I think it’s important to step in here and note that the majority of kids in my Imaginary Island group have a lot of prior preparation going into this year long project. They have heard the Montessori Five Great Lessons multiple times, and done deep dives into functional geography experiments, work of air, work of wind, tree of life and animal classification work, fundamental human needs, and more. All this means that we are moving through material quickly and assuming background knowledge. To continue…
Review week! Last week we reviewed A LOT of the Montessori elementary physical geography curriculum. My albums are from Keys of the Universe.
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Using the impressionistic charts from Keys to the Universe and a couple of atlases we remembered some of the experiments we’d done in the past – showing that air takes up space, that hot air rises, and that cool air moves into take its place. This reminded us of convection cell experiments we did last year with hot and cold water. We talked through a lot of the principles of the Work of Air, Work of Water, and reviewed Land and Sea breeze work with sorting sheets from The Modern Montessori Guide (all part of her Imaginary Island curriculum). We didn’t quite finish reviewing the Work of Wind, and will start with that next time.
I also read aloud the first part of World Book’s Climate and Biomes. The book describes the five main factors that determine a location’s climate:
1. distance from equator (latitude)
2. elevation
3. topography
4. water/ocean currents
5. wind
The kids have already determined 1 & 2. Item 3 will become clear as we finish talking about 4 & 5 next week. They will then be able to determine their island’s climate.
Here are some resources and experiments we’ve used in the past to get ready for this work:
Montessori Mandie’s Geography playlist – all the Work of Air videos
Science Sparks – Hot and cold water density experiments
Science Sparks – Coloured Water Magic Trick
FORSEA.org – Ocean Currents experiments 1 (PDF)
FORSEA.org – Ocean Currents experiments 2 (PDF)