Montessori Nature's Smile

In this blog I would like to share activities I arranged for our 13 months old girl. I hope these will help you when organising your child's play space. The key for me is not to spend money on new materials (which is always fun if one can afford), but to utilise resources available around: in cupboard, in the kitchen, outside in park, etc. It gives a good practise for imagination.

One of our activities this month are consisted on a few natural objects we found while taking a walk outside: seeds, leafs, etc. A word of caution: child always has to be supervised during his or her time of discovery as materials are not safe if not used carefully. I always keep close eye if there is glass involved, or metal coins, object that have small details on them, or with sharp parts.

At this age movement plays significant role in child's development and is essential. Montessori nature walks are always highlights of the day for us. These are done in child's pace. I encourage you to start noticing smallest details and draw child's attention to it when going for a walk: foot print of an animal, colours of flowers around, sizes and shapes of different leafs.. It will bring enormous pleasure to your little friend.

When I prepare activities I try to make sure they require minimum assistance from me and I always demonstrate how to use it before leaving it on the shelf. The reality is that most likely at one stage child will mix everything up and will find great pleasure in pulling everything from shelf, leaving mess on floor. However, I find that during these few precious minutes a day my little angel follows my gentle guidance so precisely, it brings huge satisfaction to see her develop deep concentration over meaningful tasks.
So here we go.

During Group time I tell the story of Palm Sunday. Did you know that palm is the most flexible tree? No matter how hard the wind is - it can't break palm tree. I always loved this verse from Psalm 92: "The righteous shall flourish like the palm-tree". I thought it's quite amazing. 

We look into the parts of a palm leaf and talk about why people in those days used palm leafs to greet Jesus. I encouraged children to reenact this story and they make craft with palm leafs. 

Later we play "pin donkey's tail" game  which they usually find hilarious.

Here are some Easter Montessori shelves activities to encourage work on developing hand grip, finger strength, concentration, fine motor skills, etc. These are activities on transferring, sorting, matching, colouring and cutting. 

You can find this beautiful printable (and more) here: Confessions of a Hoomeschooler.












Check out these BEAUTIFUL Ukrainian Easter Eggs activity for Montessori classroom!

Thank you for your time! Happy and blessed Easter to you and your little person!

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