Honoring an Inner Light

I would say that one of my favorite parts of this project, is finding new sources of wisdom. Our good friend is a Montessori teacher, and her daughter is in the same class as our son.  When I told her my store about how I remember connecting to life at a young age, she humored me, but more with a knowingness. She said there is a teacher who’s book I need to read, and later that day, she emailed me a link.

This book (and another book by the same author) have totally changed the way I parent, or at least the way I view what my kids are doing and what is important.  The authors name is Sonnie McFarland, and the books are Honoring The Light Of The Child: Activities to Nurture Peaceful Living Skills in Young Children, and the Montessori Parenting: Unveiling the Authentic Self. You can see their website here.

Honoring the light of the Child, is a hands on guide and lessons for how teachers can help tune children into their inner lights. This is exactly what I have in mind! Practical lessons to do with children that help teach them that happiness and energy comes from within.

The Montesori school that my friend teaches at still uses lessons develop by Sonnie 20 years later!

I could hardly believe my luck. I ordered the book and got to work, figuring that the best thing to do is give these lessons a shot, and then share my experiences and recommendations. 

The book arrived, and the activities looked amazing. The only issue, is that there are some arts and crafts involved, so I did have to go to the store. Not much in terms of materials, and there were some lessons I could get going on.

Well, I have to say, reading a lesson vs teaching a lesson is a whole different thing!  What seemed easy was actually quite hard to get my kids to pay attention to. We’d start with a lesson, but quickly, I learned I had about 2-3 minutes of attention before they would be looking bored. They humored me.

I love this book and come back to some of the activities, especially the magic bag, peace candle, and some of the early activities.

I recommend it for sure, especially for teachers.

But, guess what my favorite thing about this book is?  It lead me to another book that I LOVE and use all the time!  Montessori Parenting, also by Sonnie has totally changed the way I parent, and improved my relationship with my kids, too.  There is way to much here to post about, so I’ll be posting about that soon.