Montessori Shelves-Table Work

LJ is in a good routine with his Montessori shelf works.  I first introduced only works done on a floor mat to him and he has been really good at getting out the mat and unrolling it (with some help) and also putting it back at the end of his work cycle.

 

I thought it was time to add in some table works to the mix.  I added a small place mat to his mat box.  I like the idea of using a work mat for all of his Montessori works so he can differentiate between those and other toys he has.

I placed this spooning work on a small tray.  It consists of a wooden bowl, plastic container with lid and a large measuring spoon.  I used Heritage O's for the spooning because he still loves to put everything in his mouth and I thought it would be safer than beans.  I also couldn't bear to think of the clean up if we used rice!

When he was first introduced to the work he went to eat one and I quickly said "Let me show you" and demonstrated how to spoon.  He was delighted and from then on was only interested in spooning and not eating.  He did this work the first time for about 20 minutes.

 After several days of spooning I introduced pouring.  He gets the idea but is not overly interested and does it a couple of times and then messes about with the Heritage O's. 

 

The ever favourite pom poms in ice cube tray.  LJ loves this one.  I only put one table work out a day and always put it on the same tray so LJ knows which is a table work and which is a floor work.  There still is some confusion though sometimes as LJ wants to do all of the works at the table.  It is a work in progress.

 

 

I was surprised at how well he can manipulate the tray.  He hasn't had one spill.  I think it is because of the high edges.

 

 

Linked up to Living Montessori Now's Montessori Monday.

Montessori Shelves and Using a Work Mat

Little J is sixteen months now.  L is back at school and we have managed to get back into some kind of routine.

Now that LJ and I have time in the morning to ourselves I have set up specific shelves for his "Montessori" works.  There is really not much difference between these activities and the ones in his cubicle shelves, however what is totally different is the process in which he does them.

I wanted to introduce a separate area so LJ could understand that anything taken from these shelves needs to be done in a certain way.

As you can see on the right of the first picture he now has a basket with work mats in it.  When first introducing a new work on these shelves I introduced the use of a work mat.  LJ gets the work mat and I help him roll it out.  He then goes to the shelves and selects a work.  It is important that he takes the whole basket or work and brings it over to the mat.  He then must take the work out of the basket to do it.  After he is finished he must put the work back into the basket and return it to the shelf before selecting another work. 

At this point I am not so interested in the actual works he is doing as the whole process.  What is important is that LJ knows he needs to use a work mat to do one of the works on his Montessori shelves.  It is also important to take the whole work over to the mat and of course to return it to the shelf.  I was quite surprised how quickly LJ took to the whole process.  Of course I am there to give him a gentle reminder to bring the whole basket or to help him remember to put the whole work away before getting another but in general he does really well.  I am also there to supervise if things start to go a bit "crazy"  I just sit back quietly and observe and only step in if I must say if he starts walking away from the mat with part of the work.

 

I generally keep four different works on the "Montessori shelves" and rotate one out every couple of days.  I've also found that once his Montessori work time is over (which is decided by himself) I remove the baskets from the shelves.  I've found that this helps in not having him continually go back to them and take pieces out later in the day.  If he would like to do more work and we both have some free time then he will get his work mat out and point to where I keep the baskets.

 The "Mystery" Bag.  Later on this is used to stimulate the stereognostic sense by having the child locate a known item in the bag without looking.  At the moment LJ is just using it as a bag of discovery although I think he will be soon ready to try the "mystery" aspect.

 Color matching.  I got these little wooden cups and bulbs from the craft store and painted them as shown.  The object is to match the colored bulb with the pot.  I decided to just paint the inside of the pots with the color to make it more of a challenge.  LJ mostly loves to manipulate these and sometimes matches the colors depending on what type of mood he is in!

 

We are blessed with living very close to a wonderful market that has goats on the roof, fresh fruits and veggies, yummy ice creams and best of all tons of super cool wooden toys.  I have to restrain myself every  time I go there to not buy up the store!

This adorable little fishing game came from the market.  LJ loves it and so does L.  This is quite a process to set up as he has to remove the "water" then add the fish before he can go fishing.  Once he has caught a fish he must put it in the red bucket.  LJ does this work several times throughout the morning.

 Lacing beads.  I wasn't sure if he was ready for this but low and behold he is!  It took him a little while to work out after several demonstrations but he is now able to make necklaces.  I taped a piece of straw onto the end of the shoelace with yellow tape to help LJ push it through the bead and also for him to easily locate the correct end.

 

I introduced a basket of wooden African animals along with smaller plastic animals for matching.  LJ knows the names of all of them so I figured matching wouldn't be much of a problem.  I made the mistake of saying can you find the mommy zebra.  Well that started off a frenzy of mommy and baby kissing as well as LJ kissing all of the mommy animals.  Seriously too cute!

 LJ loves to roll up his mat and put it away.  We sing a little roll, roll, roll song as he does it.

Working with a mat

A little while ago Gypsy made a comment and suggested that I post about L using a mat. So here it is...
To be honest I never really thought about it until Gypsy brought it up. When I got to thinking I realised that L actually uses four mats! Her work mat(for table activities), floor mat, place mat and play dough mat for messy work. That's a lot of mats! Obsessive? Me? Maybe.

As far as getting L to use a work mat I have to admit there was no forethought in it whatsoever. The first book I read on the Montessori Method was David Gettman's Basic Montessori: Learning Activities for Under Fives. In his book he outlines the activities and talks about the use of a work mat. So I just started L with a table work mat from the introduction of the very first activity. (This was at about 15 months) Once I finally made it to Ikea and found a floor mat I introduced that one as well.

I think that if you start little ones with something from the beginning they don't know any different. L is used to getting her mat before doing an activity. Sometimes I will remind her but she knows to get it right away. I really like using them because they define her work space and show her that she is doing her "work" and not just playing or messing about.

L does have certain activities that she can do anywhere, like her lacing beads and opening jars but in general she uses a work mat for everything. So much so that when my Aunt came to visit and they were going to do her fishing activity together L got out her floor mat first to lay it out on!

I still help her lay out and fold up the floor mat and she puts it back onto her shelf. Once we move to Canada I will look for a mat that we can roll up and then introduce rolling to her. I find it a bit odd but L has always remembered where everything goes and the exact name of every activity so it makes things a lot easier. If I first introduce an activity on the floor she will do it on the floor every time.

I would suggest for people who haven't used mats and want to start introducing them with the activities to just choose a new activity and when you introduce it just add the mat in as a step in the activity. Then for every new activity just put the mat step at the beginning. I'm not sure if this is the correct thing to do but it works well for us. I would love to hear other people's opinions.