Art and craft Archives - Jacaranda Tree Montessori

10 December, 2014 By Simone Davies

A warm and cosy December

December already! Bring on the cold weather so we can enjoy snuggling up inside with hot drinks, baking and crafting with the kids, and enjoying some twinkling lights on these long dark evenings.

News from the classroom

We’ve been celebrating Sinterklaas in class these last weeks. We baked pepernoten together (recipe below), I added some Sint gluing activities to the craft area, and we all enjoyed singing lots of Sinterklaas songs at circle time.

Pepernoten
It’s never too late to bake pepernoten even if Sinterklaas is now heading back to Spain on his steam boat. So for those of you who would like to try it at home, here is the recipe.

150 g (2/3 cup) butter
135 g (3/4 cup) brown sugar
10 g (2 teaspoons) ’speculaas spices’
250 g (1 1/4 cup) self raising flour
a pinch of salt
4 tbsp milk

Preheat oven to 160 °C (320 °F). Cut cold butter in little chunks and knead through sugar, speculaas spices, salt and self raising flour. Add the milk bit by bit until the dough is smooth and supple. Start making little balls (a bit smaller than a marble). Your kids can help with this: if you give them little pieces of the dough, they will love making the little balls! Line the little balls up on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper and flatten them slightly with your thumb (I make two batches). Bake for about 15 minutes until light brown.

Getting ready for Christmas
We have our little Christmas tree ready in the classroom – it’s about 30cm tall and sits on a table where the children enjoy hanging wooden ornaments. I like how the children like to place lots and lots in one place!

Next week we’ll be adding some festive craft into the mix too. Will be fun.

School holidays
We have one more week of classes before the school holidays commence. Please note the last class before the holiday break will be Friday 19 December. Classes will restart from Monday 5 January.

My new project – The Montessori Notebook

Did you see my news last week? I have just launched a new idea to the world, The Montessori Notebook – where you’ll be able to find all my notes, ideas, and e-courses about the Montessori approach.

I want to help you all bring Montessori into your daily life. Give you ways to better understand your kids. Practical tips you can use at home. Answers to your questions. And in early 2015, I’ll be giving my workshops online so you can follow along at home, wherever you are in the world. I can’t wait to meet you all over there.

Very soon there will also be a website and e-newsletter too.

So if you haven’t already, I would love for you to come over and follow along! The link to the Facebook page is here: http://www.facebook.com/themontessorinotebook.

And, don’t worry, Jacaranda Tree Montessori is not going anywhere. This new idea will just help me to reach more people. I am so excited!

Upcoming workshop

Hey hey hey! It’s this Saturday. Yes, our Festive Craft Extravaganza is nearly here. The morning session is completely booked out, but we have a couple of spaces in the afternoon session from 3pm to 4:30pm if you would still like to join us. Follow the registration link here: http://www.jacarandatreemontessori.nl/shop/festive-craft-extravaganza-afternoon/.

We are going to be decorating cookies and making beautiful decorations for your house. Plus you can make wrapping paper, take some fun festive photos, and of course there will be singing too! Looking forward to it.

Getting ready for a Montessori Christmas

1. Blog post
I had a plan. I was going to get all my Christmas shopping done by 30 November. Wrapped and ready to go. And a homemade advent calendar. You can read the blog post here: http://www.jacarandatreemontessori.nl/2014/11/13/getting-ready-montessori-christmas/. There are also lots of Montessori gift ideas too if you are still looking for ideas.

Well the plan was good, has been moderately successful, but better than last year in any case. A box of presents has been shipped off to my nieces and nephews in Australia, most of the Christmas shopping is done or ordered online. But wrapped and ready it aint. There’s always next year!

2. More Montessori Christmas ideas
And if you are looking for some activities to set up in the home, you should check out “A Merry Montessori Christmas” by Aubrey Hargis. Aubrey is a fellow Montessori blogger and has put together over 20 Montessori Christmas activities. You’ll see she even has a version of decorating a small Christmas tree, just like we do each year in our classroom :). It’s US$4,99 to download – I am not an affiliate but just think it is a fun selection of activities for kids from 2 to 6 years old.

Guest blog post

And if you still have time for one more thing, I’m very honoured to have my blog post about visiting museums with young children featured on The Montessori Bloggers Network. If you missed it before, it’s got lots of fun ideas for making trips to museums interesting for your kids. Follow the link here: http://montessoribloggersnetwork.com/making-museum-trips-fun-young-children/. Yes, that is a cute photo of my kids at the Art Gallery in Sydney aged nearly 2 years and the other just a few months old. I love that shot.

I’ll see many of you in class this week and next. But as this is the last post of the year, I’m sending you all much love for the festive season and look forward to catching up in 2015. Miss you already!

I’m looking forward to a cosy break in Amsterdam. I’ve a list of festive things I want to do like visiting Intratuin to see the Christmas displays, snuggling up with my kids, drinking lots of hot chocolate, and baking lots of cookies!

Have yourselves a great one…

3 October, 2014 By Simone Davies

8 easy ideas for keeping your child’s artwork

Hello everyone! I’m loving those crunchy Autumn leaves and crisp mornings at the moment. And these sunny weekends are a nice bonus too. I have to remember to enjoy these days before everything just slides quickly into the raucousness of Sinterklaas and Christmas.Another common question I get asked is if I have any good ideas what to do with the lovely paintings that the kids make in class and at home. So here are some simple ideas for you try. Let me know what are your favourites too!

