The Garden School Tattler

It was back to classes for the kids yesterday. I was delighted that all my children but one knew all the upper and lower case letters, could count with respectable accuracy and write with understandable manuscript. Today we will begin using what we know, our letters, to make words and read those words. It's a big step, but I think it's time. Most of my children can read the color words and the number words, but we will practice that as well and we will work on the number chart to 100 in hopes that in a few weeks we will be able to write all those numbers with understanding.

Mrs. St. Louis wanted me to tell you that in Fine Arts yesterday afternoon, she presented some paintings from different eras from the National Gallery in Washington. The little kids wanted to know who was in the picture by name and familiarity and the big kids wanted to know when it was painted - which means they are acquiring an historical perspective. Hadley wanted to know how the artist was able to paint hair. Jasmin was convinced the male portraits were really women because of the hair. She should have been born in the sixties! Many of the characters in the paintings had red shirts on, and the class discussed the difference among the shirt designs. The children were also interested in the side portraiture versus the front pose.

Today we will listen to Classical music - Waltzes.

Today's menu is roast chicken, homemade sourdough bread, fresh vegetables and pears and milk.