Practical Life

Teaching "Practical Life" skills can be extremely fun and rewarding.  When you plan to demonstrate practical life skills, you are teaching useful, functional skills that increase independence and self reliance.  From my perspective this is a huge Win/Win.  While it is a simple concept  … in practice, it can be a bit more daunting then you might anticipate.  Why? Because if you are following the Montessori approach one of the primary tenants of Practical Life exercises is that they must be real or as close to real as you can reasonably get.  Which means you are using "familiar materials" that are potentially perishable AND breakable.  Eeeek … a real bowl, a real container of oats, a real carton of milk!  Sounds silly but with the cost of milk per gallon … all of the sudden that old adage, "don't cry over spilt milk" seems a bit more daunting. 

In the Montessori method there are four skill building areas when demonstrating practical life skills.

Preliminary Skill Building: This application is all about the basic movements of life: carrying, pouring, scooping, folding and the like. 

Applied Skill Building:  This application is founded in caring for oneself and ones environment.  Examples of applied skill building are: brushing ones hair, washing hands, sweeping, putting away toys, cleaning the table.

Grace & Courtesy Skill Building: To quote the line from one of our favorite Signing Time Songs, "Please, Thank You, Sorry helps everyone feel good."  This application focusing on helping children know how to properly interact with society. the children work on the interactions of people to people.

Control of Movement Skill Building: This is one of the most fun for us.  In this application you focus on refining those motor skills.  (i.e. balancing on a balance beam, pinning the tail on the donkey, playing a toss and catch game)

Check out these great Montessori Practical Life Links:

Montessori @ Home

Montessori Primary Guide

Sensorial Play

Sensorial Play is one of those key educational words that I became familiar with as a Sign Language teacher for babies and toddlers.  While the heading sounds a bit inflated it is actually a very practical way to teach a myriad of concepts and skills to children and adults.  Essentially, sensorial play is the process of teaching through the senses. 

There are so many great ways to incorporate sensory play through out your day!  You can create fun sensorial bins, play sensorial games, and plan sensorial activities.  Perhaps, the simplest and most effective thing you can do is to become aware of your own senses through out the day and communicate with your little one about them.  For example on a walk with your little one you could comment on the beautiful sound of a bird singing, the tickle of a breeze in the air, the heat of the summer sun.    

Check out some of my favorite sensory play inspiration sites:

Counting Coconuts: Sensorial Tubs
Play Activities: Sensorial Play

Outdoor Exploration

Going outside with my littles is a top priority on my daily to do list.  It always takes my breath away the way they light up and let lose during outdoor playtime.  It doesn't really matter what we are doing or where we are.  Toddler + (Dirt or Sand) + Sunshine = Good Times.  Not only is the physically activity and vitamin D great fro their health, but it's also a great place to get the sillies out.  The diversity of experience and ever changing "nature" of the great outdoors keeps my littles intrigued and exploring!

Science

Science is just plain fun.  Experiments are awesome and encourage inquisitive young minds.  For the purposes of my monthly planning, Science is a broad topic.  Some of the topics I include under the Science header in my planning are: Weather, nature, biology, nutrition, and classifications.

Check out some of my favorite Scientific Discovery Inspiration Sites.

Weather Wiz Kids
First School: Science
Parenting Toddlers: Child Science Experiments

Language

Language is a broad topic that covers a lot of  subject matter.  Some of the topics I include in our "Language" lesson plans are oral & sign language, letter recognition, reading comprehension, writing, and story telling. 

In our language lesson plans I strive to create fun experiences and environments that encourage a love of language that will last a lifetime.  We use a whole body learning methods to integrate the spoken written and signed word. 

Letter Recognition & Finger Spelling

We are a signing family.  What does that have to do with letter recognition?  Simple.  Fingerspelling!  Our littles began developing their finger spelling ability as babies.  Long before they developed the fine motor skill to finger spell themselves they were clearly demonstrating an understanding of finger spelled words, like "glue".  For families who choose to use true American Sign Language in their homes to supplement oral communication, fingerspelling can be a bonus to early literacy efforts.  Teaching your child the manual alphabet in ASL literally puts the power of letter recognition in the palm of your hand and theirs.    

Math

One of Maria Montessori's quotes that influence me the most with regarding math is "a mathematical mind is a mind which is built up with exactity".  Heavily influenced by Pascal, she expressed the belief that in the early stages of mathematical exposure must focus on finding identity, similarity, differences, and patterns.  As a result, we use sensorial tools to help expose our littles to order and sequence.  In addition we also use more traditional count and number recognition games and tasks.  

The Arts

When I think of "The Arts" my mind heads in the direction of paint, sculpture, dance, and music.  Art is exciting, intense, personal, emotional, collaborative, creative, inspiring, and wonderful.  It is regardless of medium not flat.  Therefore, in my mind, it's critical not to limit my littles art exposure to  paint, crayons,  play-doh, simple tunes and rhymes.  While all of those things can be wonderful.  Exposing my littles to the Arts is about tapping into that awe inspiring raw emotional self that is who they are … in this moment.  Pablo Picasso's quote above is one of my favorites and rings so true to this mama's ears.   

Arts Vs. Crafts

I love doing both Arts and Crafts with my little ones.  From this mom's perspective both have wonderful, but distinctly different value.  I am frequently disappointed when test driving learning programs, materials and such that present them only as one thing, "Arts & Crafts".  I find it equally disturbing when programs only focus on one or the other.  I think it's important to find time for both.  For us, Craft Time is a great time to reinforce learning objectives and practice following directions.  Art Time is time to follow our bliss, create, and learn how to respect and appreciate our art materials.  I absolutely love the book Young & Art by Susan Striker. It is full of great ideas for opening your littles up to creating and appreciating art.  At our house we have an art center that is set up for independent art activities.  The littles have open access to create art whenever the mood strikes.  When it's craft time we typically work at our activity table. 

How do you approach Arts & Crafts with your littles?