I want to share how much we love these activity cards on 2D shapes that I made last year so Vito and I can practice identifying the shapes of objects that he gets to see almost everyday. As I mentioned in my Instagram post, before working on these cards, we first looked around the house for objects with shapes of square, triangle, oval, rectangle, and circle. Then at times, we also play I spy games on shapes and objects, and other times it’s more of “give me something that has a shape of … “. We had fun doing this!
Identifying Common Flowers for Preschoolers
Tuesday, February 27, 2018
Is it spring in your part of the world? Well, it’s far from spring here but we are already starting to see spring flowers sprouting and blooming everywhere. During our daily walks, Vito loves spotting these flowers and is identifying them. It comes in handy that I have already prepared some learning materials to go along with this new discoveries. Just like last year, we used these flower cards to name the spring flowers that we see in the park and in our estate.
A Walkthrough of Animal Study for Preschoolers
Monday, February 26, 2018
This coming spring, I will be introducing the zoology album of Montessori early childhood to Vito. We did a couple of animal study last year but it was mainly for introduction and familiarization. This year, our homeschool activities will be in line with the album I bought from Montessori Parent. Of course, I will not follow the album word by word as I try not to replicate the Montessori classroom in our home and I don’t possess other classroom materials. But it will still be spontaneous and hands-on. In this post I will talk about the album, the materials I prepared, and my plans on how we are going to approach the “hands-on” aspect of the study.
Hands-on Learning on the Human Body for Preschoolers
Sunday, February 18, 2018
Vito is getting more interested in how his body works, especially that a few months ago, he got sick and I have to discuss some important things to him about his health and body. With this, I started reading to him some of our body books, explaining what happens to the food that he eats, to the water that he drinks, and why he has blood when he has a cut.
Jigsaw Seasons Puzzle
Tuesday, February 13, 2018
We love this wooden seasons puzzle (Alphabet Jigsaw Wooden Seasons Puzzle) from the company Alphabet Jigsaw (Ireland). The boys and I love this puzzle! Thought it’s still quite challenging for Vito to assemble, we love working on it together. Below are some of the features why we love this puzzle to bits!
Montessori Inspired Space Themed Learning Activities
Saturday, February 10, 2018
We are moving to new things this week as Vito’s interest is starting to be directed more about his body and senses. For the past few weeks, we’ve been doing work about the moon, the planets, and space. Here’s a roundup of our activities in learning about the solar system and space in general (in no particular order).
Hands-on Learning of Constellations for Preschoolers
Thursday, February 8, 2018
Vito and I were exploring constellations earlier this week as we were reading about the Big Dipper. He was fascinated that I extended our activity into pin poking to recreate the formation of the stars (constellations).
Phases of the Moon Learning Pack
Monday, February 5, 2018
The changing of the moon’s shape has fascinated Vito. Early this year, we’ve been seeing the moon as early as 1 pm in the afternoon, so he gets to identify and describe its shape. He would call the shapes “small moon”, “half moon”, and “circle moon”. With the knowledge that the moon changes its appearance, I read a few books to Vito to explain why this is happening.
Now, this post contains some of the activities we did to learn about the moon phases. These are hands-on activities, and we used most of our printed materials from my shop. Continue reading the post to learn more about it.
Now, this post contains some of the activities we did to learn about the moon phases. These are hands-on activities, and we used most of our printed materials from my shop. Continue reading the post to learn more about it.
Montessori Addition and Subtraction of Fractions
Friday, February 2, 2018
Sharing some updates with regard to my elementary boy. Though it may seem that I’m posting a lot about preschool activities, in the background my 9 years old is doing a lot of work too in math, geography/history, and science. Now, one of the things he worked on last year was his fractions. After working fractions and fraction equivalence, Mavi worked on addition and subtraction of fractions. He did very well on this. With one simple presentation, he grasped the concept right away, and after which he did a lot of practise using our fraction cut-outs. Somehow, I find this straightforward, meaning if your child knows about their basic addition and subtraction they can breezily work on this and move on to multiplication of fractions or working with unlike fractions.
Types of Clouds for Preschoolers
Sunday, January 28, 2018
I mentioned in my Instagram account that Vito is very much interested about the weather lately, and to be specific, he loves learning about clouds. It all started when we were reading National Geographic Kids Weather book every night. From here, he started to identify the clouds whenever we are outdoors, whether its a rainy, fluffy, or clear clouds (his own vocabulary). So while he is still enthusiastic about it, I decided to throw a simple and not so original cloud activity. Again, I worked on this activity with Mavi when he was 3 years old, and I am happy to do it again with Vito.
Preschool Activities for the Chinese New Year
Thursday, January 25, 2018
Contains affiliate links
In celebration of the Chinese New Year, we are having a few activities at home to learn about this big celebration of the Chinese community. Having this cultural activities is an opportunity to explore with your child about foreign countries and different culture and traditions. And because we (Filipinos) are greatly influenced by the Chinese culture, from beliefs, to food, to traditional practices we are joining and celebrating the New Year with our Chinese friends!
I came up with simple activities, again mostly reused ideas from Mavi’s time (Study of Ancient China) and some of these were from Pinterest too. The activities aim to introduce China to Vito as well as the celebrations and traditions of the Chinese community. I also included links to my resources so you can easily replicate these! Enjoy!
In celebration of the Chinese New Year, we are having a few activities at home to learn about this big celebration of the Chinese community. Having this cultural activities is an opportunity to explore with your child about foreign countries and different culture and traditions. And because we (Filipinos) are greatly influenced by the Chinese culture, from beliefs, to food, to traditional practices we are joining and celebrating the New Year with our Chinese friends!
I came up with simple activities, again mostly reused ideas from Mavi’s time (Study of Ancient China) and some of these were from Pinterest too. The activities aim to introduce China to Vito as well as the celebrations and traditions of the Chinese community. I also included links to my resources so you can easily replicate these! Enjoy!
How Polar Animals Keep Warm Experiment
Tuesday, January 23, 2018
We’ve been learning about polar animals for the past week, and Mavi and Vito have the same question that kept popping up during the course of our learning: why are these animals like the polar bears and penguin don’t get cold in the ice? Well, to answer the question we did a simple experiment on what makes these animals warm in the polar regions.
Favourite Books about the Arctic and Antarctic Regions
Monday, January 15, 2018
Arctic Diorama
Saturday, January 13, 2018
Polar Activities for Preschoolers
Sunday, January 7, 2018
Here are our 9 activity trays this winter season, where in some days, Vito can finish 3 activities in a day while in some, almost none. These ideas are good for about 2-3 weeks of learning. Vito would also work on some non-polar activities in between, mostly practising reading with pink series, playing with our Grimm’s blocks, Legos, and just about anything he wants to do. There are also spontaneous activities that come in between, mostly a product of discussion and as book extensions. I mostly share these in my Instagram account, but if it’s post-worthy, you’ll be able to read it in the blog as well.
Penguin Themed Matching Clocks to Time
Friday, January 5, 2018
One of the things I love to do is putting some twist on our activities to keep them more engaging and fun for Vito. Last month, he began reading the time, with Mavi modelling the reading. Every morning he would wake me up and say “Mom, it’s 8 o’clock” and when I checked it is indeed 8 in the morning! He finally figured out how to read the clock with the small hand pointing to a number and the longer hand on the 12. So I grabbed the opportunity to practise clock reading with this penguin clock and time matching printable. I used this activity with Mavi 5 years ago and now Vito is loving it as well!
Animals of Antarctica Printable with Safari Toob Antarctica Set
Tuesday, January 2, 2018
Have you seen Safari Toob Antarctic toob yet? To me, it’s one of the best toob they ever had! I mean, aside from penguins, can you name other animals that live in Antarctica? Quite difficult right? That’s why we are so happy that Safari Ltd finally came up with these figures so we can introduce our kids to other animals thriving in Antarctica other than penguins! So if you have kids or students who love animals and learning about places, Safari Antarctica Toob is one good learning toy you can invest in.
Reader’s Choice Top 10 Posts of 2017
Sunday, December 31, 2017
Happy New Year everyone! I Can’t believe that we’re celebrating New Year once again. It’s not so long ago when I was just starting to present some of our January activities, and here I am again, packing up remnants of our Christmas holiday decors and turning our sitting room into a homeschool room again.
First of all, I wanted to thank you all for reading and spending time in our blog. Thank you all for the kind words, for leaving messages that you have been inspired and that you enjoy our activities, I truly appreciate that. I wish for this coming year to come up with more great ideas so you and your kids can learn together, connect through fun activities and most of all help them in their learning needs. Speaking of which, I also plan to do more of elementary posts. I still do “afterschool” activities with Mavi about arts and crafts or extension lessons on subjects that he wanted to explore more.
