Pink Tower Perfection!

Look who can build the pink tower to perfection at 2 years and 5 months!

Please ignore the mess in the background, I was re-organizing!

DIY Sound Cylinders

I wanted to share some of the DIY materials from our homeschool.  As you all already know Montessori Materials are expensive and lets face it, buying all the materials for home use, where only one or two children use it seems like a terrible expense, especially in single income households.  While some sensorial materials are extremely difficult to make like the knobbed cylinders, some are extremely easy to put together using simple household objects.  One such material is the Sound Cylinders.  If we were to buy this online, it would cost us anywhere from $20 for a reasonable quality one to $75 for a premium quality.  The cost for making this using items from the house, $0!

Here is what you need:

1. 12 Opaque containers, if you are making six pairs.  I re-used chocolate pudding containers and made only 4 pairs, oh well!  I've seen a variety of other containers throughout the blog world, from painted glass bottles to the toilet paper tubes.
2. One sheet of red and blue card stock.
3. Tape.
4. Items for filling the bottles.  I used - large rocks, small rocks, rice and paper.
5. Stickers for marking the pairs

Once you have the above items, fill each item in two containers measuring out approximately the same quantity.  Shake them slightly to make sure they make similar sounds.  Cut one piece of red and one piece of blue cardstock to cover the mouth of the container and tape it shut.  Repeat this for the remaining items and you are done!  Easy peasy!

Some pink tower and brown stairs extensions

D and I together did some pink tower/brown stairs extensions.  These two have been sitting untouched for quite some time in our school room.  Doing this has revived some interest, plus I am planning to print these pictures and have them for future reference.

We found these at our favorite sites in the montessori blog world!