Montessori
Montessori at Home: Activities for 3-6 Year Olds
“Help me to do it by myself.” This is the phrase that best summarizes the Montessori method, and it is exactly what parents coming to this page are looking for: concrete activities, doable at home, that give the child the desire and the means to be self-reliant.
What is in The Great Montessori Workbook
A large 88-page full-color workbook, in A4 format, with 100 activities designed for children aged 3 to 6. Each page is illustrated with real watercolors and includes a “parents' corner” that explains in two lines what the activity works on and how to support without doing it for them.
The activities cover the six major areas of the pedagogy: practical life (pouring, transferring, buttoning), sensory, graphism and fine motor skills, language with nomenclature cards to cut out, early numbers, and nature. The workbook opens with a parent guide and the famous three-period lesson, the presentation method that allows a child to retain a new word without having to be corrected.
Why this pedagogy works so well at this age
Between 3 and 6 years old, the child goes through what Maria Montessori called sensitive periods: windows where they absorb learning with an ease they will never have again. A sensitive period cannot be forced: it is observed, and the corresponding activity is then proposed. Language, order, movement, small objects. The idea is not to push them ahead faster, but to offer them the right activity at the right time, and let them repeat it as many times as they want.
The adult presents, then steps back. This is often the hardest part for us: resisting the urge to correct, to finish for them, to comment. Autonomy is built right there, in that silence.
What age, what grade?
From 3 to 6 years old, which is the entire nursery school age: the first, second, and third years of preschool. Some practical life activities are suitable from the very first year, while others, such as language and early numbers, make full sense in the final year of preschool, just before starting primary school.
There is no forced order. A four-year-old may spend three weeks on transferring activities and ignore letters; this is normal, and it is even the principle.
Without expensive material, without screens
The Montessori method has a reputation for being expensive, because of the wooden materials seen everywhere. This workbook takes the opposite path: the activities are done with what you already have at home, a pair of scissors, pencils, sometimes a little water and two containers. Nothing extra to buy, nothing to install, no screens.
This is also what makes it usable in homeschooling as well as as a supplement to school, and portable for vacations or at the grandparents' house.
The six domains, activity by activity
Practical life opens the workbook: pouring, transferring, buttoning. Daily gestures that the child repeats ten times because they enjoy it, and which build gripping skills and concentration. Next comes sensory, where they learn to compare, classify, and name what they touch and see: this is the foundation for future mathematical learning.
Graphism prepares for writing by developing fine motor skills. Language arrives with nomenclature cards to cut out, a real picture book that helps the child name the world, enrich their oral language, and move toward reading. Early numbers introduce counting and the idea of quantity, well before abstract arithmetic. Finally, nature invites them to observe, experiment, and discover the world around them.
No materials to buy
When looking for Montessori materials, you quickly come across the pink tower, sandpaper letters, cylinders, and expensive wooden toys. This workbook requires none of that: a pair of scissors for cutting, colored pencils, and everyday objects already in the kitchen.
This is a deliberate choice. Wooden educational material is magnificent, but it is not the pedagogy: what counts is concrete manipulation and how the adult presents the activity, not the price of the object.
Each child's own pace
The activities do not follow an imposed order. “Is my child progressing fast enough?” A child may spend three weeks on the same exercise, ignore another, and return to it six months later: it is their own pace, and this is how autonomy and self-confidence are built. The absorbent mind of young children does the rest.
The workshops are designed to be autonomous: once the activity is presented, the child repeats it alone. This is precisely the purpose of the three-period lesson — name, recognize, recall — which allows for memorizing a new word without ever saying “no, that’s wrong.”
An awakening workbook for all of preschool
First, second, and third years of preschool: the 100 activities cover these three ages. Young three-year-olds will start with practical life and sensory; in the third year, the letters of the alphabet, counting, and motor activities take over before entering elementary school.
Whether your child is in school or homeschooled, this educational workbook is used as a supplement, never as a replacement. It is about awakening, amusing, supporting the child's development and fulfillment, not doing school twice.
Are you a preschool teacher and thinking of “my students”? Email us at contact@kidibook.com, we review every request.
An inspiration, not a certification
Let’s be clear, because the word “Montessori” is used for everything: the Montessori pedagogy belongs to the public domain, and this work is inspired by it. It is not affiliated with any Montessori school, any association, or any certification body. It is not official material: it is an activity workbook designed and illustrated in France, in the spirit of this approach.
To go further
Do you want to try before you buy? A pack of nomenclature cards is available for free on our printable Montessori activities page.
And when your child enters primary school, what follows awaits: our vacation workbooks accompany the final year of preschool up to the end of primary school, and our My Super Year range establishes a daily ritual throughout the school year.
Printed on demand in Europe, delivered for free
The book is paperback in A4 format and printed on demand in a partner workshop in Europe. Allow 5 to 10 business days between ordering and receipt. Delivery is free, with no minimum purchase, throughout mainland France.