So this is our learning area. This is our homeschool room during the day, and a family room in the afternoon and at night time. The materials you see here are mostly traditional Montessori materials, basket of books at the corner and a little bit of open ended toys for Vito. Mavi kept all his stuff in his room. What you see here are the following:
- Kallax shelves from Ikea
- Work table from Ikea
- Carpet from Ikea
- Basket inserts from Ikea
- Chairs from Mothercare (these are 6 year old chairs!)
Now let’s take a look at each shelf!
In this corner, I connected two Kallax shelves and in here I placed all the Montessori materials that we are currently using for the week/month.
While it is NOT recommended to stack materials in a shelf, in our case we have no choice due to our small space in the apartment. Now don’t panic if I did stack our materials. The boys are highly trained on how to handle this situation. They are capable of properly removing and returning items at the bottom, so stacking of materials is not a problem in our household. This doesn’t hinder their learning capability at all. But of course, when Vito was a lot younger, this is not the case. I observed the “no stacking” rule for easier access of materials back then.
The topmost is where I place our printer and space for thematic materials for our current learning activity. But since we’re not doing themed activities at the moment Mavi decided to display his animals and Grimms rainbow stackers. If you are curious how I organize the top for thematic display, here’s our Antarctica, Farm, and Shark displays for your inspiration. Excuse the printer. I know it is out of place but it has to stay close to our router, for connectivity purposes.
On the leftmost side, this is where I place our pink tower, together with our basket of rugs.
This is where I keep our nomenclature cards which are currently in use. You can get this wooden box from Ikea.
On the other side, we have baskets of open ended toys like Magnatiles, Schleich animals, Duplo and some board games. The basket inserts you see here contains my books and some printables. Baskets are from local shops Meadows and Bryne and Homebase. Oh yeah, that’s an Xbox LOL. My eldest and I (and dear husband) loves to play Lego games here!
And of course, here’s our working table! This is where the boys write, paint, do crafts and more. The table is beside our glass wall which always catches the morning sun, perfect for Vitamin D! I love that we can sit here to learn or just observe the outdoor as we look through the glass. The chairs are from ages ago, we bought them for Mavi when he was 3 years old. They’re very sturdy and nonslip.
And that’s the end of our learning area tour! If you have questions you can just leave it as a comment and I’ll get back to you!
This post is part of the 12 Months More of Montessori which is hosted by Natural Beach Living and The Natural Homeschool.
How to Set Up a Reading Nook Kids Love | Natural Beach Living
Awesome Homeschool Room - Pictures & Printable Homeschool Planner | The Natural Homeschool
How to Prepare Themed Montessori Shelves | Living Montessori Now
Montessori Inspired Homeschool Space | Mama’s Happy Hive
Montessori Home -- Our Art Area | The Kavanaugh Report
How I Organize our Montessori-Inspired Learning Space | The Pinay Homeschooler
How to Set up Montessori in a Small Space | Sugar, Spice & Glitter
I love how much you did with a small space! It's an inspiration because we have limited space, too, and sometimes I get discouraged. I also love that your school room is also the family room, I think it's really important that children are not pushed "out of the way" into their own room, to work in total isolation.
ReplyDeleteBtw, you can't synthesize Vitamin D inside, because the UVB light (the one you need for this) is blocked by windows. I know you spend a lot of time outdoors and get plenty of proper sunlight, I just thought you might find this interesting! :)
I totally agree! That's my pet peeve.... pushing them to their rooms for isolation. I love that we have a small house, keeps us closer together and the fact that I can see and talk to them all the time. Thank you so much for that information on Vitamin D. Love to learn from my readers.
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