Watercolor Eggs, A Color Mixing Activity

This weekend we painted wooden eggs with liquid watercolors.  The girls mixed their own shades using the primary colors.  Once dry, we coated them with a bit of beeswax.  It was a simple, easy, fun craft that came out to be a sweet decoration.  The eggs are proudly displayed in the living room to explore. 

Color Sorting

Today, the girls spontaneously began sorting their living room toys by color.  Peanut shouted, "I'll be right back" and returned with color box 2 to match the color piles.  I snapped these photos of their fun.  What colorful little kids!

Sensorial Fun

These photos were taken last weekend, when I started dusting-  the girls were suddenly re-interested in the sensorial works.  They spent a silent (it was Daddy's turn to sleep in) Saturday with the materials, while I drank my coffee and read my new book.  This is the life.

Red Knobless Cylinders, she's making a tower

She's sitting on the Pink Tower.  It's okay, we're at home  :)

Bean wants to draw the Knobless Cylinders as towers.

Working with the Binomial Cube

My blue tower, on paper

"It's an elephant"

I threw this photo in so that you can see their creative play with
Montessori and Waldorf items.  It's not all neat and tidy all the time....
....they're little kids!!!  

The Brown Stair, with Lesson

Pumpkin is ordering the Brown Stairs.

Pumpkin, now 3.5 has been working with the Brown Stair since she was just two years old.  Here you can see her building it vertically.  She was also pretending to put mortar in between each prism (there's construction on our street) which is fine by me.  The fast she's using her imagination shows me that she has mastered this concept.  

She caught me taking this photo...."What Mom?...It IS called the Brown Stairs.  I was just checking with my feet!"  Fair enough.

The Brown Stair Lesson-

Area

General-Sensorial

Specific- Visual Discrimination , Size awareness

Materials

  See the photos :) 

Aims

Direct-  Refinement of the ability to observe, compare, discriminate, differentiate, reason, decide, solve problems and appreciate our world.

Indirect- Learning to grade prisms by discrimination of volume

Preparation:  Pink tower, knobbed cylinders

Age- First year Montessori student

Presentation of Lesson:

  Carry one prism at a time

  Place them to the right side

  Hold prisms adjacent to floor with two hands

  Isolate the extremes to the left of the mat “This is the largest”  “This is the smallest”

  Start with the largest prism, continue grading prisms- setting them largest to smallest in a stair form

  Appreciate

  Return to shelf one prism at a time, starting with the largest

Work of the Teacher

Points of Emphasis:

  Carry with two hands adjacent to floor

  Scanning for next prism

Language:

  Non verbal 1^st

  Prism

  Large, small

Points of Interest:

  Heaviness of prism

  Chance to build

Work of the Child

Points of Consciousness:

  Largest goes 1^st

  They make a stair

Control of Error:

  Child’s eye

  Smallest prism

  If it’s not built right, it won’t look like a stair

Variations:

  Build Vertically

  Build end to end

Extensions:

  Combine with other discrimination of size materials, ESPECIALLY the Pink Tower-- hours of fun.

Montessori Monday: Magnets and Letters!

 A new collection of Magnetic and Non-Magnetic for our house, gathered by the girls.  It's got a little Valentine's theme with the box and the cookie cutter!

Why do I teach them cursive in this world of print, computers, and type?  Dr. Montessori found that cursive had gentle curved lines are a natural extension of the hand.  I tend to be a little 'old school' about Dr. Montessori's writings at my home, and lead my children by her old lectures.  Plus, there are far less letter and sound reversals (b,d,p,q,g) when the child learns the sounds with cursive first, or alongside print letters.  I have found the transition to print very easy for my girls, since they were so very interested in letter formation by the time they had a good amount of time with cursive.  Give it a shot!

"Must one begin with strokes? The logical answer is “No.” These require too much effort on the part of the child to make them. If he is to begin with the stroke, it should be the easiest thing to execute. But, if we note carefully, a straight stroke is the most difficult to make. Only an accomplished writer can fill out a page with regular strokes, whereas a person who is only moderately proficient can cover a page with presentable writing."
(Dr. Maria Montessori, 'The Discovery of the Child', Clio Press Ltd, 193)

Care of Environment:  Polishing and watering our Peace Lily and our budding Amaryllis.  They simply CANNOT wait for this plant to flower, because they know to expect the Part of Flower puzzle, cards, and booklets to come out.  Our Flower Puzzle is this exact flower!  During a New England January, flowers are few and far between.

Shared with: