Montessori Constructive Triangles

Everyone has some sort of illness in this house so not much is being done. However, we managed a couple of activities! Lady P continued with Singapore maths. She’s finding it challenging but I know once she understands the basics, future maths will be easier!

She is currently practicing adding and subtracting using ones and tens. She can do it using her snap cubes but when it comes to writing it down, it can be confusing! But we shall persevere!

Cheeky girl tried the constructive triangles today and enjoyed using them.

I think she enjoyed the hands on maths! She also learned how to add using snap cubes! I was quite pleased for her.

Although we didn’t do much, they seemed to do well with the activities.

Autumn already?

The weather has been wet this summer! And now it’s autumn weather! The kids had a busy day today! They got more done then I expected as we are watching another Little person twice a week.

Yesterday was also a good day for learning! We have hit the ground running!

Because my eldest has ADHD, I’m attempting to create a better schedule. She needs to know what we are doing and how long we are doing it. This can be annoying for me but then I realised she NEEDS to know! It causes anxiety when she doesn’t know. I personally find it difficult creating a schedule we follow all the time because we are a home, not a school and I didn’t really want it to mimic school. I guess I’ll try somewhere in between!

DIY Counting Sticks

So, you want to teach your child the basics of counting from 1-10? My research led me to Montessori counting sticks. I made mine for about £7 in total. I bought the wood from B&Q for about £5 and I bought tester pots of paint ( you only need one of each colour) for £1 each.

I used a jigsaw to cut the wood. The smallest length is 10 cm, then 20 cm and so on, until you reach 100 cm. There should be 10 lengths in total.

Next, I used masking tape to mark off the exact lengths of each colour in 10 cm increments! I started painting with red as each stick starts with red!

This is what they should look like once the tape is pulled off. You can choose to keep them like this or paint the rest blue to keep with the Montessori colours.

I chose to paint them with blue as well, so when the red dried completely, I taped off what I wanted to paint and painted the sections blue. Now I need to find some sort of way of making them glossy. Any ideas? Here are the completed counting sticks!

My daughter is a little too young to use them right now (unless I want to rearrange my lamps or destroy any breakables), but I think in the near future, they will initially help her understand the concept of larger and smaller (she can put them in size order); that numbers have meaning (counting using her hand to go up each colour); addition and subtraction of numbers to 10, and understanding one more/less etc. These are a valuable, hands-on way of teaching the foundation of mathematics…Or, you and your loved ones could use them as light sabres! The choice is yours!