Sweeping

Sweeping object to the designated area. This is the classic montessori practical life activity. Yuta decided he wants to try with the real broom after a few times trying with the toddler size one. He let Ai to have her chance to work with the toddler size broom this time.

In the kitchen

Making onigiri

Roll sushi



cutting with butter knife

Yuta has been wanting to help in the kitchen alot now. He would offer to cut and clean vegetables and wash dishes. I showed him how to make onigiri (japanese rice ball) and basically now he can make them by himself but is not allowed to scoop rice direct from the rice jar. We make makisushi(roll sushi) and he thought that we fun and thats a good way to get him to eat more and have some fun.

I dont remember where i saw post of this activity. Ai likes it so much and she will do it again and again. I first show her how to put each pom pom in the pallet well, she didnt seem interested at all but were shouting ball, ball and tossed those pom pom around. Then gave her a spoon to scoop and she is liking it. I have been doing quite abit with Ai but didnt take any picture of her working because everytime i take picture she will stop working and want to grab and play around with the camera.

Spooning and Squeezing

At about 15th month Ai is able to feed herself quite well, so i thought i will try her with some spooning work. She did well with a few bean spilt. She would be able to do this for about 2minute which i think is good for her age.

She wants to whatever Yuta does. She wants so badly to work with the pitcher where she sees her big brother pouring water she think is fun. I found this sponge ball and it was just perfect. She squeese the sponge soaked up with water in the bucket, sometimes attempt to pour from the bucket to the blue basin. it was a bit messy but all worth it with the concentration she had.

Starting out slow

Today is our official first classroom day. Im trying to start things slow, means starting with something Yuta is familiar with is good. We started our line time with the "days of theweek"song, but he surprised me with the spanish version which i cant sing along. So,that was my lesson of the day. We started out with pouring water, " the water work" he calls it. He is very familiar with this and has quite a good control in doing this work, so i make some addition to this work. Pouring into an ice cube tray,and using a dropper to suck it back from ice tray to pitcher.

He keep on asking me about "changing colour" work,which we did long time ago. In extension to the water pouring, i gave him some different colours,to mix around and show him what colour changes into what colour and get him to record down the result.

Drawing out the observation.

The result

Later in the day we did more practical life, scrubbing table.

Perhaps he has done this in school but this is the first time i seen him doing. He is expect to put away all his dishes in the sink after meal(still need reminder), with some luck he will volunteer to clean up the table spill on the floor after meal. I think by montessori standard, he should be able to do this without any reminder but im just taking it slowly.

Squeezing out water from a sponge practise.

Squeezing out water from wash cloth practise

Later he took out his japanese writting booklet for first time. Im surprised that he could actually write quite well with the japanese character eventhough that was his first time drawing japanese character compare to the alphabet. I guess is probably Japanese character is made up of few strokes where by alphabet always have only 1 or 2 only continuous line that needs better control and motor skill.Anyway grandma will be very happy to see this picture.

Wrapping up the day. He still wants to do more but it was just too much for me for today.