Our Spanish Primary I students have enjoyed learning about various members of the animal kingdom. They recently received a visit from a small reptile--a one month old turtle. The class discussed its external parts, what food it eats, where it lives and how it moves. The discussion also included the fact that the turtle has an internal skeleton which classifies it as a vertebrate.
In addition, new pets were added to the classroom--two dwarf hamsters. Both are males and about 4 months old. Students are learning how to care and handle them and learning that they are very fragile. The children voted on names and the hamsters are now named Thunder and Boomer.
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How Aikido Supports Montessori Education, a presentation by Brandon WilliamsCraig, Ph.D., chief instructor at Free Aiki Dojo, at Golden Bears Aikido at UC Berkeley, and here at The Renaissance School, will be presented on Monday, March 19 at 7:00 p.m. at 3668 Dimond Avenue in Oakland.
Using traditional aikido training, theater, and facilitation techniques to extend aiki principles into conflict resolution, Brandon offers a method called Martial Nonviolence, or MNv. Using MNv, he creates the Peace Practices curricula designed for specific communities.
The Peace Practices curricula offers an aikido-based developmental environment in which children learn to practice peace with their bodies and thoughts as though peace itself were a martial art.
The public is invited to this presentation to learn more about the curriculum and how aikido supports Montessori education. The event will include time to ask Brandon questions. For more information, or to RSVP, please contact us at info(at)therenaissanceschool(dot)org.
A strong visual art program provides children with so much more than an opportunity to express themselves. It improves their critical thinking, problem solving, flexibility, coordination, creativity, self-direction and communication.
At The Renaissance School (TRS), art lessons are provided at all levels—from pre-primary to 8th grade. Our students consider the art studio as a place where solutions are found for even the most impossible problems. The work that they create is exceptional.
Our students often exhibit artwork in the main lobby of 1111 Broadway in Oakland’s City Center. In fact, the building manager recently asked TRS to bring new work every semester.
Here's a look at what our pre-primary students are doing. In celebration of Valentine’s Day, they were introduced to the colors pink, white and red and to the shape of the heart. The classroom was decorated with pink and red hearts.
Other shapes learned were: circle, rectangle, triangle, oval, diamond, pentagon, and hexagon. The children have been doing puzzle work with different shapes.
They read a book, “Zin! Zin! Zin! A Violin” by Lloyd Moss, and learned about different instruments including the trombone, trumpet, French horn, cello, violin, flute clarinet, oboe, bassoon and harp.
One of our students shared the book, “Hands Can,” and we learned about different things that hands can do. For example: hands can wave to say ‘hello’, hands can give hugs, hands can touch high and low, hands can wave ‘goodbye’, hands can clap and hands can play ‘peek-a-boo’. The children had fun doing all the different gestures showed in the book.
During the holidays, our pre-primary classroom focused on the theme of the winter season. The children used red, green and blue colors for thier Crayon Work because these colors represent the holiday season.
Along with their teachers, they talked about different holiday decorations as they decorated the classroom with Christmas and Hanukkah decorations. They enjoyed the decorations on the small holiday tree.
Other projects they did related to the holidays including stringing beads to make candy canes. They enjoyed the work and wanted to bring home their fnished products.
The pre-primary classroom for the two to three year-old child involves exercises in practical life, which are the most important in the Montessori classroom. It is through these exercises that a child learns how to work. The child needs to have the opportunity to practice purposeful activity at an early age in order to be able to focus later on.
The Montessori approach provides exercises so that children learn to care for themselves and their environment and demonstrates the grace and courtesy required to smoothly interact with the society they live in. The goal is for children to learn independence and acquire confidence to trust in their abilities. Acquiring practical life skills allows children to become physically and mentally competent, by encouraging repetition of various real-world tasks. This gives them a feeling of self confidence that comes from within themselves, and cannot be taken away.