In your Montessori homeschool environment, sensorial materials play a key role in helping your child refine their senses. These carefully designed materials allow children to explore and make sense of their world through touch, sight, sound, taste, and smell.
Sensorial education helps children classify their surroundings and create order in their minds. It builds a foundation for more complex learning in math, language, and science.
Visual Sense Development
The visual sense is often the first that children rely on to explore their world. There are different focuses on developing the visual sense, i.e., dimension, color, shape, and combination of each.
The Hometessori Sensorial Manual includes a comprehensive collection of lessons that develop the visual sense in children ages 3-6.
For younger children (3-3.5 years), the Montessori manual begins with fundamental materials like the Knobbed Cylinders, Pink Tower, Brown Stair, and Red Rods. These materials help children distinguish differences in dimension while refining their visual discrimination skills. Simple activities like Color Sorting and Shape Sorting are also introduced at this age.
As children progress (3-4 years), they are introduced with the Color Boxes 1-3, Geometry Cabinet, and Colors 3-part cards. The Binomial Cube is also presented around this age, offering both visual and mathematical preparation.
For older children (4-5 years), more complex materials are presented like Constructive Triangles, Trinomial Cube, Leaf Cabinet and Cards, Graded Geometric Figures, and the Decanomial Square. The most advanced visual sense work with Knobless Cylinders is typically presented around 4.5-5 years.
Tactile Sense Development
Touch is a powerful way for children to learn about their world. Refining the tactile sense includes learning different textures (like rough and smooth), different weights, different temperatures, different pressures. Montessori materials/activities that help refine the tactile sense include:
- Touch tablets (rough and smooth)
- Baric tablets (light and heavy)
- Thermic bottles (you can DIY this!)
- Fabric matching activities invite children to feel different materials like silk, cotton, and wool. With eyes closed, they match fabrics based only on touch. You can easily create this using fabric scraps from your home.
- Mystery Bag which also helps develop the stereognostic sense contains objects that children identify by touch alone. This fun activity refines their tactile sense while building vocabulary.
Auditory Sense Development
Simple listening games encourage children to build concentration and identify sounds in their environment.
Sound cylinders help children match and grade different sounds.
Montessori Bells allow children to match tones and learn about pitch. As they work with the bells, they develop a refined sense of hearing.
In the Hometessori Arts & MUSIC, there’s a beautiful progression for introducing music, discriminating pitch, and musical expression.
Gustatory and Olfactory Development
There are sensorial materials for the gustatory and olfactory sense developments that can be purchased from trusted manufacturers (i.e., tasting and smelling bottles). But I think, these can be DIY-ed at home with matching bottles and various items having different scents and tastes.
Budget-Friendly Sensorial Materials for Homeschoolers
Not all homeschooling families can afford the full set of Montessori sensorial materials. It’s a bit tricky since there really are no substitute to the many of Montessori sensorial materials because they have been created with purpose which intends to meet a particular need for sense development of the child.
So how can you decide which of these materials should be in your home? Ask yourself these questions.
Then find opportunities to introduce different experiences like:
- rough and smooth with natural objects;
- hot and cold with food items;
- different smells using various spices;
- letting the child taste different flavors and textures of foods;
- DIY sound cylinders with paired bottles of different materials
The Hometessori Sensorial Print Kit offers some DIY alternatives (e.g., constructive triangles, color tablets) **that meet their respective direct aims at a fraction of the cost, and also supplemental materials (e.g., pattern cards, 3-part cards) for further work with the sensorial materials.
☝️ Photo above: Colors 3-Part Cards, Rods Pattern Cards, Color Sorting Cards, DIY Geometry Cabinet, DIY Leaf Cabinet, Leaf Shapes 3-Part Cards, Leaf Shapes Solid Thick Thin Cards, Knobless Cylinders Pattern Cards, DIY Color Tablets, DIY Trinomial Cube
Making the Most of Limited Materials in Your Homeschool
Even with just a few sensorial materials, you can create meaningful learning experiences at home. Focus on quality over quantity. The Hometessori manual provides different lessons and activities that the child can work on to help refine the different senses.
Rotate materials regularly to maintain interest. This makes a small collection seem larger and keeps children engaged throughout your homeschool week.
Above all, follow your child's interests. The Hometessori observation tools (that come with the Manual) help you track which sensorial experiences most engage your child, allowing you to tailor your homeschool environment to their unique developmental needs.
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