Montessori Curriculum – Cultural & Language

Book choices for today:

Showdown at the Food Pyramid   Rex Barron
Fed Up   Rex Barron
How Big Where the Dinosaurs?   Bernard Most
Did Dinosaurs Eat Pizza?   Lenny Hort
Stegosaurus   Michael Goeke
Triceratops   Elaine Landon

Science: (first circle)

Need for lesson – Food Pyramid Chart and Myplate guide.

Science 35

We have learned about the four main food groups. Tell me the names of the four food groups. We also talked about how important it is to eat foods from each food group for our bodies to grow and be healthy. I wonder how we would know how much of each food group we need to eat? Is it the same amount for each food group?

To help us to know the balance we need of the many food choices there are, we can look at a food pyramid. This is what it looks like it. It is called a food guide pyramid. It is a triangular or pyramid-shaped nutrition guide divided into sections to show the recommended intake for each food group. This is another way to help us understand which foods we need the most of. It is called My Plate. These two charts show us that we need to eat a variety of foods and less of some and more of others. There is one other group that we haven’t talked about yet. It is the smallest part of the food pyramid. What do you think it means if it is smaller than all other spaces? We need to eat little of these kinds of food. These would be foods that have fats and sugar. Can you think of some some foods we should not eat a lot of?

Go over the food group names and look for them on the chart.

Additional Works:

Food Group Sorting – I made this work using pictures of different foods and children have to sort the cards under the food group they belong to.

Food Ingredients – These were pictures from long ago. I just colored them and made them into a matching work. The ingredients are matched to the food they make when put together.

Food Group Game – This game is from Macmillan. The children go shopping and they have to collect a food from each food group.

Art:

Food Pyramids – Have a variety of foods that the children can color. They can then build a food pyramid and glue the foods on the pyramid.

Zoology: (second circle)

Need for lesson – Any of your favorite dinosaur materials.

Dinosaurs are such a favorite with children. Talk with the children about how dinosaurs were reptiles. There is so much you can do with dinosaurs. Choose your favorite ones to talk about with the children. The next few days can be spent on dinosaurs.

Additional Works:

Dinosaur Vocabulary Cards – These are cards made from stickers for the children to learn some dinosaur names.

Dinosaur Shadows – A matching work of shadows.

Dinosaur 1-10 Counting – I made a set of number cards for children to count out the dinosaurs.

Practical Life:

Marble Tonging – I found this dinosaur shaped soap holder. Children use tongs to transfer marbles onto the suction cups.

Art:

Stegosaurus – Children can glue bony plates along the back of the dinosaur and use flat toothpicks for the sharp spikes on the tail.

Songs/Poems:

Once a Mighty Dinosaur
Once a mighty dinosaur
Sat down upon the jungle floor.
Then many, many years went by.
The bones he left lay old and dry.
They dug, they did, some time ago
And found his bones: that’s how I know.
Now, somewhere in a big museum,
If you go there, you can see ’em:
Hundreds! Thousands! Maybe more!
Enough to make a dinosaur!

Song (CD) choices for today:

Healthy Body   A Healthy Body – Macmillan
Four Basic Foods   Exercise – Janet & Judy
Keep Sugar on the Shelf   Exercise – Janet & Judy
When I was a Dinosaur   The Chenille Sisters