How to Make your Own Montessori Materials at Home

Before we explore the domain of crafting Montessori materials at home, let us learn a little about what Montessori education is about. It will help you gain a better approach while designing materials and teaching aids to use in your Montessori nursery.

The founder of Montessori theory, Maria Montessori, was a wise woman indeed. A physician and an educator, she devised an educational approach, a teaching philosophy that has since laid the foundation of many a schooling principles. Montessori education refers to a teaching technique that is based on human tendencies.

When a baby is born, it has certain ways and channels through which it learns about the world around it. There are different abilities of the human brain that help the baby understand its surroundings. These include such techniques as exploration, communication, manipulation of the surroundings.

Children learn by means of 'copying' actions, words, etc. This is called repetition. Finally as the baby grows up and becomes a young child, he/she learns about such things as order, imagination, abstraction, and they develop a mathematical ability as well.

All these are means by which a newborn 'learns' as it grows up. Education can and should support the development of these basic fundamental abilities of learning that almost every human being is born with. It should supply to and facilitate the development of these skills. It should fuel fluid intelligence. This is the principle of Montessori education.

To encourage freedom, choice and independence, it is important to devise study material that will encourage the same qualities in the child during preschool or kindergarten. Montessori philosophy applied in preschool can show amazing benefits. Let us see some tips on various techniques, tips, tricks and teaching aids for your Montessori nursery school.

Teaching may be accompanied with audio clips. Audio clips are also a good way to teach students how to say new words, how to make different sounds with their mouths so that they can learn pronunciation as well.

Making Children clap on beat, or dance in tandem with the music would help them to identify sound patterns. You can ask them to repeat a few lines of the song so they understand the difference between high and low pitches, or high and low volumes. Music and dance will also allow them to develop coordination skills, dexterity and other such traits.

This way learning can be fun, rather than writing in a book. As the kids learns the alphabet, they may be given books and pencils to start writing the proper way. Another way would be to use letter blocks to make words. You can encourage them to make different words out of the same set of alphabet blocks. It will improve their organization skills.

If you bring in colorful balls and devise games that include passing the balls to each other, or putting all red colored balls together, such games would help children understand how mathematics actually works. When you say 'minus', make one of the children return a ball to you. When you say 'plus', give them a new ball. Games make concepts easy.

Encouraging emotional intelligence in children is one of the best things you can do! That is why you do not need to verbally tell a child you are upset because he/she stole cookies from the cookie jar - they already know when their mischief has upset you! However, stories told through cartoons can teach children the importance of sharing and helping.

These involve grouping activities such as sorting out all apples and oranges. Pattern recognition is an important aspect of learning, and this can be developed through such exercises. Another way would be to adopt a protocol wherein the children tidy the classroom before they leave, putting things back in their places and keeping them in neat order.

Encouraging and developing a social attitude is hence elementary of any school. The best way to do this is to encourage sharing - sharing food, playthings, toys, etc. Meals can be had by sitting at a common lunch table. There has to be at least one group activity everyday, which requires all the children in the class to come together and work as one.

✤ The furniture in the classroom such as tables, chairs, beds, books, shelves, should be of such dimensions as to suit the children in the classroom so that they learn independently how to sit on a chair, how to use a table, how to pull things off a shelf, etc. Inculcating freedom and independence is a fundamental of Montessori education.

✤ Do not have a set routine or schedule as to which activity is done at which time. Encourage the children to engage themselves in activities that appeal to them.
✤ Do not assist a child unless the child asks for it. Encourage them to do things on their own. Show them the way, and then let them understand, absorb and implement the technique on their own.

Montessori is not just a synonym for preschool. It is a teaching approach. It is not so difficult to make Montessori materials at home. The three important 'E's to remember are - Easy, Effective and Encouraging. Design your Montessori materials and you are sure to be loved as a Montessori teacher!