The Garden School Tattler

It's been quiet week. The children have been playing beautifully with all the new toys and a lot of the old toys. They are getting along, and suddenly seem so grown up. Table manners have been so good, sweeping the floor is almost unnecessary after meals!

We have some real little artists at school. Mrs. St. Louis directed the dancing drawings last week, and yesterday we did some watercolor and couldn't decide which one was cuter. We've tried to cut snow flakes and there was a lot of frustration. But we'll get it!

My class has been playing with a lot of numbers. We did our first addition pages this week and most of the children understood the directions. Their biggest problem is that they lose interest or don't have the stamina to get through the whole page. That's a first grade leap. But practice and interest give energy and life to any project, so we encourage and reward and sooner or later, they just seem to go from half a group of problems to wanting a second page.

Mrs. St. Louis's class is working on numbers as well and the children seem to be understanding more and more with matching the number idea and name to the actual printed number.

Miss Kelly's class is working on a darling set of books which they will be bringing home soon.

Yesterday in geography class, Hadley was able to read just about all the map names. She can maneuver across the globe with a few landmarks - no pun intended! This is a good reason to leave a child at the GS when their age bridges going off to public school. This last year always seems to be their great leap year. We see this as often as one stays when he or she could have gone off.

It's nothing more than our desire to teach and their desire to learn and the small environment. Having 9 friends in your class and a teacher you trust is all anyone needs to launch.

Yesterday Miss Kelly took Miss Jana's science and did a liquid and solid and gas project, and the children finished up eating frozen apple juice from stemware. It was a race to the bottom of the glass!

We had roast pork, baked potatoes, oranges, applesauce, homemade rolls and milk yesterday for lunch. Today we will have grilled cheese, mixed vegetables, fruit, and milk.

Please let me know if you will be coming to lunch next Monday!