden making arrangements to sit together for
lunch.
Eliana is treated so sweetly by KimberAnn, who greets her kindly when she returns to the classroom after her nap, with “Hello
Eliana! Did you have a nice nap?” Eliana has been working with the Cards and Counters work, trying to place numerals in
order on a mat and then counting the appropriate number of discs beneath them.
When Iyla arrives at school, she immediately starts calling out for her cousin, Eliana. The two are inseparable in the
classroom. Lately, Iyla was introduced to cards with circles of varying diameters that match to cylinders from our cylinder
blocks work. In my observation of her work with these, she was able to match quite a few of them.
Amelia and Nola have been taking out the Matching Mystery Bags. They feel the object in a red bag, and then match it to
one that feels similar in a blue bag. All of the bags are stitched shut. Many of the objects are similar in shape so it takes a
refined stereognostic sense to be able to distinguish the differences. Amelia is also learning how to add large quantities in
her head, and is also midway through reading The Ice Cream Book.
Tommy just had a lesson on Unit Division. He takes a sample of 24 beads at first, and then records his answers after dividing
them among 9 skittles, then 8, then 7, etc. It is his first introduction to the term remainder. He is also continuing to work on
pin-pricking and labeling the countries of Europe.
Nola and Owen are learning to recognize more states with our US puzzle map work. Nola also is learning more letter sounds
and is listening to the words they make when you put them together. She also wrote and illustrated her page in our
progressive story book.
Owen likes to write equations and play the Boom! Math game with Shiven. He also started reading his first phonetic reading
book!
Cambria likes to practice her handwriting and also work with the Color Wheel exercise. She is getting regular Sandpaper
Letter lessons from Ms. Barbara.
Gage started writing a number roll, connecting papers that will eventually get to 1000. He has caught onto the pattern of
numbers, and is learning how to write three digit numbers.
Graham still enjoys reading books and working with the farm, but he has also been doing our Color Wheel work.
Sydney has been working more with the teen numbers both with recognition and counting. She is becoming more comfortable
writing her name. I was quite impressed with her part in our progressive story. She both wrote and illustrated her page by
herself!
I can tell that Sneha has been practicing letter sounds at home, as she knows almost all of them now. She is building words
with our Moveable Alphabet work and reading phonetic words I write for her word envelope. She can add four digit numbers
and add dynamically (the use of carrying) using our Stamp Game, and is ready to tackle Subtraction.
Aiden becomes obsessed with certain activities to the point of concentrating on them for long periods of time. His latest
activities of enjoyment are writing stories and trying to master spatial awareness when writing by separating words by spaces,
and the skill of stitching. He stitched his first pillow the other day, and also stitched our liver-shaped felt pieces for use with
our organs of the body apron.
Cherenet loves grating cheese and placing it on miniature tortillas for our quesadilla work. He is also reading phonetic words
and matching them to the objects in the object box work. He will soon be ready to start our phonetic readers.
Derebe’s favorite work has been the Cleaning Shoes work. He the children if he can wash their shoes for them. He also
loves reading from his set of reading books.
Cole also enjoys the quesadilla work and will sit wearing an apron for minutes on end, waiting for someone to finish working
with it so he can take it out. He enjoys learning the names of objects in the kitchen and the names of insects.
Shiven is finishing his last puzzle map: pin-pricking and labeling the countries of Africa. He has made a geometrical design
that I am using as a back cover to our progressive storybook. He chooses to write down various vocabulary words, such as
the names of rocks for his writing activity.
Our classroom is contributing the following items for bidding for our school auction on Feb .25:
~a garden-decorated toy chest. Each child painted (with their thumb or fingerprint) or freehand, a garden bug, flower or
bird.
~a beautiful patchwork painted vase with each child decorating a square, and producing their signature.
~a recipe book which will include every child’s picture, their version of a favorite recipe and other recipes submitted by
parents in the Bumblebee room
~a progressive storybook where each child added onto a story we told aloud. Then each child had a page where they
could draw a picture that matched their sentence and write their sentence out. Some children had help from the older
children on this.
Then Ms. Barbara and I are also auctioning off:
~ Your child can bring a friend for lunch and bowling with both teachers
~ A day with Donna spent at my house doing some fun things for 4 hours.
My hope is that most of you are planning to attend this fundraising auction. There will be items for silent bidding (just write
down the amount you want to pay for the item, someone else can then raise that amount, and you can return and bid higher.)
There will also be some great food by K’Syrah and a fun ‘travel’ type atmosphere! Please order your tickets a.s.a.p.
Our class will be exchanging valentines for Valentine’s Day on Feb. 14th. I encourage your child to participate in either
signing, addressing or making their valentines for each child in the class. We are also looking for a volunteer or two to help
the children open and read their valentines on the 14th.
Below is our Bumblebee class list:
Abram KimberAnn Eliana Iyla Charlie Max
Amelia Owen Tommy Nola Cambria Gage
Graham Aiden Shiven Sydney Sneha Cherenet
Derebe Cole Ms. Kate Ms. Barbara Ms. Donna
Camas Montessori School