Our prepared home environment is currently in transition as my oldest is now of Elementary age. For with the changes in the child’s mind from the Absorbent Mind of the first plane (0-6yo) to the Reasoning Mind of the second plane (6-12yo), the environment has to evolve to meet their new developmental needs and their heightened intellectual curiosity. Maria Montessori described the second plane as the greatest intellectual period, and we have an opportunity at home to stretch their minds at a time when they are hungry for vast amounts of knowledge. We can not only reinforce what they learn at Montessori or mainstream elementary, but go beyond that. No longer will simple matching cards and little trays hold the interest of a highly intelligent, endlessly-questioning second-plane child.
Our art shelf has been available to the children since toddlerhood. Now, I’ve added a color wheel and a mannequin.
You’ll also see more office-like supplies, such as good quality scissors, stapler and ruler, to support independence with filing and schoolwork. There’s also a puncher and hand-cranked sharpener that’s out of sight.
I placed some transition elementary materials on this shelf, as well as a gorgeous earth story book, which should give you a hint that even the types of books and literature we give the children should be expanded beyond concrete concepts and realistic images, as their minds have expanded.
I still have a front-facing bookshelf filled with books suitable for first plane children (my younger child). To differentiate my elementary-age books, I put them in a basket on the floor, next to our tatami floor cushions. If you don’t have a big home, you can totally Montessori the floor or the walls.
In a Montessori elementary classroom, materials would still be precise and orderly, but there would be some stacking and repetition.
- These are four-part-card printables from Diamond Montessori. I thought them suitable as a transition material because it introduces children to headwear from many cultures. Similarity in difference.
Instead of laminating the info sheets, I used this chance to teach my elementary child bookbinding with a needle and thread, which will come in handy for the many future uses I’ve planned. He bound the Head Coverings Around the World book and then glued the info sheets on each spread.
2. Speaking of sewing, there is nothing more concentration-inducing than sewing! You could introduce sewing around 5ish yo.
3. Grammar work is seriously underrated! As a former high school teacher, I often saw how poor understanding of grammar rules set back students who otherwise had a solid foundation in vocabulary and expression. And I love that Montessori takes grammar seriously and makes it so easy to understand, so this is an area which I plan to supplement mainstream schooling with, which I think will be a wonderful support.
This is a temporary way of displaying the grammar work (over 300plus labels hand cut and glued by me and my child?!) – see the coffeeshop rubberbands – until the cloth folder I have commissioned is ready. But it shows you that at elementary, you can stack several things together, and not have to display each individually.
4. Placement. Sometimes, we don’t even need to put the items together on the same tray. I’ve placed the weighing activity and the cash register (filled with 100 real 10-cent coins) adjacent to each other on the shelf, so the child can make the connection himself and use both together, to measure and weigh the coins, then do a simple recording on paper.
5. Memorisation. In mainstream school, much memorisation is required. I do not think memorisation is bad, unless it is overused. For instance, even in Montessori preschool, children do have to memorise sight or puzzle words that cannot be sounded out phonetically. Elementary children will move away from concrete materials to abstract equations eventually, so at around 6-9 years old, I want to give them bridges between concrete and abstract.
I purchased some multiplication timetables on TeachersPayTeachers that correspond to the colors of the Montessori bead stairs. The child can take this and try to do it for himself, then refer to the control chart to check for errors. All this, without me having to drill him or sit him down for a test or tell him where he went wrong. At elementary age, we must find ways to help children control their own errors.
On memorisation, it is common practice to display many posters of various subjects around the classroom or home. However, once the novelty wears off, it is unlikely that the child will notice the poster much, and it also contributes to visual clutter. What I’ve done is to roll up all my maps and charts in an Ikea metal bin, so the child can come and refer to the one that he needs, then put it back. I would like to label each map on the outside so it’s easier to find. A little tip: I am amazed how sharp and vivid color photocopying is nowadays – one of my historic maps is a color photocopy from a friend!
I hope you’ve enjoyed this glimpse into our transitional environment. I can’t wait to show you more.
If you have a child approaching or of Elementary age (6-12yo), I run an online course on the Montessori Elementary child, based on my AMI 6-12 Assistant training and experience as a former mainstream educator/ leader. This course had great reviews the first time and it’s only going to get better as I’m adding a lecture on the Storytelling and the Great Stories, a beautifully-designed workbook that you can refer to long after the course is over, and some Montessori-inspired printables for your elementary child. Homeschooling, distance-learning and mainstream-schooling parents of children as young as 5yo have attended this course, and found it enlightening. Read full course outline and testimonials here.
You may also enjoy reading about the transition to elementary here