Do you know what Circle Time is and how it is used in the Montessori Curriculum 3-6?
Have you ever tried Circle Time before?
How did it go? What did you include?
If you have, let me know in comments what you thought of it!
If you haven’t, come and find out what Circle Time is and why you should consider it in your homeschool and Montessori environment.
What is Circle Time?
It is a time where you can meet as a bigger group.
If you know anything about the Montessori philosophy, you know that the majority of works are independent and individual.
Sometimes, it is one-on-one with the Montessori Guide, but entire group gatherings are rare.
Circle Time is a great chance to get everyone together.
You can have one Circle Time meeting per day or two shorter ones.
Ideally, you will have one first thing in the morning, but if your mornings are too busy or full, you can break it up into two shorter ones.
One Circle Time can be first thing as children come into the Montessori environment and the second can be anytime after.
Some do the second one before lunch, some prefer to do it after lunch and yet others like it best if the second Circle Time is at the end of the day.
At the end of the day, children are winding down and are ready to go home.
It is a great way for them to review what they learned, what they liked about the day, etc.
It is an opportunity to help normalize children.
You can use several activities and tools during the Circle Time to help children become normalized, as Maria Montessori would put it, faster.
Normalization is an adjustment to the Montessori environment.
So, in this line of thinking, you can definitely come up with different things during Circle Time to help them in this capacity.
Why you should consider Circle Time for your Montessori environment
Circle Time is a chance for extroverted children to thrive.
Think about how much social children thrive in spending time with other people.
Their little spirits shine when they interact with others.
The Montessori philosophy has many works that are for individual use, so these children are not socializing as much in the environment as they would like.
Circle Time is probably the time that they look forward to the most because of this aspect.
Circle Time is an opportunity for introverted children to grow interpersonal relationships.
And think about the flip side.
Our introverted children get an opportunity to connect with others, make friends, be given leadership opportunities and more.
What a wonderful thought, isn’t it?
Even though children are not forced to join in the Circle Time activities, most do decide to participate because they like it so much.
Why you should consider Circle Time for your Montessori environment
Circle Time is an opportunity for children to learn public speaking skills.
Everything you do today will be building and creating the future adults of tomorrow.
By giving children opportunities to learn to speak in public, to come up with reasonable topics to talk about and to take questions calmly, you are doing just that.
You need to brainstorm and think of different ways to come up with these opportunities during Circle Time.
Circle Time is an opportunity to tackle important topics.
We discussed normalization and adjustment earlier.
This is what this is about.
If you have rules that need to be reiterated, a certain activity that everyone must learn or have an announcement, then Circle Time is great for these.
Also, if you have a Science experiment that requires supervision and that yo ucannot be watching all day, you can certainly do it during Circle Time.
How Does This Tie in with the Montessori Philosophy?
Maria Montessori actually had Circle Time in her schedule nearly 100 years ago.
It was an important and it was a consistent part of their schedule in the Casa dei Bambini.
Will you give Circle Time a try?
We discussed the WHAT and the WHY in this post, but I go deep a whole lot more on exactly HOW to to carry out Circle Time inside The Montessori Way Foundations Framework.
I walk you step by step and even give you a printable Circle Time set to get you started and set you up for success!
Find out more HERE.
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