Favorite thing about the toddler community?

[bettyjones]

What is your or your child's favorite thing about the toddler community? Which materials? Snacks? Songs? Friends? Playground? Nature walks? Practical Life?

6-12 Montessori teacher going for toddler training to start toddler program at my school looking for inspiration. Also low budget- what materials are a must, what materials are handmade by parents?

[kittykat2481]

My son loves practical life, but I guess that's expected for this age. He loves washing dishes, sweeping, cooking, cleaning table tops, etc. I know at home he loves reading, puzzles, and is really getting into stuff like lacing beads and lacing cards. I will know more after his parent teacher conference the week after Thanksgiving. He also has this. He lines them up by color/shape, counts them, then replaces them. Lather, rinse, repeat.

[kittykat2481]

Oh yes, anything that he can scoop or transfer using tongs. He loves that too. They have beautiful stones that you transfer from one bowl to another, or to a container with little compartments. Very easy and inexpensive to make.

[Lillianna]

Hi BettyJones!
My favorite thing about the Toddler Community is that they all wear cotton unders and the Guides carefully record their routine to enable toilet learning.
I love that they participate in setting the tables and eat from real dishware.
I love that they are given important work to do.
Have you read Dr. Montanaro's book?

[crwilson]

My dd loves songs, or at least that's what she talks, and sings, about the most at home. She works on lots of the activities that have been mentioned - tongs, practical life, puzzles, and knob cylinders - but she spends a lot of time at home singing songs she learned at school and dancing.

[kittykat2481]

Originally Posted by Lillianna

Hi BettyJones!
My favorite thing about the Toddler Community is that they all wear cotton unders and the Guides carefully record their routine to enable toilet learning.
I love that they participate in setting the tables and eat from real dishware.
I love that they are given important work to do.
Have you read Dr. Montanaro's book?

I think it's so great that they all wear cotton underwear. They mostly all wear disposable pullups at DS's school, so it's been some work to get everyone on board when I started sending DS in underwear. And believe it or not, as long as we remember to send him potty every hour or two, he rarely has misses now, only 2 weeks later. (And this has been the case for at least a week).

OP, if you can manage it, it would be a great draw to me as a parent.

[SomedayMom]

My son also loves practical life stuff. Washing a baby, washing windows, etc. He LOVES making his own snacks. He loves sorting works and fine motor skills things...latching clothespins on the rim of a cup was his favorite thing for quite a while (and totally handmade!). He also loves art, he is always so excited to show me what he did. The other day he cut paper into strips and pulled out his bag full of paper strips with such a huge smile on his face. He also loves to be outside with the garden and sandbox.

I love how happy he is to go there and how proud he is of what he can do!

And the PLing thing would be a huge draw to me b/c my first PTd himself and I am new to this whole thing...

[askew]

My son is all about books. He likes when they read one in circle, and when he can go into the reading corner and look at books. He also loves the songs, and especially when they sing them in English and then Spanish.