Anyway, to start the year, I want to share the TOP 10 reader’s favourites of 2017 (not in order). Enjoy!
Winter Printables: Ten Frames Counting Activities
Monday, December 18, 2017
I am so happy to share Vito’s favourite counting activities and materials, our Ten Frames Winter printables!!! This printable was created out of pinetree counting sheets which I created last autumn. It was so popular that I wanted to recreate it and at the same time, include ten frames seen in our dinosaur post which was Vito’s favourite too. So combining these together, plus a tracing activity of numbers has led me to produce these products!
Learning The Square of a Number Using Montessori Short Bead Chain with Square
Monday, December 11, 2017
We find ourselves working on the Short Bead Chain once again as Mavi reviews his multiplication table. If you skim through my posts, you will find that we’ve been doing this since Mavi was 5 years old. Now that he’s older (and wiser!) he finds a deeper meaning in learning the square of a number.
Yes folks, in mathematical terms, the short bead chain materials (and the squares) are used to present the precise squares of a number (2 squared, 4 squared). Using manipulatives, children can easily grasp the concept and eventually memorize the squares.
Yes folks, in mathematical terms, the short bead chain materials (and the squares) are used to present the precise squares of a number (2 squared, 4 squared). Using manipulatives, children can easily grasp the concept and eventually memorize the squares.
The Nativity and Story Cards
Saturday, December 9, 2017
It brings me joy to recount the story of the nativity to our children. We have made it a yearly tradition to read various books of different versions, and sometimes we even watch nativity movies to fully grasp the meaning of Christmas. Now that Vito is old enough to comprehend, I incorporated story cards and activity sheets to accompany our book reading this year.
FREE 12 Days of Christmas Counting Cards
Tuesday, December 5, 2017
We love the 12 Days of Christmas song! The kids love it so much that we kept on singing it over and over again and always speeding up as we approach the 12th day. So as part of the kids’ interest, I decided to create these counting cards to go along with the song. Vito enjoys setting up the counting cards as we sing each of the day. To share our love for the song, we are sharing the counting cards to you so you can do this activity at home with your kids too! Enjoy!
Hands-on Activity on Comparing Numbers
Monday, December 4, 2017
We are moving on with our math by introducing new math concepts, one of which is the more or less activity and using the greater than or less than symbol. To do this, I made use of the holiday season’s symbols so Vito can easily relate and used manipulatives like some Christmas erasers and Montessori beads.
Christmas Themed Tray Activities for Preschoolers
Friday, December 1, 2017
Happy first day of December!!! I’ve been away for awhile, busy with life and other extra curricular things… because you know, “it’s that time of the year”. Anyway, despite of all the happenings, I was able to assemble these simple Christmas-themed activities for my 4 years old. My aim here is to simply introduce the meaning of Christmas, the symbols, learning Christmas songs and a little bit of arts and crafts. Hope you like these activities!
Montessori Friendly Gift Ideas for 3 Years and Older (2017)
Monday, November 20, 2017
I would like to make this post brief and to the point. We don’t have a lot of toys at home, so I only have a short list. I called this list “Montessori friendly” because these are toys that my kids would actually play on a regular basis. To get the best of toys for your kids, it is better that you are aware of what they really really like and what makes them happy.
So to give you ideas on what my kids love to play at home scroll down below to check them out.
So to give you ideas on what my kids love to play at home scroll down below to check them out.
Montessori Inspired Continent 3 Part Cards and Booklet
Wednesday, November 15, 2017
Vito is 4 years and Mavi is 9 years old.
One thing that I love with making our own learning materials is that I get to customize them according to the kids’ liking. One of these materials is the continent learning printables I made last year which we often use. At first, Vito would match it according to colors, now that he’s older, he’s trying to know the names of the continents, especially the ones where he’s been to.
One thing that I love with making our own learning materials is that I get to customize them according to the kids’ liking. One of these materials is the continent learning printables I made last year which we often use. At first, Vito would match it according to colors, now that he’s older, he’s trying to know the names of the continents, especially the ones where he’s been to.
Montessori Friendly Gift Ideas for Tweens and Teens (2017)
Tuesday, November 14, 2017
This post contains affiliate links.
These gift ideas are intended for families with older children, ages 9 to 16 years old. I made this list based on my son’s and niece’s current interests and hobbies. These are suitable for kids who are hobbyists, artists, musically inclined, readers and explorers. Mavi owns some of these already (some are hand-me-down), and others are still on the “wishlist”.
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