Toys in a Montessori Home - Lower Elementary

Our toys requirements for the elementary Montessori age - 6-12 years:

• constructive
• imagination development
• develop real-life skills
• aesthetics: something I can stand to look at

So what do we have? A lot that has carried over from primary actually - just expanded and deepened, with a few things removed: 

• Legos - yep, plastic - constructive, imaginative, aesthetics (good and bad), patterning - we do NOT utilize many specialized pieces; a friend has described his engineering college degree as "legos on steroids"
• Lincoln Logs - cultural significance to North America, natural, limitations of styles encourages creative solutions to build various structures, those same limitations demonstrate what is possible or not possible with this particular material
• Easel with chalkboard and magnetic/dry-erase board
• Art and Writing supplies: non-drying clay, real water-colors, a few kid water-colors, easel paper, various high quality paint brushes, a couple of junk drawers for random supplies to use for imaginative purposes, high-quality paper scissors, fabric scissors, tracing paper, some construction paper, glue, double-sided tape, Prismacolor colored pencils, white erasers, KUM pencil sharpeners, cheap sets of cards and envelopes, notepads
• Craft supplies: yarn, knitting needles, crochet hooks, cross-stitch and embroidery materials, felt, fabric and thread, use of the sewing machine
• Schleich and Toob animals and scenery
• Wood barn
• Supply of cardboard for making own creations
• Gardening supplies
• Stuffed animals - nothing gaudy or entirely unrealistic
• Wood train track with magnetic-wooden trains
• Music: various percussion instruments from various cultures; recorder with instruction book; CDs; CD player; 
• Books - lots and lots of excellent literature selections
• Wood pattern blocks for tessellations and patterns: my Montessori albums do not include presentations for these, so we count them as "toys"
• Board games, card games, strategy and logic games: this is a whole post by itself! See this post for a few of our games
• Building blocks
• Wood yo-yo
• 2-wheel bicycle
  
• jump ropes, kites, sleds
• Keyboard: newest acquisition - yes, it's for learning to play, but it's also for fun!
• Kept the balance beam! 

This has actually been a difficult list to create because so much of our school and home/play overlaps, flowing from one to the other. Because of this overlap, this list actually looks longer than it feels. A lot of these items were primarily "school" at primary and are now toys; or are still partially used for school. 

And I want to include our science supplies as toys, because they are so much fun! But I'll hold back on that one! ;) 

Toys in a Montessori Home - Series

So not only does my son have a Montessori education, with the influence of such at home - we are homeschooling Montessori, so the influence is even greater.

I've had a few e-mails asking what kind of toys does my son play with? What do we allow or disallow?

Well. There's toys, then there are toys.

Yes, I have always made very conscious decisions about purchases and gift lists. Follows were the credentials:

• small living space
• not easily broken, yet encourages proper care
• readily repairable when needed
• limited budget for batteries and electric bills
• desire for an actual attention span in my child

We have had more than our share of plasticy toys, items I didn't really want but somehow ended up in our home, whether because the previous tenant left a bunch of stuff, or the church nursery was closing and I received everything to use for my in-home daycare, or as gifts. 

Maria Montessori was not opposed to toys - she just found that the children *chose* not to use them when they were presented with more real-life items that fit their developmental needs at the time. 

What follows in the next few days is a series of posts about some of the toys we've had in our home over the years for various purposes. 

The second Mama-endorsed electrical "toy" ;) 

Toys in a Primary Montessori Home
Toys in a Lower Elementary Montessori Home

Elementary Montessori Continuum - or Breakage

It is so great to see more information on elementary Montessori spreading across the internet :)

There are differences between AMS and AMI and other Montessori organizations; unfortunately AMI's stance of keeping themselves to themselves has allowed a proliferation of information on Montessori to spread that is not entirely "the complete picture".


One of those differences is in regard to the continuum or division of the elementary age.


Many Montessori schools (and training centers) divide up the elementary into lower and upper elementary - and the most readily accessible albums for homeschoolers are divided thus; however the presentations and materials used are the same and should not be arbitrarily divided - I've seen so many album options for this age group that become too much "curriculum" and not enough "fulfilling the needs of the child, encouraging independent research, and building community".

Just something to think about when we say "this work is only for upper elementary" when you have a 7 year old KEENLY interested and doing independent research on that very topic that surpasses what we would typically give to an upper elementary student.

