Our Multiplication Board

When I saw the homemade multiplication board on Montessori Print Shop's blog, it reminded me that I never posted about our multiplication board!  (so many things to share...so little time and motivation!)

Here it is...


To make our multiplication board, I took a picture of O(5)'s multiplication board at school.  I printed it and laminated it.  I taped it to a cork board and added 100 push pins (I could only find plain wooden push pins, so I colored the tops with a red sharpie).  I velcroed plastic number squares to the side, and we were done.

O requested that I make this multiplication, but she hasn't used it much since I made it.  She'll probably use it more next year during homeschool...there's just so little time for things like this when she's spending her mornings at school and her afternoons playing.   (I really like the board on Montessori Print Shop's blog better than ours, and I'm tempted to make another one...we'll see).

Another Valentine's Size Sequencing Activity

Here's another simple Valentine's activity!  I bought a set of heart measuring cups (for a dollar from Dollar General) and put them in a basket on E(2)'s Montessori shelf.  Done!



E puts them in order from smallest to largest.  We talk about the different sizes, and we pretend that the measuring cups are the different members of our family.  One day she was insisting that the biggest one was O(5)!  Silly girl :)

Sorting Hearts By Size

E(2) has had fun sorting the "mama" and "baby" heart stickers.  What a simple and fun activity for my little love!

A Moveable Alphabet of Hearts

Here's a Valentine's Day twist on the moveable alphabet!  Fun and simple...that's what we like!

A Valentine's Pouring Work

E(2) has enjoyed pouring the candy hearts.  However, she kept sneaking them into her mouth, so I put them out of reach.  Now, she just does that work with supervision :)

Valentine's 1-to-1 Correspondence Work

Both girls have enjoyed this simple work.  They put one pom pom in each heart.  I'd like to add a pair of tongs to this work, but they are all missing.  *sigh*  One day my house will be organized.

A Valentine's Math Work

Both girls were VERY excited by this work despite the fact that it's much too difficult for E(2) and very easy for O(5).  They love it because it involves candy!

O lined up numbered sparkly (or "farkly" as E calls them) hearts in order from 1 to 10.  She then put the appropriate number of candy message hearts under each number.














They got to eat a couple of pieces of candy after O finished the work.  Then, I had to put it out of reach of E because she kept sneaking pieces of candy!

Valentine's Day "Work"

I LOVE setting up Valentine's Day "work" for our girls' Montessori shelves.  They have been excited by all of the new additions!  Here's one simple work that E(2) has enjoyed...



She puts the toothpicks in the shaker.  She got a little frustrated that they leaned to the side, but she handled it well.




O(5) also enjoyed completing this work.  She calls this type of work a "relaxing work."




The Valentine's toothpicks are cupcake decorations that came with a pack of cupcake liners from Dollar General.

The Pink Tower

I finally bought a pink tower.  I've been thinking about it for years, but decided not to buy one since O(5) has one at school.  Then, since E(2) won't be going to Montessori Preschool until she is 4, I decided to go ahead and get one for her.  I'm so glad that I did, and I wish I'd bought it sooner (maybe 4 and a half years ago!).

I bought our pink tower from Amazon, and it came with an instruction booklet which lays out how to give the pink tower lesson.  That was helpful, so I gave the lesson to E(2).  She really just wanted to play pretend with the pink tower, so I related the different sized blocks to the different members of the Ingalls family...the biggest was Pa, then Ma, then Mary, then Laura, and so on.  This made all the difference, and she loved it!  I know that probably wasn't very "Montessori" of me, but it's what she loves, and it worked for us!








After building the pink tower vertically and horizontally, I let her just play and explore with the blocks.  She grabbed the instruction book and said "Let me see the designs!  I want to make designs!"  Unfortunately, there aren't any designs in the book, but she still loved looking at it.  I'm going to make some design cards for her soon.

Our Peace Basket

The girls (especially O) love our peace basket.  It sits on the floor behind a chair (O chose the location), and they enjoy going back there for some peaceful moments.

When I put together the peace basket, my goal was to include items that would reach a variety of their senses.  So, we have a whelk shell for the girls to hold up to their ears to hear the ocean (they have to be very still and quiet to hear the sounds of the "waves"), a finger labyrinth to trace, a cinnamon stick to smell, a book to read (When I Make Silence by Jennifer Howard), and our Starry Night Bottle to shake and then watch the "stars" settle to the bottom.



I decided to remake our Starry Night Jar after E(2) was shaking it and slammed it into her face (she was ok).  I decided that a plastic bottle may hit with a little less force when shaking than a glass jar!  Also, I LOVE the round Christmas Coke bottles.  (I also love Coke...it's an addiction that I'm trying to break...I haven't had one in more than a week!) So, before Christmas, I bought many round Coke bottles to use for various Discovery bottles.  The round bottle works perfectly for our Starry Night bottle.  I just poured the contents from the jar into the bottle and added extra water to fill it up.

I know that most people glue the tops of their discovery bottles so that the kids don't open them with disastrous consequences, but I've never done this.  So far (going on 4 years), the girls have never opened a bottle.  I like to have the option of pouring out the contents and using the bottles for something else, which is why I don't glue them.

Matching Objects/Actions to Sentence Strips

This activity is copied from a work at O(5)'s school. I wrote sentences on sentence strips and paired the strips in a basket with objects that match the sentence. O LOVES this work!


She didn't like the sentence "An apple is in a basket." She told me "Mama, you really should have written "the" instead of "an."


After O finished the work, E(2) said "my turn!" I pointed to each word and read it, and then E repeated it after me and did the actions with the objects. She loves to do EVERYTHING her big sister does!

Marble Transferring Activity

I introduced this transferring activity to E(2) last week, and she was immediately successful when picking up the marbles with the spoon and then dropping them into the bottle. (I was very surprised that it was so easy for her). However, when I started videoing the activity, she had a VERY hard time picking up a marble with the spoon. It was almost painful to watch, and I wanted to jump in and do it for her. I had to bite my tongue, and I was just waiting for her to ask for help, so that I could jump in and help her...Here's the video.


After she spent so much time chasing the marbles around the bowl with the spoon, I realized that I needed to put something in the bowl to hold the marbles. I put a small square of tissue in the bowl, and it worked perfectly.

This is a great activity for developing persistence when presented with a difficult task (obviously!). She's also developing hand/eye coordination, fine motor control, concentration, the ability to transfer from left to right (which will eventually help with reading), and the ability to cross her midline. So many things are going on during this very simple task.


The idea for this activity came from this blog via Pinterest.