Monday, July 19, 2010

Easy Graduated Shapes

Another Montessori activity suggested in Teaching Montessori in the Home: The Pre-School Years is working with graduated shapes. There aren't any templates for these in the back and I couldn't find anything online, so I spent about fifteen minutes in Word and created some myself. Just in case anyone else is searching and wants to use my fancy document, I'm posting it here. (Always happy to save someone else fifteen minutes of time!)
Graduated Shapes

I just used the shapes in Word and decreased them by 25% each time. I think the particular shapes used depend on what you want your child to know the best. I chose oval, hexagon, diamond, triangle, square, circle and rectangle. I printed it out on card stock (a different color for each shape) and cut it out. Done! (I considered laminating them, but they were so easy to make I decided not to bother. If something happens, I can always print them again and ask First Son to cut them out for me.)

First Son did work with graduated shapes in his kindergarten math curriculum (and so First Daughter did as well). We'll see if they are interested in them for next year, but if not, I'm sure Second Daughter will be soon.