Approaching PL

I think my big problem with putting together PL is that I don't have a overarching plan and I always find myself digging around at the last minute for materials.

So I've been reading over some lists of PL activities online, consolidating and grouping them. I'm going to try to come up with a good progression and then gather up the necessary materials. I'll assemble little PL "kits" with the basics where I can then swap out pieces (for instance, put together two bowls and a spoon, but leave the material as something that I can change out depending on my mood, the season, or our theme).

Are there any favorites in your house that I should give a try with Nugget?

PL follow-up

Ok, I'm totally following you guys who choose fine motor refinement activities to put out. Makes sense to me. And I love the idea of a progression or other organization of activities.

But my manual (from NAMC) doesn't have that progression or categorization (I thought the PL one was pretty worthless). Can anyone point me in the direction of a list or resource for that?

Edited to add: Found one list....

ETA #2: And this one....

A question

I'm looking for advice from the other Montessori moms out there.

So, the Sensorial, Language, and Math parts of Montessori have a nicely planned out flow. I know what to start with and what to move to when Nugget demonstrates that she's ready.

For more thematic study, I have the curriculum from New Child that I'm kind of following.

But Practical Life.

...

Okay, confession time. I really don't like thinking of and assembling Practical Life activities. I kind of feel like I'd like to focus more on Sensorial and other "harder" areas than PL during the small amount of time we tend to be in the room. And it seems like there's opportunities during the day outside of the room to work on PL sort of things (dressing herself, pouring in the sandbox, spooning in the beans, cooking with me, etc).

So I'm pondering dropping PL activities from the room.

But I'm torn about it. She is of the age when you usually focus on PL. I'm slightly worried that without PL, she won't have as much to do (on the other hand, maybe it'll lead her to choose more of the Sensorial).

On the other hand, isn't the household environment the absolute best place to learn the skills of daily life?

So what do you do with Practical Life in your Montessori homeschool?

Deep in preparations

We're due to start up in 2 1/2 weeks! I'm spending most of my evenings working on various materials. I'm not really sure what materials are going to strike her this year, and I know they'll be used another year, so I've been doing more than is probably strictly necessary. But I'm starting to burn out, and I'm happy to start using the stuff and seeing how it's received soon.

I've been taking the time to find free images for some of the materials so that I can share them. I've put a link on the side to my box.net account that has a few things in it -- animal/skeleton matching, tablewear 3 part cards, and sorting types of houses (apartment, townhouse, house). I hope someone finds them useful!

You know you're a homeschooler when...,

You spend your evening making a life-sized felt cutout of your daughter complete with removeable felt organs.




This was a blast to make. I traced Nugget onto some butcher paper during the day -- difficult, with all the giggling it caused! Then I taped the paper up on the sliding glass door, taped felt over it, and traced my original. Cut out the felt and -- voilà -- a felt preschooler!

My nurse husband and his textbooks came in quite useful for the organs. They helped me get the right size and shape as I freehanded.

This is part of my preparations for the first week of our new start in September, which will have a My Body theme (not arms, legs, face; instead we'll do heart, lungs, digestion, etc). I've also made up organ 3 part cards, sometimes/anytime food sorting, and animal skeleton matching. I used free images from Wikimedia for the animal skeleton cards, so I'll figure out how to share those with you guys soon.