Day 1 of the Blog, Day 6 of NMI
I have been having such a wonderful time at my training and have been wanting to share every juicy story with all my juicy fans so I thought I'd give a go at the blogging thing to keep everyone updated.
Today was the first day that we really got into the classroom materials, beginning the section called Practical Life. This is the area where the children learn various skills for Daily Living, like buttoning and pouring and food slicing and washing, etc. etc..
I am proud to say that I am not alone in my passionate and thorough pursuit of each individual work (this being the industry term for each material on the shelf for those of you non-Montessorians) so there are many other women who share my enthusiasm. BUT, during our practice sessions, I paired up with a new friend to go over the lessons. The course is set up so that the instructor shows the entire group a lesson and once we have seen several different lessons, then we have time to practice pantomiming a lesson to a child just as the instructor showed us so that we have due practice for the exam on Friday.
A big part of the practice session is taking pictures of each step to add to the big album of lesson plans we will turn in for grading. I am a stickler for details and deliberately exaggerated each step and followed the model of the teacher to the T as well as take pictures. My partner, however, was so concerned with picture taking that my exaggerated pantomiming and communication with the imaginary child was causing her undue stress and she rushed me through the lessons I was practicing. You'd be surprised at how many steps there are to pouring liquid from one pitcher to another! Needless to say, I was devastatingly agitated and had found a perfect opportunity to cultivate the virtue of patience in the Montessori adult. Her practice lessons were so rushed and messy that I literally started to feel the bug of Middle School grade competing and think to myself, "She is totally gonna get a C on her practical exam." Now if that's not Maria reincarnated, I don't know what is.
So, tomorrow I will try to be patient.....okay, it's true. I will actually just find a new partner.
Today was the first day that we really got into the classroom materials, beginning the section called Practical Life. This is the area where the children learn various skills for Daily Living, like buttoning and pouring and food slicing and washing, etc. etc..
I am proud to say that I am not alone in my passionate and thorough pursuit of each individual work (this being the industry term for each material on the shelf for those of you non-Montessorians) so there are many other women who share my enthusiasm. BUT, during our practice sessions, I paired up with a new friend to go over the lessons. The course is set up so that the instructor shows the entire group a lesson and once we have seen several different lessons, then we have time to practice pantomiming a lesson to a child just as the instructor showed us so that we have due practice for the exam on Friday.
A big part of the practice session is taking pictures of each step to add to the big album of lesson plans we will turn in for grading. I am a stickler for details and deliberately exaggerated each step and followed the model of the teacher to the T as well as take pictures. My partner, however, was so concerned with picture taking that my exaggerated pantomiming and communication with the imaginary child was causing her undue stress and she rushed me through the lessons I was practicing. You'd be surprised at how many steps there are to pouring liquid from one pitcher to another! Needless to say, I was devastatingly agitated and had found a perfect opportunity to cultivate the virtue of patience in the Montessori adult. Her practice lessons were so rushed and messy that I literally started to feel the bug of Middle School grade competing and think to myself, "She is totally gonna get a C on her practical exam." Now if that's not Maria reincarnated, I don't know what is.
So, tomorrow I will try to be patient.....okay, it's true. I will actually just find a new partner.
posted by i.d.a. at
6/26/2006
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