Have you tried any blindfold activities with your child? If your child goes to a Montessori school, it's likely they have tried some sensorial activities like the pink tower, knobbed cylinders, thermic tablets, perhaps even the trinomial, binomial cubes or roman arch while wearing a blindfold. What is the point? Wearing a blindfold takes away the child's sense of sight, and therefore the child needs to rely their other senses especially touch. Wearing a blindfold helps the child to develop their stereognostic sense. When using their stereognostic sense the child creates a mental picture through touch; as the child feels... Continue reading

Are you looking for a gift for a three-year-old? There are a lot of gift ideas here. I hope you find this list helpful! Scooter (AU here) - three is a great time to start scootering if your child hasn't already. This is the same scooter we have and still use at five years. Screw Board - promotes fine motor skills, coordination, concentration and focus. Silk Streamer - I like this for playing outside with the wind; we've given it as a gift many times. Children's Measuring Tape - for exploring length and math concepts at home. Children's Stop Watch... Continue reading

Does your child cook independently? Montessori families often teach young children to cook things like eggs pretty early, so this isn't a new thought. But just in case you haven't tried it yet, or your child is still young, I want to put it out there. There are a ton of benefits to teaching your child to cook, and when they are ready, they can cook independently. There is no need to rush or push your child, but if you involve your child in cooking from the start, their independence will build slowly. This morning Otto, mostly independently (I helped... Continue reading

My youngest recently turned five, and just before his birthday, I panicked because I couldn't think of a suitable gift. So I made a list of his favourites and some wish list items to help for his birthday and Christmas. If you have a four or five-year old I hope find this list useful!! Children's Yoga Mat & Yoga Flash Cards - we love this yoga mat and cards from Mindful & Co Kids; you can use the code MINDFULFRIENDS20 at checkout for 20% off your order! Check out the different mats, we have and the Nature Print. Colour Change... Continue reading

Have you watched the Netflix series Old Enough? What are your thoughts? If you haven't seen it, Old Enough is a reality show from Japan that captures children as young as two (yes toddlers!) doing their first errand. The children are filmed running errands independently, like delivering or collecting dry cleaning, shopping at the fish market or walking home and making juice. Often the children are walking kilometres; some of this takes place in rural areas, but there are some errands set in city streets; some children independently cross busy roads and catch public buses; most children do it alone,... Continue reading

Want to see some of the art and craft activities we've tried this week? These are all a little bit different. Pasting leaves and blowing colour bubbles could be enjoyed by toddlers (from around 18 months). While making stickers or using transfer paper is best suited to preschool children and could be enjoyed by children much older! Let's take a look! Leaf art - we've presented some collected leaves, paste, cardboard, scissors, and Look What I Did with a Leaf by Morteza E. Sohi (UK here)(worldwide here). We've used Look What I Did with a Leaf to inspire us and... Continue reading

I'm always on the lookout for Montessori materials, or similar products that families can use at home for a really good price or that can be DIYed. I recently ordered these wooden letters for some crafting activities, but when they arrived I thought they would be an affordable option for a Moveable Alphabet. They are all lowercase in a simple print font. They are a light natural colour, so they are easy to paint. They are approximately the same size (height and width) as the Movable Alphabet we usually use. The letters shown here are all lowercase - affordable crafting... Continue reading

This post is sponsored by Goodevas. The development of gross motor skills is essential for children all year round. Simple things like going for a nature walk preferably on uneven surfaces, running up mounds of grass, climbing trees or balancing on tree logs are all wonderful ways children can explore the outside world while developing gross motor skills. But how can children develop their gross motor skills while inside? We can set up a fun obstacle course think jumping through hoops, climbing through indoor tunnels, and throwing mini bean bags. We can set up a fort, perhaps using a blanket,... Continue reading

Sandpaper Letters are one of the most used Montessori materials in our home when my children are between the ages of three and five. Some children tire of them, but we still have them on our shelves, and Otto works with them periodically. It is important to say we do tons of practical life (including cooking, cleaning and handwork like sewing) and art (including playdough, clay and using scissors), so there are lots of other ways we assist our children in developing fine motor skills required for holding and controlling a pencil. We have used a few different variations of... Continue reading

Are you looking for some new books to read to your children? We've recently found three new books that I think you will like. The first is Being You: A First Conversation About Gender by Megan Madison, Jessica Ralli and Anne/Andy Passchier (UK here)(worldwide here). Being You covers body parts (includes the words penis and vagina, but there are no images of nudity), gender, pronouns, and the importance of being you! Being You helps us to give our child language around gender and opens the discussion around gender in a really open and positive way. It's also a fantastic book... Continue reading

Over the last two years, I've attended felting workshops with a fantastic Steiner (Waldorf) educator. I've made a birthday crown, a placemat, seasonal mats and children's playthings. The crafting sessions have been for adults, but I keep on thinking about how much my children would love them too. So I've started to do some felting at home with Otto. We began with wet felting as it's easier to do with young children (than needle felting), and children often enjoy playing with water and soap. Today we made some Halloween decorations, but we could make Christmas decorations or even little toys... Continue reading

There is one really easy thing you can do to promote early literacy in your home - put some magnetic letters on your fridge. Or on your dishwasher or on a metal cabinet. Magnetic letters are just like the Montessori movable alphabet but on a magnetic surface! We can put our child's name with magnetic letters on the fridge to help them recognise their name. We can use the letters to help with letter recognition. The children can play and start to put the letters together, later they can write their own words and even write notes. Otto loves to... Continue reading

I Spy is a fun and easy game to help develop phonemic awareness. We can start with just two items that the child is familiar with. Above we've used three fruits. "I Spy with my little eye, something which starts with o." "Yes!! Orange starts with o". To start playing I Spy, I use items in a tray or on a work mat, mostly using small language objects and household items. Below we are using six items. Below is an example of when we've used six items, but three of them start with c (crab, cow, cat). Over time we... Continue reading

