Montessori Activity: Fun with Teaching Pattern Recognition through Fanta-Colour Peg Board/模式识别

Age: From 4 years

Activity Duration: 10-15 minutes

Objective(s):
1. To get the child ready for Maths.
2. To teach logic and number pattern recognition.
3. To train the child’s fine motor skills.

Materials:
1. Fanta-colour peg board
2. 1 tray

Directions:
1. Make a pattern using the fanta-colour peg.

2. Encourage your child to peg a square by following the pattern you have just set.

Alternative:
Or you can vary the game as follows:
1. Peg a rectangle with a embedded pattern.

2. Take away some of the pegs and ask your child to peg the missing pegs, following the pattern.

Additional Information:
Recognizing patterns is part of the pre-school kindergarten curriculum in Singapore, and I saw such a problem sum from the Singapore pre-Maths book. I am getting some inspiration to turn it into a fun and educational Montessori activity, by getting my inspiration from browsing the Singapore Maths books. This activity is too advance for Joshua, but I am just recording it down, before I forget it.

You can buy fanta-colour peg board from Amazon:

Montessori Activity: Balancing Weights

Age: From 3 years old

Activity Duration: 5 minutes

Objective(s):
1. To teach the concept of heavy and light in a fun way
2. To teach the law of gravity in a concrete way

Materials:1. 1 see-saw balance scale
2. 1 bowl filled with fanta colour pegs or dry beans

Directions:
1. Add a few of the pegs or beans in the left container one at a time until the container begin to sink.

2. Tell your child that weight of the pegs will lower the container down and lift the empty container up.

3. Add a few pegs or beans to the other container one at a time, until the containers balance each other.

4. Tell your child that equal weight will balance the see-saw scale.

5. Encourage your child to try and experiment.

Additional Information:
I tried this with Joshua, but made the mistakes of making it complicated with styrofoam, marbles and pegs, and Joshua lost interest. He could not see the purpose of this game. I then make this simplified version with only pegs, but I still don't think he Joshua is developmentally ready for this. I think I will try again when he is 3 years old.

References:
http://nurturingthetenderyears.blogspot.com/2011/05/homemade-balance-for-learning-about.html

Montessori Activity: Storage Containers with Screw-On Lids

Age: From 2.5 years old

Materials:

1. 5-6 containers with lids nesting on top of each other containing a fantacolour peg each.
2. 1 set of tweezers (optional, the child can also just use his hands)

Directions:

1. Open the lids by unscrewing and take out the pegs or use a pair of tweezers to take it out.

2. Put everything back and ask your child to repeat.

Additional Information:

J tried this on 2.7.2011 (2Y3M27D) and it was quite a hit. It was quite challenging for him and yet not too impossible. One never knows which activities would be a hit and which would not. Initially, I thought that this activity would not interest him, but it turned out otherwise. I hope to repeat it soon this evening, so that J have a chance to perfect the screwing and picking with tweezers skills.

I kept making the mistake of interrupting his work. I should try to take a step back and allow him to struggle. That is one of my major weaknesses.

Montessori Activity: Screwing & Unscrewing Jars with Lid

Age: From 2 years old

Activity Duration: 5-10 minutes

Preparation Time: 5 minutes

Objective(s):

1. To sharpen the child’s sensitivity to sound.
2. To teach the concept of empty and full by shaking the jars respectively through sound.
3. To train fine motor skill by screwing and unscrewing the lids.

Materials:

1. 2 jam or baby food jars with lids, one filled with some dried pasta, beans or plastic pegs
2. 1 tray

Directions:

1. Unscrew the lids and screw it back.

2. Shake the jar with things, bring your hand to your ears and ask your child to listen.

3. Shake the empty jar, bring your hand to your ear and ask your child to listen.

4. Tell him the full jar makes a sound, and the empty jar does not make any sound.

5. Encourage your child to try by shaking both containers and listening to them.

6. Allow your child to play with it himself, unscrewing the lids, pouring the content into the other jar, screwing it and shaking it.

Additional Information:

I still give J iron and vitamin D drops in the morning sometimes (but sometimes vitamin pills). Yesterday, J (2Y3M3D) wanted to unscrew the cap of the bottles himself. He did it all on his own, unscrewed the bottle, dripped the drops into his spoonful of oatmeal (I was holding the spoon), and screwed back the caps tightly. So I realized that he could now screw and unscrew lids.

Taking the cue, I quickly went to set up this game for him to let him practice more screwing and unscrewing lids. He could screw it back, but was not so good in unscrewing it. I think the size of the jars posed a little challenge, compared to the bottles. but it was good practice still.

Montessori Activity: Inserting Fanta Color Pegs

Age: From 2 years 3 months

Activity Duration: 5-15 minutes

Preparation Time: 3 minutes

Objective(s):

1. To train the child’s fine motor skills.
2. To train the child's hand-to-eye coordination.

Materials:

Fantacolour plastic pegs and pegboard

Directions:

1. Show your child how to create beautiful mosaics by inserting the pegs into the pegboard.

2. Encourage your child to try.

3. Show your child how to undo by turning the pegboard over and pushing the pegs directly into the case.

4. Encourage your child to try.

Total Cost: 10 DKK (2.40 SGD) from the Flea market

Additional Information:

J tried this yesterday (2Y2M25D) and today. He enjoyed it very much. I actually wanted to wait until the weekend to introduce this toy, but he discovered this new toy on the shelf yesterday morning and pointed at it. As seen in the picture, J loves orange colour and he picked all the orange pegs for this activity.