On the Shelves: September

The classroom is ready for the arrival of little hands and I'm so excited!  Here are just some of the lessons currently on the Practical Life shelves.   If  you are new to my blog or a parent of one of my students, please be sure to read more about the importance of the following types of lessons in my post, The Significance of Practical Life.


Spooning Apples:  These apples are from the floral section of the craft store.  I think they must be used for vase fillers...  You can see here how perfect they are for spooning - and they fit perfectly in my Russian spoon!



Spooning Pom-poms:  These are oh, so tiny and cute and I love the small, wooden buckets - looks just like bushels of apples!  This lesson is a bit more difficult than the previous spooning activity because it takes greater concentration from the child to balance one lightweight pom-pom on the small spoon.



Tonging:  These "apples" are actually pencil-top erasers - I just like the way they look in the bowl!  ;-)



Tweezing:  These beads came from a plastic jewelry making kit.  I like the little "stem" on each bead - they are perfect for using the tweezers to grasp which creates a natural point of interest for the child.  The youngest members of the class have the option to use just their fingers to transfer the beads as use of the tweezers is actually quite difficult.  Either way, this activity not only develops the child's pincer grasp (necessary for writing), but it also enhances their concentration and coordination.



Bead and straw pieces for beading onto pipe cleaner bracelets.  The small, decorative apples are from a teacher's supply store and I simply hole-punched each one.  I rotate the contents of this activity each month - sometimes we use pipe cleaners to make bracelets and other times we use various strings for necklaces.  Such a simple lacing activity is perfect for building many skills such as concentration, independence, coordination, order, and others necessary for further learning.



Apple tracing activity:  This activity is laminated for repeated use.  Once a child is finished tracing the lines, they leave the material ready for the next person by erasing the lines with the towel.  I like this as an alternative to paper (worksheets)!

 We also have several apple-related Math activities out on the shelves which you can read more about here.

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