We've been doing lots of Halloween-themed art activities this week. Here are eight activities we've tried. Most of these activities are suitable for children 3-5 years+. 1. Spider puppets - using cardboard spider cutouts, a rod and string. These could also be used for Halloween decorations. We could present these with paints or crayons, but here we've used markers. 2. Spider painting - I found some old cardboard spiders in our Halloween decorations, and I thought it would be fun to try some negative printing. We put the cardboard spider on the paper and then used a roller to paint... Continue reading

Have you started getting ready for Halloween? Otto (5yrs) is really looking forward to Halloween and has been asking for all the Halloween arts and crafts. Around the five-year-old point, I find my children really get into the scary and spooky side of Halloween. Here are a few activities we've tried so far. Most of these activities are suitable for children 3-5 years. Scratch paper bats - my children love scratch paper; it's a great 'quiet' activity, we often use scratch paper when travelling, and we have it in our busy bag that Otto takes when waiting at his brothers'... Continue reading

As part of my studies, I recently read The 21st Century School Library: A Model for Innovative Teaching and Learning. It's an excellent book that considers different literacies including textural literacy, visual literacy, information literacy, digital literacy, technological literacy and racial literacy. The author covers some of the ways he teaches these literacies in a school library setting. While I consider these literacies in my studies I also consider these literacies at home with my children. The author writes one way he addresses visual literacy is by setting up a Pattern Play station in the school library. "Pattern Play. This... Continue reading

If you live anywhere near me, you've probably had to deal with mould this year. While we haven't been affected by floods we've had a lot of rain and moisture in the air. We also use a lot of toys in the bath, which are more susceptible to mould. I usually clean our Schleich and other model animals with warm soapy water but this time I needed something more serious. How do you clean your children's toys and what do you do with mould? Our Squigz also had mould on them. I've read a lot of suggestions to clean toys... Continue reading

Paper weaving has meaning in both Montessori and Froebel philosophies. No matter your style of parenting or education preference, paper weaving is a great activity for developing fine motor skills, spatial awareness and early mathematical skills. In Montessori, weaving is a practical life activity. In Froebel, weaving is both a gift and an occupation. Have you read about Froebel? There are lots of similarities between the Froebel and Montessori approaches. Froebel believed that children gain a deeper understanding of the world around them when given opportunities to interact with concrete activities and use carefully selected hands-on manipulatives. Sounds familiar, right?... Continue reading

Is your child easily frustrated by crayons? Often young children find pencils and crayons too hard, they require too much pressure to make a mark and the child fatigues easily and may give up in frustration. If your child doesn't like crayons or pencils, I suggest giving oil pastels a try. Oil pastels are rewarding; they make a mark with very little pressure, they are responsive, soft and smooth on the paper. Oil pastels come in a wide variety of colours, the colours are highly pigmented, vibrant and rich. They are affordable and easily accessible. Our local stationary shop has... Continue reading

In the last couple of weeks, we've been focusing on drawing with oil pastels and creating with clay; however, every couple of days, I will also set up a new and interesting art tray. Some of these are just for fun, others are to help develop fine motor skills. Let's take a look at the last eight art activities we've tried! Salad spinner art - I cut some cardboard in a circle the same diameter as the bottom of our salad spinner. I presented this with some small squeeze paints (ours are from Kmart AU), the paints are small enough... Continue reading

Have you ever thought about how to integrate chess into your Montessori environment? My two older children learnt to play chess at their (Montessori) schools. Many of their schools also had chess clubs, so they could practice playing with their peers. Until now, I've never had to teach a child how to play chess. I am thankful that Otto (4yrs), the youngest of three children, has two patient older brothers to play chess with, but he still has to learn the basic skills. If you want to know more about learning chess in a Montessori way, you must read No... Continue reading

Have you used drawing prompts with your children? It's something I really love to do. I believe in process art and believe children benefit from free and open access to art materials. But I also like to present art activities to stretch their minds and their imaginations, to introduce new concepts and to encourage exploration of art, form, colour and materials. We recently had little visitors, and I put out some drawing prompts, paper, oil pastels, markers and pencils. It was a complete success! The four and five-year-olds loved the spirals, stairs and hearts. The seven-year-old loved drawing arrows and... Continue reading

I've been getting a lot of questions about the moon lately. Perhaps it's because we've just come out of winter, and the nights have been long, perhaps it is all the excitement over the launch of NASA's Artemis I moon rocket. 🌙🚀 Young children learn best through real hands-on experiences, and this can be difficult when learning about the moon at school. It's a great idea to explore the moon at home where can go outside and see the moon at night. To encourage my children to closely observe the moon, we've been using a moon journal. The journal encourages... Continue reading

It's NOT the Stork! / Amazing you! / Only for me At around four years old, my children start asking questions about babies and where they come from and have questions about body parts. Four years of age is also the time we discuss nudity and privacy with our children. It's when we teach them about keeping their clothes on and keeping their private parts for them. One of the easiest things we can do for our children from birth is to call our body parts by the correct name. Yes, let's normalise penis, testicles, scrotum, uterus, vagina and labia.... Continue reading

It was Father's day today here in Australia. To celebrate Otto (4yrs) made waffles for the whole family. This is a wonderful idea for children who love to play cafe or shops. Our waffle-making station is on a child's table, so it is at the child's height. This is useful for the child who needs to run around take orders, make the waffles and then deliver them, there is no getting up or down from the kitchen counter. We use honey, icing sugar, strawberries, banana and blueberries. I made the waffle batter in advance, but the child could easily do... Continue reading