Montessori at Home: Dedicated Space for Materials

Feb 3

A place for everything and everything in its place. Like everything else, this can look a lot of different ways. Check out the photos below to see my recent reorganizing project.

What this generally means is limiting the amount of activities or materials you have in your environment so that every activity has its own home. It provides structure, reliability, and promotes independence when the child knows where they can find an activity and where it can be returned when finished.

It's a process that takes time, and over time the child internalizes the order from the environment and it becomes routine. Selecting a material, working with the material, and putting it away, and the cycle repeats. Lots of modeling and practice here.

The behind the scenes work of storing the materials is a thing in and of itself. For me, clear storage is crucial. Take things out of bulky packaging to save space and organize them in categories that make sense for you. I group materials by language, math, sensorial, science, geography, practical life and the very sophisticated category of 'things that hold other things' like bags, pouches, trays, baskets, boxes, etc.

Having your own 'place for everything' makes it more manageable when it's time to swap out materials that your child is no longer using, less interested in, etc. It is also definitely its own process.

For more info on setting up activities and rotating materials, download my Montessori at Home Planning & Preparing Checklist. It's totally free!