Homeschooling Preschooler The Montessori Way

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Our homeschooling journey is something that consumes my heart and mind these days. I guess because it is unknown territory that we are walking into. So far it has brought great fruit and I feel that our everyday life is bursting with colors like never before. My daughter’s “whys” have got a completely new dimension, and I love, love, love how excited she got from receiving a magnifying glass by mail the other day. I would like to share what happened when we emerged into our Montessori work 3 – hour session. You can read about our Homeschooling routine in this post. I hand-picked a list of Montessori materials for our classroom. Aside from this list we also use some natural toys and materials that carry educational purpose.

Practical Ways To Organise Effective Montessori Work Cycle | Homeschooling Preschool | Learning Activities | Montessori At home

Here is a list of general guidelines that I follow during the Montessori 3-hour cycle to help it run smoother keeping children engaged

  • Always follow the child’s lead and build future lessons upon it;
  • Give as much vocabulary, knowledge, and information as possible on the topic of conversation. I will explain this one. Once a child is focused on a topic and is in the moment when all his or her life is surrounded by that scorpion or whatever creepy thing it can be you know they are hooked. It means that they are keen to listen to you talk about it for as long as the interest lasts. This is a perfect opportunity to throw as many complex words and facts (of course still within their ability to grasp), as he or she will soak in like a sponge;
animals books montessori preschool
  • Print when possible. I replace wooden puzzles with printables I can laminate and work with instead. It took us one week to master Globe 1,2, and the Continents World Puzzle. I used to blow up a simple Globe to explain the same concept about Land and Water. We colored in and laminated our world map with continents. She is a happy Montessori camper who can recite all continents and point to each on any given world map, our puzzles fit on one shelf and we saved literally hundreds of dollars.
  • Homeschooling a child is very different from teaching a whole classroom for obvious reasons. Homeschooled children master Montessori materials at a much faster rate sometimes, since they have more opportunities for one-on-one demonstrations and activity choices can never be as broad as in a classroom.  
  • You can see my printables here and sign up to get access to free educational materials at the bottom of this post;
  • Follow the sequence of presentations and always take learning to the next level. Knowing the Montessori curriculum and scope and sequence is very crucial. At times, I jump to the next presentation too soon, but I do try to go back and revisit the material/ subject if I notice a gap;
learning about continents montessori preschool
Practical Ways To Organise Effective Montessori Work Cycle | Homeschooling Preschool | Learning Activities | Montessori At home
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Australia map activity Montessori preschool Practical Ways To Organise Effective Montessori Work Cycle | Homeschooling Preschool | Learning Activities | Montessori At home
  •  One lesson on numbers and letters every work session is something that I always aim to include;
counting beads Montessori activity preschooler Practical Ways To Organise Effective Montessori Work Cycle | Homeschooling Preschool | Learning Activities | Montessori At home

Use as many natural materials as possible. This is more or less activity with natural loose parts from Natural ReSourcer;  These materials are incredibly versatile and can be adapted to many different areas of learning.

more or less math with Montessori natural loose parts Practical Ways To Organise Effective Montessori Work Cycle | Homeschooling Preschool | Learning Activities | Montessori At home
  • Think outside the box. I aim to utilize our materials to make as much use of them as possible. For example, the metal insets get great to use every single day. We learned about parts of a butterfly with their help.
parts of a butterfly montessori preschool
drawing butterfly with the metal insets

It is handy for doing art and fine motor activities as well.

creating design with the metal insets montessori preschool
finger strength with the metal insets

We learn about different dimensions, comparisons, and patterns with the knobless cylinders and cylinder blocks.

cylinder blocks and knobless cylinders activity montessori preschool
making patterns with the knobless cylinders montessori preschool

“The child must see for himself what he can do, and it is important to give him not only the means of education but also to supply him with indicators which tell him his mistakes……The child’s interest in doing better, and his own constant checking and testing, are so important to him that his progress is assured. His very nature tends toward exactitude and the ways of obtaining it appeals to him.” M. Montessori

There are phrases that I repeat almost every time we take off to the next activity:

“We always finish our work”.
“We keep on trying until we work it out”.
“We always check”.
“We always concentrate during our work. We learn when we make mistakes and fix them. If we are not focusing we can’t notice mistakes. It means we can’t fix them. We can’t learn if we do not fix mistakes.”
Now, feel free to share your favorite part of your homeschool Montessori work cycle in the comments below.

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  About Anastasia. Anastasia is a former Early Childhood Teacher and the founder of Montessori Nature, a blog about Montessori - inspired and Nature-based explorations. She taught in a Montessori setting for 10 years and has been practicing the Montessori way of learning and living for the last 20 years. She loves designing engaging educational printables for children. Browse Anastasia's educational resources on Teachers Pay Teachers.


9 thoughts on “Homeschooling Preschooler The Montessori Way”

  1. This is one of the first blogs I have read that reveals why homeschool is not the same as a classroom and Montessori parents don’t need every piece of equipment a class world need and no your child won’t miss anything not being in a class, he will actually learn quicker!

  2. Thank you, Carol, for your comment! I agree with you! We made a few sacrifices along the way when we chose to homeschool and our homeschooling does have a budget. Nevertheless, not even one moment of it is dull. My goal is to aspire my children to find their passion in life and follow it wholeheartedly. This is when I will be prepared to invest as much as I can in lessons, equipment, etc.

  3. I am about to start homeschooling my 28. months old boy, and was very happy to find your blog. I am readning all I can find about Montessori and we are convinced that it is the right method for us, but I find it hard to know where to start. I guess I will learn as I go:-) I will read more in here, and sign up for some things, but since we are a Norwegian /Spanish family I can’t use all your materials. Anyway, thank you for such an organized blog :-)’

  4. Thank you for visiting, Lindy, and for your support! Congratulations on your decision to start doing Montessori with your child. Usually parents start with setting up practical life area first, making sure that child has opportunities to do things on their own whenever possible, like pouring water, putting on shoes, washing hands, helping with food preparation. Minimizing amount of toys, creating time appropriate learning activities that target fine motor. wooden puzzles are great tools as well many Montessori parents choose. You are very welcome to join our Multicultural Montessori community. I often offer my printables for translation there and group members are keen to help with that. All translations are avaliable for everyone in the group. Join us here

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