Montessori activities

I started my project this week by tidying P's room.  DH finally removed the desk from her room, and we rearranged the space to make it more play friendly.  It got quite messy.

But the finished product was worth the mess.  

I bought the shelves from the Hospice Shop for $5 and the baskets were 'fill a bag for $1', also from the Hospice Shop.  But once I got all the baskets, I got a bit lost.  After all there are so many different kinds of activities that I could include.  I really liked the idea of doing a 'theme' but then I realised that this would require rotating some baskets around, and I decided to leave this until P is a bit older, and might have more definite topic preferences.  I found this facebook note from Counting Coconuts, and I focussed on the areas she suggested there.

Practical Life - Threading

This is a mixture of cut up straws and penne pasta pieces, with some string.  The idea is for P to thread the pasta and straws onto the string.  I painted the ends of the string with nail polish to make it a bit easier for her to manage, and to stop the string from fraying.

Sensorial - Felt Shapes

These are some felt shapes that can be made into a house.

Sensorial - Colour basket

This activity is really for J rather than P.  A blue scoop, a teddy bear, two different pieces of material, and some blue yarn.  I chose blue because it is the largest teddy that I have, and J is sure to want to put it in her mouth.

Language - 'P' basket

This has a selection of objects that start with the sound 'p'.  A present, a peg, a pizza, a purple pair of pants, and a picture of P.  I've covered the pictures with some duraseal to help them last.  You can find some ideas about an Alphabet box here.

I thought really carefully about including the letter 'P', but I decided against it.  Partly because Montessori teaches phonics as the primary way to learn language, and I don't think this is the best way to learn a language like English, which is not very phonetical.  But the main reason I didn't include the letters is because I don't actually want to teach P to read.  In this respect I fall quite firmly into the Steiner ideas about learning to read.  I just don't think its necessary for her at this age.

Practical Life - Button snake

You can find how to make this here.  Buttoning is something that P has trouble with so this was a great activity to help her with it.

I filled all the baskets with things that I already had at home.  I was very surprised with how easy and quick everything was to make.  With the exception of the fabric numbers (which I will post about separately) all the baskets were pretty much 5 minute jobs.  Doesn't it look fantastic?