Developmental Montessori Inspired Work for Toddlers

“We then found that individual activity is the one factor that stimulates and produces development”

-Maria Montessori (The Absorbent Mind, p. 7)

 Usually, I introduce new jobs/ activities to my 2-year-old toddler one at a time, so she has enough time to get familiar with it and practice new skills. I also try to replace activities she has not touched for a while with the new ones. However, honestly speaking at this age she does not spend much time doing her shelf activities during the day. She is much more interested in following me around the house and participating in what we call Practical Life activities – basically doing chores. In my coming up post I will share the list of chores that she shows great interest in. I follow her interests the best I can to provide her with the necessary equipment and teach her skills to perform them. For now, I introduce you to our new activities from this week:

Sorting from the largest to the smallest. First, I lay cards out, show her how to match pictures correctly, and then encourage her to do it on her own.

Peg and card color matching activity helps to strengthen finger muscles, identify colors and learn to match them. I started with only two colors at first and gradually added two more.

Opening and shutting activity develops eye-hand coordination. Haven’t you notice how much young children LOVE to open and shut everything that can possibly be opened or shut?

Pouring activity. This was very helpful to practice pouring before doing it with water.

Fine motor hand control activity with a coin elephant box and 5 coins. We also practice counting coins when placing them inside, which works very well.

Practicing threading.

Picture/letter cards. When we work with these I tend to present only three cards at a time and use 3-part lesson to teach new words.