8 easy ideas for keeping your child’s artwork

It’s easy to accumulate a lot of artwork with a child in the house. I would put it into a box to store it and then wonder “what should I do with it all?”.

But since then I’ve come up with some ideas that don’t require hours of effort to repurpose them into baubles or the like. Although if you find that fun, don’t let me stop you!

It’s important to note that when the child is young, they are interested in the process not actually the product. For example, the movement when they are painting, the colours, the feel of the paint. So it’s common in Montessori training to learn that the paintings don’t need to be kept.

However, as adults we do like to keep some and here are 8 simple ideas if you would like to do something with the end product:

1. Make a portfolio

Once a year, I would sit down one afternoon with the kids and pull out our favourite artwork from the year. I would buy a simple scrapbook (my favourite are “plakboeken” from the Hema for those of you in the Netherlands). And we simply glued them in, folding up the ones that wouldn’t fit.

You could also use a folder with plastic sleeves and slide the artwork in too.

Often we’d stick in some tickets from a special outing and the kids still enjoy to look through them from time to time. And it’s a nice thing to show visitors from out of town.

2. Wrapping paper

Repurposing the larger sheets for wrapping paper means you’ll rarely need to buy wrapping paper again. Add some baker’s twine or a cute ribbon and you have added a personal touch to your present.

3. Post to grandparents and family

Remember to send some to the grandparents and family. For those of us living in a different country from family, this is a lovely way for family members to be included in your child’s life.

4. Frame and hang

It’s fun to take a special artwork or two and buy frames to hang them in your home. You can change the artwork from time to time. Your child will feel pleased to see their work displayed like artwork. You can also have conversations with them about their work.

5. Use a wire curtain line with pegs

If you have a wall available, you can also hang a wire curtain line and use pegs to hang up the art work your child brings home. It’s easy to rotate work and replace older work with something new. The old work can go into a box to be reused for another of these ideas.

I like the Ikea curtain wire here: http://www.pinterest.com/pin/111745634473638507/

6. Recycle recycle recycle

There is no need to keep it all. As mentioned above, the younger children are not busy with the end product and the paintings can be recycled. Older children may want to keep them, so it is worth checking with your child before they find their lovingly made artwork in the recycling box.

7. Take a photo and print a photo book a year

Particularly with art work that can’t be stuck into a book, I like to take a photograph. Some people then put together a photo book once a year from these photos and have it printed. Saves a lot of space and is a beautiful memory.

8. Hang clipboards on the wall

I think a fun way to present art coming into the home is to hang some clipboards on the wall, perhaps in the kitchen or hall. It’s then very easy to update the artwork, rotating out the old one for something new.

I’ve put together a little summary in case you’d like to pin for later and remind yourself of some of these ideas. And of course I am sure you have some great ideas too. I would love to hear about them on our Facebook page.

Upcoming workshopsI’m super excited to have Eowyn Crisfield coming back to Jacaranda Tree Montessori on Monday 27 October for her seminar on Raising a Bilingual Child. Eowyn is an expert in bilingual and multilingual families and gives great advice on putting together a 6 step plan for your family.Date: Monday 27 October
Time: 20:00 – 22:00
Cost: €35 p.p or €50 per coupleTo register, please click here: http://www.jacarandatreemontessori.nl/shop/raising-bilingual-child-seminar/

Update from the classroomIt has also been lots of fun to make a few additions to the classroom. My favourite is the table in the kitchen area for the parents to drink tea and share wisdom. And my kids were great helping me to assemble the furniture. So pleased with it!

And we had fun in class making some cute Autumn crowns. How adorable are these? The idea came from this blog: http://www.handmadecharlotte.com/fall-leaf-crowns/. Love!

And not related to Montessori but of my love for cake, my favourite piece of cake this week has to be the chocolate and sea-salt cake from Bilder & De Clercq. Did you know it has been baked by The (lovely) English Cake Lady herself for them? Worth checking out. Oliver and I shared a piece after school on Friday – such fun these little outings with my nearly-14 year old son.I hope you found these tips useful for keeping your child’s artwork. And have yourselves a lovely weekend everyone!

31 October, 2013 By Simone Davies

Halloween fun

We had some Halloween fun in class this week. Some of the kids were game to get their foot painted green to make scary foot monsters. Too cute.

22 September, 2013 By Simone Davies

Montessori tip to use at home

Here is another Montessori tip for you!

One of the things I am always collecting is these little jam jars you sometimes get at cafes or hotels. They aren’t the regular size you get from the supermarket – they are only a few centimetres tall. This one was Bonne Maman jam, but there are other brands too.

These jars are manageable for kids from 2+ years to open by themselves. And they are very versatile, great for collecting small parts like beads etc. But in the classroom I use these most in the art and craft area.

1. As glue pots
I fill the small jar about ⅓ full with glue paste in the pot and provide a small glue brush. The glue I use is made from a powder and my box has lasted me over 5 years! I bought it at Knutsel Frutsel on the Hoofddorpplein and if you want to know what to look for you can find the product here.

2. For water colour painting
These are the perfect size for getting water for water colour painting. If the jar gets tipped over, there is not too much for the child to wipe up!

Hopefully you won’t get too many funny looks if you pop them in your bag after brunch at a cafe. And perhaps you have some great tips to share with us. Be sure to add yours on our Facebook page.