Only your compassion

and your loving kind-

ness are invincible,

and without limit.

-Thich Nhat Hanh

February Calendar 2

Identity Fair Information 3

Casa News/ELMO News 4/5

Upper ELMO News 6

What is Cosmic Education? 7

MALT Photos & more! 8

Inside this issue:

Mo

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Volume 1, Issue 6

February 6, 2017

February is here and we have offi-

cially started the second half of our

school year! We are thankful for

your children and are appreciative

of all of the support you provide in

assisting with school projects,

events, and activities. Thank you for

helping us to make Parkside Mon-

tessori the outstanding school that it

is!

We hosted our second M.A.L.T. day

this month and were excited to of-

fer our students a variety of oppor-

tunities to extend their curricular

learning. Students had the chance

to develop their skills with sewing,

baking, Tai Chi, water color paint-

ing, spaghetti tower building, sci-

ence experiments, music, art, hock-

ey, yoga, drama, talking sticks, and

building. Thank you to all of our

parent presenters and volun-

teers. You can hear the engage-

ment and joy of learning during our

M.A.L.T. sessions as you walk

through the halls and listen to the

chatter of multi-age groups of stu-

dents creating and discovering!

January also brought our first Litera-

cy Week which was enjoyed by

all. Thank you to everyone who at-

tended our Family Reading ses-

sions. Students also participated in

our first “Read Around the School”

sessions, dressed as favorite book

characters, had fairytale day, and

displayed many interesting figura-

tive language costumes. It was an

exciting week of exploring Literacy

at Parkside Montessori!

February News

It’s hard to believe that our information

and registration night for new families

in just around the corner on March

22nd at 5:00. p.m. We are looking for a

few parents who would be willing to

attend our info night and have con-

versations with new parents who may

have questions for existing parents

about your experience with Montessori

education. Please contact the school

office if this is something you would like

to help with.

We are looking forward to seeing

many of you at our Identity Fair where

we will have the opportunity to cele-

brate the uniqueness of each individu-

al in our school and grow together as

a school community.

~Miss Corrine and Miss Terra

M.A.L.T. Monsters! During the morning session,

some of our gr. 3-5 students sewed their own

monsters using recycled clothing.

Page 2

On the Calendar...

M ONT ESS ORI NE WS

“to love and be loved

is like feeling the sun

from both sides”

Sun Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat

1 2

Thank you lunch

for GPPSD

Maintenance

3 Full Day,

ECS-Gr. 5 4

5 6 School

Council @ 6

p.m.

7

Hot Lunch or-

ders are DUE

8 9 10 11:40

dismissal (Staff

meeting/SIP)

11 Gr. 4-5

District Mini-

Basketball

Tournament

12 13 14 Red &

Pink Day,

Identity Fair

15 16

Hot Lunch (Subway pre-

order)

17 11:40

dismissal

(PLCSIP)

18

19 20 NO

SCHOOL,

Family Day

21 22 Pink Shirt

Day,

Anti-Bullying

Awareness

23 24 Full Day,

Gr. 1-5

25

26 27 28

February 2017

V OLU ME 1, ISS UE 6 Page 3

Valentine’s Day Identity Fair! All Parkside Montessori stu-

dents and staff are invited to

take part in our first Identity

Fair!

This is an opportunity for each

individual to share about

what makes him/her unique

and what his/her areas of

passion are in a school-wide

Valentine’s Day celebration.

Valentine’s day is a time for

connecting with others and

sharing friendship. The focus

of Valentine’s Day at our

school is to emphasize the

uniqueness of each child and

to build community. Tradi-

tional Valentine’s Day cards

are welcome to be sent to

school on this day if families

desire. Our main focus for this

day will be celebrating each

child at the Identity Fair.

The Identity Fair will be set up

in the gym in a format similar

to ta Science Fair. Each child

will be able to set up a dis-

play that represents things

that make him/her unique.

This could include a poster,

pictures, PowerPoint, scrap-

book, story, small artifacts,

etc. and may include infor-

mation about the child’s fam-

ily, interests, and characteris-

tics that make him/her

unique.

M/W Casa parents are wel-

come to bring their child on

Feb. 14 for the tour & present-

ing times. We are also able

to coordinate times for fami-

lies with children in multiple

classes &/or grades. Let us

know which session you are

able to come to and we’ll

make sure your children are

able to join you to share!

