This week we are looking at the letter R, actually we a listening to the ‘r’ sound that this letter can make. Slight difference there but I focus on the phoneme - the sound - rather then the letter name. I have set up next the TV a small toast rack that I bought in an second hand shop. It holds the sandpaper letter R, that I bought from Wood Puzzles here in Queensland. It also displays ‘My “r” Book’ by Jane Belk Moncure and ‘Sleepy Cheetah’ by Mwnye Hadithj. First we practised writing the letter by tracing over the sandpaper as we made the R sound. I then read ‘My “r” book’ aloud, really pointing out and emphasising that R sound. These books a super cute and Atlas really enjoys them, I have the vintage set which I bought off eBay. We then read ‘Sleepy Cheetah’ which has many R sounds. The illustrations are beautiful and soft, and I love the similes used through out the story. I pointing out the lower case letter R every now and then as well.
We will read ‘Sleepy Cheetah’ through out the week and work on related and fun activities... I just haven’t planned out what they are yet 😂
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I bought this material on sale at the end of last year as on of A’s Christmas presents and then hid it away, and forgot about it. I found it late January and got it out for A to play with. He really enjoyed it, sorting the bolts and figuring out which way to turn the nuts. To be honest, if I lived near to a hardware store I could have made this one myself but I don’t so... I really want to get the activity with the screw driver!
I think purchased this from A to Z Montessori from here. Such an easy activity to prepare! Fill a jug (I added food colouring). Put out cups. Add a sponge. Let the magic happen. Concentrating on trying to pour even levels. Opps! Time to clean up. Oh dear! Most of the water didn’t make it back into the jug. That’s better! Pour the water back into the jug... then clean up that mess 😂
Grandma’s garden has lots of flowers in it, so we’ve been enjoying picking and arranging flowers. Pouring water into the little vase. We are using Grandma’s good crystal 😱 In goes a jacaranda blossom, he does like the blue and purple flowers. I don’t often include face shots of A but look at the joy! Gently arranging the rest of the flowers. Here’s one we prepared earlier.
I am so glad I packed the Hape wooden numbers for our holiday. I just knew that A’s interest in numbers would keep growing. I was at a discount store and spotting packets of cats. They came in a pack of 6 so I grabbed three knowing I would have enough for A to use them as counters up to 5. I introduced the toy cats to A just after we were playing with our real cats. ‘I love these! These are my favourite animals!’ I started with the number 1 and then we worked out way down the mat; going back to check if A had enough cats for each number. After this I also added the zero and showed him how there were no cats beside zero because it means ‘none’ or ‘nothing’. Such a hard concept to understand!
I think I’ll go back and get some more packets of cats so he can keep counting up to 10. We have travelled back to my home town for Christmas and bought along with us some new Montessori works. This puzzle was actually a Christmas present. We love puzzles 🧩 from the pincer grip to the fine motor co-ordination and the visual perception needed. The feeling of success when you get the puzzle piece to fit. I’ve got my eye on some more puzzles because I can never resist!
A has been disappointed lately that he can’t read, so I’ve been slowly introducing the sandpaper letters, well the concept of them. A week or so ago I demonstrated how to use them. On the weekend when we were playing, A identified that Transformers started with the ‘t’ sound. So I pulled out the t sandpaper letter. I didn’t take any photos when we were working with just the t though! Sorry as per usual I’m not prepared! So after presenting the t, and having A trace the letter and say the sound A identified that he had a t in his name. I took out ‘s’ and ‘a’ because they are also in his name. We went through each letter, A loved guiding my finger over the sandpaper too! He took over, and as he traced I repeatedly made the ‘s’ sound which he started to copy. To finish this session off I asked him to identify which letter can make the ‘s’ sound etc. He’s getting pretty good at this but far from perfect!
I got my sandpaper letters from Wood Puzzles. They are made to order, using Queensland cursive, but you can choose other fonts. They are also made here in Queensland. I highly recommend them and will be buying more from there. The method I used for this is based upon the three-period lesson which is used a lot on Montessori. You can read more about it here and here. I remembered that I had kept some wooden Christmas craft buttons and shapes, so I got them out to see if I could use them as counters. There was enough to create counters from 1 to 5, and A was interested in counting them with me. I got the Montessori numbers and counters puzzle down off the shelf so that we could also put numbers to our counters. Basically I showed A a number and said, ‘This is the number 2, can you find the collection that has 2 in it?’ I then put the Christmas counters to the side and pulled the counters part of the puzzle out of the box. I repeated the activity, pointing out the number and asking him to find the puzzle that had that many dots. A then grabbed some cars and started using the completed puzzles as car parks or truck pads. 😅 You just got to ‘roll’ with it. I really wish I owned the sandpaper numbers. I want to DIY some basic number tiles instead of buying them but I haven’t gotten around to it yet.
I do like this puzzle. I could have DIYed them easily, but I like the tactile warmth of the wooden puzzle that a laminated piece of paper doesn’t have. I have removed the parts for 6 through to 10 to make it easier for A. When he can count the dots half of the puzzle, and it actually matches up to the number half it’s pretty satisfying. A was proud of his efforts during this activity. Our shelves needed some rotations! We’ve swapped out the scales and weights for a number puzzle and a stacking game! A really enjoyed the puzzle - an improvement from last time I had it out. I asked A to pick up a number and I told him the name of that numeral. Once he knew what the numeral was, he could then count the animals on the jigsaw before putting the number in place. I think this is also helping with estimating how many items are in a group which has a name but I can’t remember it. The other shelf we swapped over is the miniature tray. We put out the Safari Toob Nativity set. I printed out a picture from this link which was from this YouTube video. We watched the video and A had to find the figurine as it was displayed. We can match up the figurines with the image for a later activity.
I have had this work on the shelf for some time and it’s been pretty much ignored so I thought that as A is getting into counting I would demonstrate this and let him have a go. This work consists of a tray of mixed shells and a piece of wood that I have drawn lines on to create a ten frame board. We did a bit of comparison between shells and then decided to use the cone shaped shells. I showed him how to place the shells within the frames, then away he went, picking out shells and putting them on the board. He wanted a variety of sizes. He especially likes tiny ‘cute’ things at the moment so the baby shell had to be included. He talked about the smallest, biggest and ‘mediumest’ shells.
And then of course we practised counting the shells. A still has trouble with one-to-one correspondence, he will sometimes count the same object twice. |
AuthorHi, I'm Pamela. A nail crazy lady with green hair. I live in outback Queensland with my toddler and my husband. I love books, writing and crafting. For more info about me go to my 'About' page. Archives
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