Dog Themed Montessori Inspired Tot School Week
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My daughter has always loved animals, especially dogs. We have 3 large dogs at home so I think this is probably why. So this past week I set up this dog themed montessori inspired tot school week for her. There are 4 easy activities to set up and all of the items came from things around our house. I loved that I didn't have to go out and buy anything special for this.
For those of you who don't know, my daughter is 25 months old, so these activities are geared for a 2-3 year old.
4 Activities for Dog Themed Montessori Inspired Tot School Week
1. Matching straight and curved lines – Sensorial
This activity was inspired from my ebook, Basic Shapes for Beginners. In that ebook I talk a lot about hands-on activities for introducing pre-writing lines and shapes. Since the letter D starts with a big straight line and a big curved line, I pulled out our Handwriting Without Tears wood pieces for Capital letters. I always start with introducing capital letters first, since those are all common pre-writing lines and shapes.
I made 5 pages by tracing around each line on a piece of paper. Then I laminated the sheets and used them as simple puzzle cards. (If you need a good laminator for home, we have the Scotch Thermal Laminator, only $19.99 on Amazon right now!)
- 4 Big straight lines down
- 2 big curve lines
- 1 big straight line and 1 curved line to look like the letter “D”
- 4 small straight lines down and 2 little curve lines (introducing big vs. small
- A pattern design with 1 small straight line, 1 curve line, 1 straight line, 1 curve line
If you don't have the HWT wood pieces, you could use pop cycle sticks or long wooden craft sticks with the same effect. You would just need to make your own curved lines either with foam or felt perhaps.
I placed one paper at a time on her table and showed her how to match up the lines on the paper with her sticks.
2. Brushing the Dog – Practical Life
This one was super easy to set up. I just got some of her stuffed dogs and a hairbrush and put them on one of our shelves. The lint roller is kind of a joke. All 3 of our dogs shed, so we always lint roll pants or clothing when we head out the door somewhere.
3. Dog themed play dough tray – Practical Life
My daughter loves playing with play dough. So I always try to include her play dough tray in our weekly themes. For this week I included a dog bone cookie cutter that we used for her dog themed birthday party last year. And also the colors of the play dough were brown and red, the color of dogs.
So yes, the play dough is green in this picture. I had actually made some green apple scented play dough this week, so I was having her try it out too. 🙂
4. Pouring Water into a dog dish – Practical life
This one, by far has been the most popular of the week. I used a left over dog bowl dish we had used during her party last year and our enamel pouring container. I filled it up with water about half way and just let her practice pouring the water back and forth. I showed her one to two times how to pour the water back and forth “gently.” After a few spills, she got the hang of it and is now doing a very good job at pouring gently. She even figured out how to get the water from the dog dish back into the white pouring container, which is a harder skill.
Overall, it has been a very fun well. I am going to leave these activities up for probably 1 more week and start gearing up for our apple week.
Check out this really neat Dog Themed Activities for Tots post from Every Star is Different. She also has some free printables to go along with her activities.
For even more ideas, check out my Homeschool Tot-School Ideas board on Pinterest.
Sharing with: This Reading Mama Tot School Gathering Place, Hip Homeschool Moms, Crafts on Sea, Awesome Sensory Bins, The Mommy Club, Montessori Monday
Heather Greutman, COTA
Heather Greutman is a Certified Occupational Therapy Assistant with experience in school-based OT services for preschool through high school. She uses her background to share child development tips, tools, and strategies for parents, educators, and therapists. She is the author of many ebooks including The Basics of Fine Motor Skills, and Basics of Pre-Writing Skills, and co-author of Sensory Processing Explained: A Handbook for Parents and Educators.