New on the shelves and the marathon school day!

Before we left for vacation last week I added several new activities to the shelves.  Link only had time to do one or two, so he was very eager to go to the school room today.  We spent three hours there the first time and an hour the second time!  When I put his brother to bed for the night, he asked to go again! (we didn't)

Tonight I'll just mention the new activities:

• color box (I took out the 3 pair from Box 1 and put in about 10 pair of color swatches I picked up from Lowes)
• Classification cards - farm and ocean pictures
• What does not belong
• Dinosaur matching - I printed two of these to use as visual discrimination cards (I figured they would be more interesting than the leaf ones)
• Same / Different Cards
• Fall cutting strips
• Pouring beans between two cups
• Locks w/keys
• Money sorting - nickels, quarters, and pennies
• "B" sound box - bat, batman, boat, bunny, brown bear, blue block, barn, bottle, belt w/buckle

One of the three hours we spent in the school room was not doing an activity.  Daddy went to Atlanta this week, so while he was there I had him pick up various sized boxes from Ikea.  Link helped me put 6 of them together today.  Talk about pincer exercise!  Each box had about 12 holes to be pushed out and 4 screws with nuts to be attached.  Link did almost all of it with me holding the box together.  

Tomorrow (hopefully) I'll have some pictures of the new activities and a rundown of the three days we've had in the school room this week.

Treasure Maps!

Since I'm going to be ordering some maps soon, I thought I should do some preliminary map activities.  So, last week instead of going to the school room, we mapped my bedroom.  Its funny how we take for granted the ability to understand that something on paper can represent a room, house, neighborhood, etc.  Once I got started, Link picked it up quickly.  I drew the room and explained what it was.  Then asked him to point to all the doors and showed him what they looked like on the map.  I asked him to point out things in the room, then I drew them on the map.  We did a sorta-three-period-lesson with things to be sure he understood what the map represented.

Then, the most exciting part - I drew an X on the nightstand, and told him that there was treasure in there.  For a good five minutes, I couldn't get him to go see what it was because he was laughing so much.  It tickled him every time I said it, but finally, he went and checked the nightstand.  Then we did it again in the kitchen.  He really enjoyed this and spent the rest of the day "drawing maps".

Over the weekend we all went to Bald Head Island for a little family vacation.  Unfortunately it rained almost the entire time.  However, since it wasn't exactly beach weather we decided to go see some things on the island we haven't visited (because we're usually too busy at the beach!).  So, Daddy, Link and I hopped on the golf cart with our map of the island and made our way to the Old Baldy.  On the way I attempted to teach Link his left and right so that he could tell Daddy which way to go.  I also pointed out points of interest on the map and asked Link where he'd like to go and where we were or where we were going.

I'll probably continue these activities for a little while just because Link enjoys them so much.  Hopefully once we get our maps of North America and the World Parts, and our globes, it'll all come together.

Hh Sounds Like Honeeeeey!

Link has really been into sounds lately.  I do not play I Spy like I should, but when I think of it, I throw it into our day.  We were reading a Dr Seuss book before his nap yesterday and rather than read it like I used to, I was using it as an opportunity for I Spy.  When we got the 'H' and I asked what begins with h (using the sound, not the letter) Link jumps up and says with enthusiasm "h sounds like honeeeeeeey".  (the pictures to choose from were hen, hat, horse and hay)  I should mention that if there is something that Link really likes, he has to draw out the word and say it with a very mischievous smile on his face, and Link really likes honey.  He also found something that sounds like PoohBear, but I'm sure you can figure that one out on your own.

I have gathered quite a few little object for starting a sound box.  My grandmother has LOTS of nicknacks and has become my go-to person for school related things.  She put together a fantastic assortment of objects and covered almost every sound.  I'm going to start out with just a box that represents one sound.  Link likes going through the objects and I figured it would give us a chance to make sure we've covered all the sounds. Then, I'll do a box with two sounds and see if we can sort them together.  That will get us through Stage 2 of I Spy (as Gettman explains it).  I have some I Spy books that will help us through Stage 3.  After that, if he seems ready, I think I'll introduce the sandpaper letters while continuing the stages of I Spy.

No School This Week

We have had a busy week after being out of town for a week.  Monday we unpacked and rested, Tuesday the landscaper, appliance man and carpet man all came by, and Wednesday was the farmers market and other errands.  So Thursday I get to clean up after being gone all day Wednesday, except for the time we stopped by the house to make a mess.  I'm also going to try to get some materials put together while the boys are sleeping.

I didn't intend to have school time as I haven't yet changed the activities.  However, when Link and I went down to tell Daddy good night, Link decided it would be a good time to show Daddy all the things he could do.  I was amazed!  He chose things he has NEVER chosen on his own.  He folded towels, hung clothes, transferred with the dropper, matched land, air and water cards, matched blocks to the pattern cards, cut and pasted, and even matched color tablets.  It all only took about an hour.  Then I suggested that we head to bed.  By this time even Daddy and I were tired.  I had to nudge Daddy a few times to keep him from putting his feet on the table, shaking the color tablet box and starting to point out an error Link was making.  Later I mentioned to Daddy that Link knew how to do the activity, so having the error pointed out would not help things, and Link may be embarrassed, especially because the entire reason Link wanted to do the activities was to show Daddy.

In other news, I'm close to being ready to make my material purchase.  I haven't decided between buying $200, $400 or $500.  I've also gotten a little more advice on what to order and where to save.

I don't have any photos from our night with Daddy, but I do have a few from our last session that I didn't share and one of my boys "fixing" my table.

Teaching little brother how to fix things

Mixing rice with his hands

Fist time with dropper

Land, Air and Water cards with goggles ;)

Montessori Suppliers

After my last post I found a few other suggestions for ordering materials, and since there is too much information for me to keep straight, I decided to consolidate it here!

My teacher Karen suggested Alison's Montessori and mentioned that her students get a discount, a commenter from my last post also suggested them.

Someone else suggested Kid Advance, and for my order at least they are coming out $20 cheaper

I googled something like "montessori materials reviews" and came across these links:

Just a forum post

Wild Flowers and Marbles - Why We Chose Montessori (reading material)

I'm A Full Time Mummy - Montessori Print Shop review

Living Montessori Now - Where to Buy Montessori Materials

Maybe Montessori - Cylinder blocks on eBay

Montessori MOMents - Adena Montessori Review

Chasing Cheerios - Where to Buy

Montessori Candy - Montessori Education Supplies Review

Child and Me -  Montessori Resources (books, suppliers)

Inside these links I'm finding a lot of information to sort through.  Since I don't have time to read them in detail right now, I'll just leave the links and come back to them soon.

**EDIT**
Rather than make another post, I decided to edit this one.  I made this chart to compare suppliers since there are so many!  Looks like IFIT is the winner, but only if you order over $500 to get free shipping.  They are in Canada, so shipping is really high from them.  Without free shipping, I think Kid Advance was the winner.  I believe there are more suppliers out there, but I'm not sure I'm going to go through the trouble of checking their prices too.

	Allison’s	Kid Advance	A Plus	M Outlet	IFIT	Grandpas
Period 1
cylinder blocks	140	110	104	120	130	99
pink tower	35	35	32	38	32	35
presentation tray	33	25	25	27	25	30
geometric solids	60	50	50	57	42	45
land & water globe	35	25	23	na	18	na
Period 2
geometric cabinet	185	135	147	119	120	165
single letter sp letters	35	15	30	34	28	na
maps	48	25	26	30	28	25
Period 3
double sp letters	30	24	24	23	22	22
number rods	28	25	21	26	20	29
Period 4
sp numbers	16.5	15	15	7	13	7
spindles	36	27	26	32	27	35
$500 order shipping	82	69	0	0	0	50
discount	-68.15	-48
	695.35	532	523	513	505	542
						shipping estimated

Bolded items are the things I added from my previous order to get to $500. As you can see, it only took four things to go from $200 to $500. But, I get to spend that entire $300 on materials, rather than wasting $60 on shipping!

