Vacation Time!
We recently took our annual family vacation to the beach. It is my favorite place in the whole world. I'd rather stay in a shack on the beach that a mansion probably anywhere else in the world (unless they had a beach nearby). Thankfully, we didn't have to stay in a shack, but you get my point.
I love the beach not only for it's beauty and the fun we have but because I love the opportunity it gives E to be out in nature. Living in Las Vegas, you have to be extremely heat tolerant to spend any significant time outside, and in the summer with temperatures as high as 115 even the most hardy among us can't stand to be out!
The Beach as a Teacher
Nature is such a wonderful teacher. I honestly believe that a Montessori indoor classroom is only second best to letting kids be outdoors. Not only are there animals to learn about (sand crabs and pinching craps and royal terns and seagulls and sand pipers and sea lions and sea shells!), but weather patterns (how the fog would come in in the evening and burn off in the afternoon, the tides would come in and out) and geographical (tide pools and cliffs and rocks) and botanical phenomena (sea weed and kelp and sea grass and palm trees), there are cause and effects to learn about (the waves come in and out, the hole I dug fills with water, the castle I built gets knocked down by the waves) and risk assessment (how long can I stand here before a wave knocks me down? How high can I build this rock tower? should I touch that sand crab?).
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| Elia observing the sand crabs we caught |
"This is our mission: giving children the opportunity to stir up life and leave it free to discover" - Maria Montessori
Not only are all these things begging to be learnt about at the beach, but there's a magic about being outside that allows us as adults to LET GO and GET OUT OF THE WAY. When you're indoors you're always worried about things getting knocked over, spilled, broken, etc. But when you're outside? No worries! Play in the sand! Get wet! The richest learning takes place in my opinion not only because it's so rich and diverse and engages the whole body and all the senses, but because us adults aren't always having heart attack about messes and we leave the children free to discover.
We left the beach but the beach didn't leave us!
So after our week long stay at the beach I was literally having a panic about how I was going to bring this beauty back with us to dreary hot and dry Las Vegas. I came up with a few ideas I'd like to share with you.While at the beach I was struck by how many beautifully colored rocks I found in the surf, only to be disappointed by how dull they looked once they had been taken out of the water and dried off, it was is they had become sad after being removed from their beachy home (kinda like how I felt going back to Las Vegas). I wondered how I could return their beauty to them, and came up with rock washing!
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| Before a wash After a bath |
E and her cousin looooooove this job. They have such a peaceful zen-like nature about them when they wash things, they take such care and attention. And they become very excited and pleased to see the rocks change color! It's like ocean magic!
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| A towel to soak up water for washing the rock on, a tupperware for water, one for the sponge |
"As soon as children find something that interests them, they lose their instability and learn to concentrate"
Maria Montessori
Besides boogie boarding, laying in the sand and eating fresh fish and chips, my favorite thing to do at the beach is to collect sea shells I find in the sand. I saved nearly everyone I found, even the broken ones. I just can't resist. I thought I'd make a basket full of them where the kids could examine them. But I realized that the fun about sea shells is the discovery. Seeing a tiny speck of white in the sand and digging it up, not knowing if it will be whole and perfect or a interesting fragment full of possibility of what it might have been. So, much to the amusement of my husband and relatives, I packed as much beach sand as I could into a container and made this sea shell discovering box out of an old plastic bin. I let them use it OUTSIDE, and yes, I freak out every time a drop of sand is spilled but I try not to let it show. I just show them how to keep their hands IN the box, and keep a dustpan handy for them to clean up their spills. (see, this is why nature is the best! everything artificial is second best!)
Also in our collection is seashell washing.
Also, I found a ton of these flat black rocks at the beach and painted eyes, mouths, and noses so they can create faces. Just another example of how nature can help you become more creative! I loved how some of the rocks had the shapes of noses and mouths already!
Process, Not Product
Observing E at play at the beach also reminded me of a VERY important topic. Process over product.
I was helping E build sandcastles (at least that's what I thought I was doing). We'd work diligently to fill up her bucket of sand, and I'd flip it over to make the most beautiful and perfect sand castle.
What did my daughter do with all our hard work? Our beautiful sand castle? She promptly took huge handfuls of it so she could put it BACK in the bucket so she could do it again! She crushed my dreams of having a huge and populous sandcastle city!
"She wasn't in the process of
constructing a sandcastle,
she was in the process of
constructing HERSELF."
I wanted to stop her and show her what I had in mind, how beautiful our sandcastles could be if only she stopped destroying them! But I stopped myself. E was showing me that it was the process that was important to her, not the product. You see, it's during the PROCESS of building a sand castle that she learns the important skills of grasping sand or holding a shovel, aiming the sand into the bucket. Endurance and concentration to stick with the task until the bucket is full. It's not the product of the finished sand castle that interests here at ALL, Why not? Because SHE herself is the product, she is in the process of creating herself. And she is the most lovely sandcastle I ever did see.
I hope you enjoyed this post. Please feel free to comment below on how nature teaches your children, how do you bring nature home? Where do you see process over product?
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