Be as creative or simple as you like!

Casa dei Bambini: Miss Trisha

Page 4 M ONT ESS ORI NE WS

January was a quick month full of fun! A highlight of the

month was getting to use our school Science Lab! The chil-

dren loved exploring and experimenting. Congratulations

to Maddox who was our January Author of the Month.

We will be continuing our Ocean theme into February. Last

month, we concentrated our learning on labelling ocean

creatures. This extended into the children’s journals, where

they drew and labelled pictures. The children were particu-

larity interested in learning about Sharks. We will see where

this learning takes us in February!

In Math and Sensorial, we will be 3D objects and 2D

shapes. The children will practice sorting, building, and

naming. It should be fun!

In Language, we will be focusing on oral language skills.

The children will continue to practice speaking in a clear

and loud speaking voice when presenting to their peers.

Show and Share has already helped the children to gain

confidence in themselves.

Have a great February!

-Miss Trisha

Casa dei Bambini: Miss Renee

January went by quickly and was filled with many opportu-

nities to build understanding.

Literacy week was wonderful! We all had a great time

dressing up and reading with other students from around

the school. A big thank-you to all the parents who were

able to come out to read with the children.

Brook-Lynn Everett’s twin baby brothers, Russell and Walter,

came to visit our classroom in January as well. The Casa

students were surprised and excited to meet the little

guests. The children were kind, curious and gentle with the

babies during the visit. Miss Jessica showed the children

how to hold the babies. This was quite a treat for many.

February is the month of poetry, rhyme, and skip counting.

Each day we add another dot to a 10-frame keeping track

of how many days we’ve been in school. We have filled

seven 10 frames completely. When January ended the to-

tal count was 76 days. Many of the children are certain we

will reach 100 days of school before the year is over.

-Miss Renee

Above: Morning

fun building maz-

es!

Right: Maddox,

Author of the

Month

Duke, Author of the Month and his writing. Wow!

Lower Elementary, Gr. 1-3

V OLU ME 1, ISS UE 6 Page 5

Welcome to February! January was a

month full of fun activities and getting back into

great learning routines. January is always a time

when students show great growth and this year

has been no exception.

Our first literacy week was a huge success.

Students loved reading around the school and

participating in many different dress-up days. At

the end of the month we had our second MALT

day. The students participated in a variety of

multi-age activities. Some favourites were sew-

ing and a talking stick activity. Make sure to

check out our Facebook page for tons of pic-

tures of all of our special events.

This month we were thrilled to open the

science lab and welcome a new school pet: Pax

the Bearded Dragon. The staff spent time un-

packing and sorting all of the cool science re-

sources for the students to access with their clas-

ses.

All of the ELMO classes learned about how

ancient peoples met their common needs in the

Stone Age. They explored how these first people

lived and survived through class discussions, mov-

ies and special art projects.

Moving into February we will be focusing

on kindness and friendship. We are very excited

to host our first identity fair on Valentine’s Day.

The classes will also be learning about global citi-

zenship and communities around the world.

-Miss Laura, Miss Lora Rae, Miss Desiree

Upper Elementary, Gr. 4-5 January was a very productive month in

our world. Students have really been focused in

their learning and are really developing their

growth mindsets. That three-letter word “yet”

keeps creeping into statements, (i.e. “I haven’t

got the hang of this strategy yet. I need some

more practice to be able to improve.”) It’s great

to see students re-framing failures as opportunities

to learn and grow!

Highlights of the month include: many “a-

ha!” moments with our multiplication and division

strategy work, our Viking lap books, curling, bas-

ketball, all of the Literacy Week fun, M.A.L.T Mon-

day, and our session on the World of Work.

In February, we continue with our work on

Montessori Language Materials (Reading & Sen-

tence Analysis Materials, Grammar & Parts of

Speech, Word Study). Biographies will be our fo-

cus in Guided Reading and Writing for the next

few weeks. This ties in really nicely with our school

Identity Fair (Feb. 14) and connects with under-

standing of growth mindset as well as in Health on

Self-Awareness.

In Math last month many students discov-

ered that knowing their basic multiplication facts

(those lovely multiplication tables) had a HUGE

impact on their ability to quickly (and correctly)

apply the strategies they were using in both multi-

plication and division. February is Math Multipli-

cation Fact Fluency Month. Students need to

have their multiplication facts memorized for

them to be able to access them fluently. Daily at

home practice is an essential to building this im-

portant skill.

