I love Montessori Practical Life
The exercises of Practical Life are some of my absolute favorite early childhood activities. Montessori and Montessori based early childhood programs provide a wonderful foundation of learning. These same benefits can easily be incorporated into your own home and more traditional learning environments. I’m going to create a series of posts to introduce the basics of Practical Life and then continue into how to easily and inexpensively create Practical Life activities for children in your own home or early childhood program.
All of the information included is available in a comprehensive format in my book “Montessori Made Easy: Practical Life Lessons.” Links to the book are found on “Dr. Andrea’s Books” page.
An Introduction to Montessori Practical Life:
Montessori Practical Life activities are some of the most basic and yet some of the most beneficial and enjoyable activities for building skills in young children. Although Montessori programs often include expensive materials and set up requirements, there are many activities which can be created using simple, inexpensive, and easily accessible materials. Practical Life easily fits into these criteria. All of the ideas presented in the book were put together for less than $10.00 each. Many of the activities can be put together at little or no cost by utilizing items that you already have around your house or in your child care center. If the exact materials aren’t readily available, simply find something else that works. Look around for everyday materials that you can either purchase inexpensively and locally or that you can “borrow” from your own home. Sources for obtaining the materials presented for the activities are noted in Appendix B at the end of the book.
Montessori Practical Life skills are a wonderful addition to any program or home environment. Enrollment in a Montessori school does provide a wonderful education for children; however, for many children the reality is that such programs can be beyond their ability due to location, financial costs, and other such realities. Montessori Practical Life skills should be available for all children. The book provides the information, examples, and ideas to implement these valuable activities into the homes and preschool programs of all children.
Practical Life in its essence is simple. It is based on the fact that children love to do what they see the grownups in their life doing. Watch as they want to “help” you do activities such as cook, fold clothes, and sweep the floor. These elements provide the basis of Practical Life. Simple activities which mimic the everyday things people do.
These activities are much more than play for young children. They teach important cognitive knowledge, developmental skills, fine motor skills, and concentration. Practical Life exercises require children to concentrate as they work hard to do the activities well. It is wonderful to observe children as they develop such skills while enjoying the process.
When using the Montessori philosophy, the work materials can be called activities and the process is called “work.” This differs from more traditional programs which usually refer to children’s materials as toys and the process is called play. I owned a “Montessori-Based” child care center and it was very common for the children to correct teachers or parents who called the materials toys. They would quickly let the grownups know that those items were activities not toys. Being a blended program, we also had toys for play time which were considered and used differently from the “activities” used for our “work” or lesson time.
Montessori is a method of teaching and there are many different educational components to the method. This book focuses on one of my favorite parts of the Montessori Method – the wonderful Practical Life activities.
The wonderful benefits and activities of Practical Life can be useful in all early childhood environments. Home environments and child care centers can easily implement Montessori Practical Life lessons and activities into existing programs. These activities can be set up in a Montessori style with shelves dedicated to these Practical Life activities. This is a typical Montessori set up which allows children to choose from numerous Practical Life activities and it is a key component to the Montessori environment. Another option for parents or centers using more traditional curriculum is to use the Practical Life activities as centers and simply rotate the activities. This method doesn’t provide the Montessori environment along with numerous choices in activities. It does, however, provide all of the benefits of the individual Practical Life activities and is a good option for implementing the activities into a traditional setting.
In this book, and throughout this blog series, I will show you how simple materials can be put together to create wonderful activities for young children. These activities are not original, they are timeless and simple. Practical Life activities can be found throughout books, internet, and numerous other sources. This book puts together many activities which are divided into content areas and it compiles useful and creative Practical Life ideas into a form which is easy to use for parents and teachers working with small children. During busy days working with small children, it is easy to get in a rut and do the same activities over and over. It can be difficult to have the time to think about and research for more ideas to add to your Practical Life program. This book puts it all together so that you can simply look through the pages, gather a few basic materials, and easily add new activities to your Practical Life program. It is not comprehensive. It is intended to be an idea book that you can take and use to copy ideas as well as spark your imagination to create your own activities.
There are many ways to use the activities and extensions. Alternate ways of using activities are discussed in many areas. As you work with young children, you can easily recreate the activities in the book. In addition, you can use the ideas as a springboard for your own imagination. The options and ideas of Practical Life skills are unlimited! Join in the fun of creating your own Practical Life activities and watch the joy on the children’s faces as they concentrate, learn, and “work.”
All of the materials used in the book were either taken from my own home, purchased locally, or bought online through sources listed in the back of the book. The materials used were inexpensive and easily obtainable. The pictures were taken in my own home and without professional photography. This is “Montessori Made Easy” and it is a format that is obtainable for all teachers and parents. I hope this series provides many opportunities for teachers, parents, and young children to benefit from the wonderful applications of Montessori Practical Life by making it simple, easy, inexpensive, and obtainable.
The book is not intended to be a complete source of Practical Life materials. The ideas are not original but instead timeless. Similar information can be found in many different resources. The book provides all of the time consuming research, information on how to put materials together, and many examples which are organized into chapters based on the skills and concepts of the materials. The book seeks to provide parents and teachers with a resource that can be easily accessible and usable so that the implementation of Practical Life lessons is quick and easy to construct. In addition, the book provides a resource for examples of materials and where specialty materials for Practical Life can be easily located at affordable prices.
These materials may be used exactly as presented or duplicated, and changed to meet individual needs. In addition, this idea book is created to open your imagination and provide a springboard to even more Practical Life activities for the children in your care. Take the ideas, use materials that are easily obtainable and inexpensive, and enjoy the process of creating wonderful materials for children’s Practical Life lessons.
When utilizing Montessori materials in a home setting, select materials which are appropriate based on the developmental level of your own child. Be sure to supervise your child carefully as he works with those materials. When utilizing Montessori materials in a preschool or child care setting, be sure that you are complying with any regulations which are applicable to your school or child care center. Pay careful attention to age and developmental requirements of children. Provide only materials which are appropriate for the needs of the particular children in your care.
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