Purchasing Materials

So I've been thinking hard about ordering some materials.  There are many activities that can be done without buying specialized materials, and so far I've tried to focus on those.  However, there are some things I feel like Link is missing out on and I'm ready to get started!

At first, I decided to get what I can for $100.  Then I thought, no, I should get at least what I think Link will be really interested in right now.  After that I started exploring everything!  I get excited and often try to skip ahead, so I decided I should try to get things in the order I'll need them.  I used Gettman to make a list for each period.  Then I used the prices from IFIT to help me prioritize.  (I'll say more about why IFIT later)

First, I summed everything.  Then I just summed the things I think I need right now.  I should say that my need list is very subjective.  I am not as well versed in Montessori as many others, so I'm sure there would be those who disagree about what I need.  But I think to myself, wow, the brown stairs are $68, do I really need that? The things I left out are things I think I can either make, wait for, or get by without.

	All	Need Now	Need Soon	Later
Period 1
cylinder blocks	130	-	130
pink tower	32	32
presentation tray	25	make	25
geometric solids	42	42
land & water globe	18	18
forms	21	-	21
Period 2
brown stair	68	-	-	68
red rods	38	make
color tablets	30	make	-	-
geometric cabinet	120	-	120
binomial cube	21	-	21
tactile tablets	17	-	-	-
sounds boxes	22	make	-	-
single letter sp letters	28	28
metals insets	64	-	-	64
maps	112	28	28	56
classification by leaf	95	-	-	-
Period 3
constructive triangles	12	-	-	-
square of pythagoras	23	-	-	-
trinomial cube	29	-	-	-
double sp letters	22	-	20
number rods	20	20
Period 4
Movable alphabet	40	-	-	40
sp capitals	30	-	-	30
sp numbers	13	13
number tablets		come with
spindles	27	27	-	-
numbers and counters	17	make	-	-
bead material	200	-	-	-
number cards	12	-	-	12
Period 5
knobless cylinders	36	-	-	-
teens	45	-	-	45
Totals	$1,364	$208	$365	$270

So why IFIT?  Well, I've read a few other people's posts about purchasing equipment and the comments people left.  The three I've seen the most about are Montessori Outlet, Adena Montessori, and IFIT.   I tried shopping at Adena, but I hate the way they do their prices.  They are one of those places that jack up their "original price" so that their sale prices look better.  Also, they like to put really high prices in the shopping cart, then take a big % off.  Just list the price already!!  A person's comment on this post seemed to sum up what I think the general opinion is:

I think IFIT is by far the best with shipping time, customer service, and quality. Outlet's quality is good but shipping is often delayed. I have been displeased with Adena's quality and problems with orders and I won't order there again.

There are also some comments here that also lead me to believe this is true.  A Plus Montessori seems to have similar prices, but I haven't heard much about them to say anything positive or negative.  I haven't personally dealt with any company's customer service except IFIT, but I was very pleased.  I emailed them to ask about availability of an out of stock item on Friday night, and they emailed me back that night!  But, before I order from IFIT, I'm going to try to find out more about A Plus Montessori. For the same materials, IFIT is cheaper than A Plus, but shipping makes the difference.  I end up saving $7 shopping at A Plus.  Now that I've seen that shipping is going to cost me $60 I almost want to wait until I can order enough to get free shipping.  But at A Plus that is $400 and at IFIT it's $500.  I'd rather not do that right now, but I don't want to waste almost $100 on just shipping!

I would love to have feedback about my purchase decision!  If anyone has shopped at these places, or has a comment about what I need the most or don't need, your comments are more than welcome.  Once I've decided what to do and have made the order, I'll be sure to post about how it goes!