This month in Science we begin our unit on

Chemistry. Students will be working individually &/

or in small groups to complete learning tasks in

our new Science lab! In Social Studies our focus

will shift from Canadian geography to that of the

Histories and Stories of Ways of Life in Canada.

We will begin with an examination of the ways of

life of Aboriginal peoples in Canada.

A BIG THANK YOU to our curling parent

volunteers for helping each week! We appreci-

ate it! -Miss Terra

Page 6 M ONT ESS ORI NE WS

V OLU ME 1, ISS UE 6 Page 7

What is Cosmic Education? Since it has been ... necessary to give so much to

the child, let us give him a vision of the whole uni-

verse. The universe is an imposing reality, and an

answer to all questions.... All things are part of the

universe, and are connected with each other to

form one whole unity. The idea helps the mind of

the child to become focused, to stop wandering in

an aimless quest for knowledge. He is satisfied hav-

ing found the universal centre of himself with all

things.

- Maria Montessori, To Educate the Human Poten-

tial.

This, simply stated, is Montessori’s statement and

reason for her idea of Cosmic Education. Cosmic

in this sense means comprehensive, holistic, and

purposeful. “Cosmic Education” differs from tradi-

tional education as it goes far beyond just the ac-

quisition of knowledge and developmental

growth, to encompass the development of the

whole person. Montessori believed that children

who are given a Cosmic Education have a clearer

understanding of the natural world and, thus,

themselves. She believed that those children who

receive a Cosmic Education in childhood are bet-

ter prepared to enter adolescence as independ-

ent, confident, responsible, emotionally intelligent

individuals, balanced in physical, intellectual and

social achievements. They are also prepared to

make responsible decisions and act on them in a

responsible way; to recognize limits and give, ask

for, and receive help, as needed.

She believed that the world was a highly ordered

and purposeful place; that war and poverty, igno-

rance and injustice were deviations from that pur-

pose. She believed that the way back to harmony

and order was through children, as it was the chil-

dren who were innocent of corruption and carried

with them the imprint of normalcy.

Maria Montessori believed that there were two

things necessary for raising peaceful human be-

ings: an awareness of interdependence and the

sense of gratitude that comes from that aware-

ness. By providing a holistic, therefore Cosmic edu-

cation, children receiving these lessons learn to be

grateful to previous generations so that they may

benefit from their knowledge. Children are also

exposed, not just to humans, but all the elements

and forces of nature, the plants, the animals

(extant and extinct), the rocks, the oceans, the

forests - even the molecules and atomic particles.

These subtexts of gratitude echo constantly in the

Montessori elementary classroom and children

gain a sense of importance, purpose, and respon-

sibility, which they carry into adulthood while seek-

ing a joyful vocation.

Above all, Cosmic Education does not present the

universe as random or objectified, but rather con-

stantly stresses the interconnections between all

content areas and, in the study of history and cul-

ture, seeks to go beyond superficial racial and cul-

tural differences to show how all human beings are

driven by the same set of fundamental human

needs.

It is therefore necessary that we, as Montessorians,

not lose sight of this vision. It is our duty to present

our Montessori lessons in such a way to bring the

child not just to concrete and abstract knowledge

of content area, but to a higher plane of appreci-

ation for the beauty of knowledge itself. By stress-

ing the gratitude that we feel toward past genera-

tions in their search of knowledge, we also teach

our children to respect the studies of the past, thus

encouraging them along their path for knowledge,

academically, personally, and spiritually.

© North American Montessori Center - originally

posted in its entirety at Montessori Teacher Train-

ing on Friday, February 6, 2009.

Parkside Montessori

Corrine Shmyruk, Principal

Terra Shewchuk, Vice Principal

PARKSID E MONTESSORI

9617 91A avenue

Grande Prairie, AB

T8V 0G7

Phone: 780-532-7429

Email:

Parkside.montessori@gppsd.ab.ca

Facebook:

@ParksideMontessori

Visit our school page:

www.gppsd.ab.ca/school/

parksidemontessori

M.A.L.T (Multi-Age Learning Time) Fun from January 30!

Left: Ashwanth and his K’Nex Pterodactyl

Below: Brook-Lynn, Joshua and friends do-ing some LOVE-ly finger painting

Right: Liam and Jacob are VERY pleased with their spaghetti tower.