Elementary Montessori Homeschool Information

There is a great blogger-Montessori-mom-teacher posting a series of elementary posts.

Visit Living Montessori Now - Elementary Posts for a great consolidation of elementary level resources.

Mathematics Sample

I love Montessori kids ;)

My nephew is 11 months younger than my son (1st grade in public school but way ahead of his peers) and keeps telling me, in reference to my son, "He's GOOD!" (at math). My nephew keeps asking him questions like what is 400 plus 900? (because in my nephew's mind those are HUGE numbers) Of course my son knows it's just 4 of something plus 9 of something, so it's just as easy as 4+9 - but he gives his cousin both answers when applicable (13-hundreds and 1-thousand-3-hundred). It astounds my nephew every time! So my son showed him the pattern and he's picking up on it. :)

Montessori Music - Piano Lessons

Our music has not been entirely Montessori - and that is as it should be!

In a school setting, the primary child has the bells, as well as rhythm activities, group songs, and cultural music. The elementary child continues with these activities, studies music in history and other cultures, and is introduced to the tone bars.

Then that child will have other musical influences outside of school, varying with the family and living situation.

For us, we have had the following influences and experiences:

Primary: 

• Full Montessori primary level music: bells and rhythm specifically
• Can You Hear It? 
• Our Musical Year - Level 1
• 1 year of Montessori school with the group singing; 1/2 year at another Montessori school; 1 year at a local non-Montessori preschool (lots and lots of songs)
• Church hymns and prayer time songs
• Atrium music - 3 years

Elementary: 

• Elementary Montessori music begins with reinforcing all primary presentations, allowing time for extensions
• Can You Hear It? 
• Our Musical Year - Level 1
• Christian Light Music, levels 1-4 thus far (they focus on shaped notes)
• The Story of the Orchestra
• Children's choir at church: 2 semesters
• Atrium music - 2 years
• Sacred Harp singing (all shaped notes; 4-part singing with the melody in the tenor rather than soprano)

Is Montessori music curriculum enough? No. Music needs to be part of a child's life and for the most part, we can assume that music IS a part of the child's life, in some manner or another. It is written in their souls. 

Therefore Montessori music presumes that music saturates a child's life and the materials are designed to hone in on certain key aspects in order to enrich the child's experience elsewhere and fulfill his inner soul. 

Recently, my son received his long-awaited big Christmas present (we're just over 3 months late): 

He started his first lesson the same evening - and is already 3 lessons in (the next day as I type this!).
(Editing just before this post goes live: he's halfway through book 1 because of his previous music experience)

We are skipping the entire activity book that corresponds with this level. Why? Because the Montessori primary music alone covered it ALL; but then he's had the other experiences as well. The only thing for which we'll pull out our music flashcards to reinforce are the intervals - which Montessori covers, we just didn't as much as we could have. Again - Montessori music was not meant to be the child's ONLY music experience - but if it is their only experience, they are still on strong footing. 

I like The Music Tree books, because they have a Montessori feel for them. 

• They were developed at a music school in conjunction with the students (sounds like the history of Montessori, huh?)
• Book 1:
• it gets the children hands on the black keys immediately; using BOTH hands; and in multiple octaves (this is the first song!). 
• The child immediately becomes adept at moving across the keyboard, using black and white keys (white keys are brought in just a couple of lessons in). 
• The child is given exercises in playing the same patterns in multiple locations on the keyboards (using those intervals of 2nds and 3rds, etc!) - this is possible because the staff lines are not introduced until halfway into the book. The focus is on the pattern, not on just memorizing the location of notes. 
• In this way, the child is playing real music with real patterns before focusing too much on the scale of notes; he'll be able to adjust to both bass and treble readily. (how many of us are stuck in one or the other because we played a single clef instrument in our youth? or our piano lessons didn't include bass clef until we had "learned" treble clef?)
• Additional books: 
• Corresponding activity books fit together and extend better than others I've seen, or those that I used to teach myself over the years, and even those I used in my own lessons. 
• the second book as a full set of staff lines and looks more like a regular piano books
• starting in the 1st book and continuing ahead, there is constant review on each page
• AND the children write their own songs based on patterns they are learning

Toys in the Montessori Home - Primary

Our toys requirements for the primary Montessori age - 3-6 years old:

• real materials
• real images
• constructive
• imagination development
• develop real-life skills
• aesthetics: something I can stand to look at
• long-lasting (culturally, age-span, actual number of years in use)

And these lists are not including activities that don't require materials - this is just physical items.

So what did we have? A lot that has been very multi-age - we use a lot now in elementary, and had some of it in toddlerhood as well. 

• Balance Beam - great extension for walking on the line (does not replace it!)
• 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 - double-sided with chalkboard and magnetic/dry-erase board
• Art and Writing supplies: non-drying clay, 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
• 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
• Books - lots and lots of excellent literature selections
• Wood pattern blocks for tessellations and patterns: we had these at the primary age, but they were not a big hit
• Games: typical deck of cards, Skip-Bo, Uno, Bible Timeline cards, Mary Memory Match, Opposites Matching 
• Building blocks
• Blankets and pillows for making forts
• Practical life items: child-size brooms and mops, cleaning cloths, spray bottles; yep, these were toys ;) 
• tricycle (carryover from toddler)

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. 

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! ;)