Chicken Soup with Rice

In January
it's so nice
while slipping
on the sliding ice
to sip hot chicken soup with rice.

Sipping once
sipping twice
sipping chicken soup with rice.

Happy New Year!

Today, we marked the new year by constructing 2010 with golden beads. As we did so, we skip-counted by tens to check our accuracy.





It is dramatic and fun to solve the problem of what to do when we come to the end of our thousand chain. Now what? This year, it was a first grader who got that “Ah, ha!” look on her face and suggested we borrow a second thousand chain from the classroom next door.




We also enjoyed lessons on A.D. & B.C., the history of the Gregorian calendar, and the months' names.

The year I completed my Montessori training was the first year that required a second thousand chain. This year, we added a ten bar. It’s hard to believe that much time has passed. It doesn’t seem that long ago that I celebrated “the new millennium” with college friends in Boston, hoping that the Y2K Bug would not obliterate civilization as we knew it.

The first graders I worked with that first year are now 16! Those little people can drive! Abby, who, one cold winter day, dissolved into tears because her mother made her wear her “Puffyman Sweater.” And Taylor, whose zipper got irreparably stuck after he zipped himself—knees, arms, torso, and all--into his hoodie jacket, so that only his feet and head protruded. (We had to use scissors to release him from the jacket so that he could walk again!) Anna and Katie, who cheerfully worked non-stop, writing lengthy stories and completing volumes of research. And Julio, whose reading took off after we reeled him in with non-fiction books on topics like sharks and big cats.

Surely, they have no idea how much they taught me.

I told you once
I told you twice
all seasons
of the year
are nice
for eating
chicken soup with rice!
--Maurice Sendak


What We're Reading:
Chicken Soup with Rice: A Book of Months by Maurice Sendak