At elementary, we want to give the most pertinent, necessary information; give them their place in human history through the key timelines; spark imagination and intrigue; so that they go off and discover new insights on their own, in community, and find their places in our society, in history. It looks chaotic, but if they are receiving the keys, allowed time to explore on their own, having certain amounts of outside expectations/requirements to fulfill, creating their own materials that are above and beyond the keys, and are truly going deep with their work, then we have a true elementary environment :) because then we have a community (which leads to the peace education and other aspects that we desire, without having to use a "curriculum" to get there).

My concern with splitting 6-12 to 6-9 and 9-12 is that we want to give too much, and the children are left with less to discover on their own; there will be less community-building; fewer opportunities for conflict resolution; fewer opportunities for self-planned Goings-Out (student planned field trips for a small group of children exploring a particular field of interest); less opportunity for building self-confidence and study skills;

Practically speaking, many schools may NEED to divide into 6-9 and 9-12; but then each classroom should have the complete set of elementary materials (and training) so that the children can be where they need to be at any given age, without that arbitrary division that will only hinder growth.

However, Montessori teachers who have a full class of children ages 6-12 find that they a true community and the children really teach each other, with the children having more freedom of movement within the continuum so that they can go back and forth as needed without worry of "being at the wrong level."

In our homeschools, the continuum should definitely be maintained, without artificial breakages; especially if you have children across age spans - otherwise you'll give up on Montessori before you really get into it.

I choose AMI elementary because of this continuum. I have the complete picture for the elementary range and my son moves along where he needs to be.

I know that if I had used the 6-9 and 9-12 albums available, we would be "too structured" and our love of learning would be entirely killed, given our family situation and circumstances. I still look at those albums once in a while, but we almost never use any of the presentations or "assignments" in them because either my son already thought of that work himself (as an extension) or it is superfluous to our family and life goals.

So I keep coming back to my AMI albums, and trusting them more and more each day, with each passing moment.

The albums I use are available through Keys of the Universe.

Celestial Almanack

The latest Celestial Almanack for astronomy studies is available!

We LOVE these things - and they go great with a Montessori education, unschooling, classical - or pretty much anyone! Including us adults ;) This is what Montessori astronomy is about :)

Written by a homeschool father; packed with gads of information on various age levels and understandings - check out the free preview over here.

NOTE: Affiliate links included in this post. This does not mean I'll get anything even if you make a purchase; it just means I might :) It all depends on credits you use, if you allow cookies, etc. :)

Beautiful Materials

When I started our little co-op last year, I did not have the metal fraction insets. We had some plastic fraction circles (each number with a different color; and not all numbers represented) and these: 

Made and cut before I made the connection that the UNIT is being divided into fractions;
HINT: USE RED CARDSTOCK!

This work is meant for the elementary children to do lots and lots of fraction operations. The primary children, if they get to fractions, will only work with the metal pieces - using them for making designs, discovering equivalencies, and very simply operations. We just never had them in our home environment - it would have been better if we did; but we made do with the plastic pieces (at least we had *something* hard/stiff - I found the fractions to be necessary, just not the most readily affordable). 

Now, several months ago, I purchase the metal insets used. There is one piece missing, I am ordering from a company that is taking their time getting it to me. I might just cut it out of wood for now and paint it!

The children came in to the co-op as usual; I said *NOTHING* about the new material - which is kind of in a back corner. 

Within 45 seconds, there was a group of children sitting around admiring them, picking them up very so carefully, seeing if they could put them in another place. They were in AWE. These were elementary children - not the primary kids! 

Here is what they saw on a low box on the floor: 

Used for both primary and elementary; design work AND fractions

Since then, they have also discovered these: 

Elementary Fraction Skittles

Now, I've not formally presented this material to anyone but my own son yet; but the elementary children have already "matched" them with the fractions and given them their "proper family names" of whole, family of halves, family of thirds, family of fourths and quarters (that is the phrase they chose to use!). 

Without even a presentation, the children were DRAWN to these materials. Which makes the presentations that much more meaningful. 

They beg to receive a presentation on an intriguing material - sometimes I feel like my presentation is only going to be a let-down, especially if we have to wait for several weeks, but it never once has been a let-down! 

All of these materials have been more than worthy purchases or investments of time. And I am so happy to share them with my co-op children; not just my own child :)