"Who Will Help Me Grind the Wheat?"

The following is a post I've revamped from an old blog of mine that was addressed to parents of my preschoolers. I've reposted it here for inclusion in a new Montessori ebook:

The children in our classroom certainly know how to help. We recently completed our unit on the Little Red Hen. A beautiful version of this story, with vintage illustrations like the one above, can be found through the Baldwin Project found at this link. Traditional rhymes and stories are a wonderful introduction to literature as they familiarize children with rhyme, rhythm, pattern, memorization, and social values. Children will grasp even more when these stories are read not once, but several times in one sitting, and in different ways.

I printed the pictures from the link above and pasted them onto red cardstock.  After I told the story the first time, each child was given a picture and, working together, the children were able to place their pictures in sequence to tell the story. This work was then placed on a shelf where children were able choose to complete the exercise again on their own. Children were able check their work by turning the pictures over to see if the numbers, which I had written on the back, were in order. You can encourage your children to think through the stories you read at home by asking questions as you read: "What do you think will happen next?" or "What happened first? Next? Last?"

After discussing the story the children decided they would have liked to help the little red hen. So we gave them a chance. First children enjoyed exploring the feeling of wheat moving through their fingers. You might enjoy the feeling yourself : ). Place a large bowl of wheat kernels on a tray and allow children to explore.  You may also wish to include a small hand broom with the work so children can sweep up any spills.

Next we placed fresh wheat in a hand grinder and each child loved taking a turn grinding the wheat into flour. This work was available to the children throughout the week and the grinding literally did not stop until we ran out of wheat to grind! If you would like to replicate this activity but don't have a hand grinder, simply supply a bowl of wheat flour and let children explore it as they did the kernels, though if you can purchase or borrow a hand grinder it is SO worth it! (I was once hired to spend some time with a sweet little boy who was going through the process of being diagnosed with what was expected to be Austism.  We ran our fingers through wheat and then ground it everyday. He could never get enough and was always calm and more communicative after our wheat grinding.) We poured the wheat the children were grinding onto a cookie sheet and children used it instead of sand to form letters and numerals with their fingers.

My oldest boy at age 2.  They grow too fast!

After the wheat was ground, children were able to knead bread dough. We used dough I had prepared ahead of time but my boys always help with the bread making at home. How rewarding to make a loaf of bread from wheat you have ground yourself!

This unit would pair wonderfully with this beautiful and free "From Plant to Food" printable from MontessoriForEveryone.com.

We discussed how fun it was to work together as we enjoyed hot homemade bread and jam for snack. The children enjoyed this story so much that they chose to create masks from some suitable printables I found at Janbrett.com and performed the story for their parents at the end of the school year.