Montessori teachers generally highly recommend not to have duplicate materials at home and at school.
For the most part, I agree.
But there are always moments that make you say, "hmm."
And this was one :)
Junior Legoboy (he had not yet discovered legos at this time of his life!) was in an AMI primary Montessori school for his 3 year old year. First thing of interest is that he started to write at home - writing out the letters to spell "thank you" on his after-Christmas cards - but he wouldn't write at
One day, at home, he pulled out a world puzzle map we had there (yes out of storage, without my permission), and proceeded to do work he'd seen the older children doing at school.
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| This photo became the cover of my sensorial album! Please ignore his clothes hanging in the closet behind him ;) |
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| Assembling the puzzle outside of the frame, with no outer border reference. |
So in this case, we certainly had moments where he went deeper with the work at home than he did at school. I'm not drawing any significant conclusions from these observations - just something to say, "hmmm."
Yes, this material was in my sensorial album - not a separate geography area. I had sensorial aspects of the world in sensorial, with the appropriate language activities in the language album. I personally found this layout to be SUCH a relief after having spent several years finagling with multiple subject albums - 4 was such a blessed relief! It certainly helped me to organize the patterns and connections in a way I just didn't "see" before despite the number of years in Montessori environments!
I can totally understand why a Montessori teacher would not want duplicate materials at home. On the other hand, it so often happens in our homeschooling home that my daughter makes a connection between something she has just seen/heard/thought of and runs off to the classroom to investigate further. That sometimes happens during formal school time, but often it's when school is not in session. Sure, if she were in school, no doubt the idea or association could wait, but I like to think it's a silver-lining to a homeschool to have that immediacy.
ReplyDeleteRegards
Amanda H
Same thing here - it might be school time, but it might not be! About a month ago, my son got up in the middle of the night to work something out with a math material (I don't know what it was - I was too tired!). Apparently he'd woken up with this burning question and he wanted to work out some sort of pattern. So he went right to it!
DeletePatience is a virtue, but sometimes it is not about patience, but about joy in learning! It was SO great to be able to respond in the moment like that!
I too think the primary organization into just four albums makes a lot of sense. It's just so much easier to FIND something. Even though AMI keeps the albums to a minimum compared to AMS, I still am always looking in the wrong album now that I have so many. (I need to make a chart for myself that tells me which album each Great Lesson is in.)
ReplyDeleteI put together a cosmic education album - with just the Great Lessons, anything that gets told at least 3 times throughout elementary on an "official" basis, and a few of the more usual "follow-up" album pages.
DeleteBut I have temporarily pulled it, because I want to add an appendix to it for each subject, with further information on potential follow-ups :)
yes - the primary albums were so lovely and simple. While I may need to go to two different albums to get all the geography stuff, it was easy to know what was where: language in one, sensorial aspects in the other ;) And I think it really emphasizes the nature of cosmic education.
But that's just me ;)