Montessori Strewing- Stacking blocks
One day we went to see a special museum exhibit on Beatrix Potter. I remember it was a real pain driving everyone in, parking, walking to the museum which was very crowded. I remember I lost my 4 year old for a while and had a huge panic searching for him, before I found him in the little movie theater where they were showing a short bio of Potter. My heart is racing just remembering that panic!
We had read lots of Beatrix Potter stories for years, so everything in the exhibit was charming and familiar to the kids. They had a little gift shop too and so I bought these blocks for my littlest ones.
The way I used this resource:
This was one of the Montessori trays I would put out for my 4 and 2 year old every weekday morning.
I think these blocks work a lot like the pink tower in Montessori. My kids would spend intense periods of time taking up two blocks, comparing them for size and then stacking them in order from largest at the bottom to smallest at the top. I was amazed at how much they enjoyed this activity. They did it over and over again. And when they stopped being interested I simply stopped putting it out for a while. A few months later I'd add it to the rotation again and they enjoyed it all over again at almost the same intensity. This pattern went on for months and months.
When you first put out a Montessori activity, you gently show the child how it's done. However, I honestly think I didn't have to do a thing except put out the tray with the blocks partially in a tower. They got it intuitively.
We had read lots of Beatrix Potter stories for years, so everything in the exhibit was charming and familiar to the kids. They had a little gift shop too and so I bought these blocks for my littlest ones.
This was one of the Montessori trays I would put out for my 4 and 2 year old every weekday morning.
I think these blocks work a lot like the pink tower in Montessori. My kids would spend intense periods of time taking up two blocks, comparing them for size and then stacking them in order from largest at the bottom to smallest at the top. I was amazed at how much they enjoyed this activity. They did it over and over again. And when they stopped being interested I simply stopped putting it out for a while. A few months later I'd add it to the rotation again and they enjoyed it all over again at almost the same intensity. This pattern went on for months and months.
When you first put out a Montessori activity, you gently show the child how it's done. However, I honestly think I didn't have to do a thing except put out the tray with the blocks partially in a tower. They got it intuitively.
Actually, now that I think about it, our version of blocks had more than just six.
ReplyDelete