I think everyone agrees that movement in any school is tantamount to a child’s growth.
In a Montessori classroom children have the freedom to move all day. They can get up and down as many times as they please. They can move around the classroom, they can take, for example, 10 trips to collect the number rods and lay them on the rug near or across the room from where they are located. They become spatially aware and move accordingly.
1) Circle time: can incorporate all sorts of motor skills from fine to gross usually along with a song or two. Children linking words with movements.
2) During the work period: all of the materials and equipment in a Montessori classroom require some sort of movement, and developing skill of movement control.
Fine and gross motor movement: Hand/eye, and eye/hand/foot coordination in so many situations.
To name a few:
a) Walking to a shelf.
b) Lifting a tray from the shelf and walking carrying a tray.
c) Placing the tray on a table.
d) Bending while carrying to place a full tray on the floor.
e) Rolling or folding a rug.
f) Manipulating books, binders, materials, scissors, insets, arts and crafts and a multitude of other activities.
g) Laying out and rolling up and putting away bedding.
h) Laying tables and doing washing up.
i) Hanging their coat and using their cubby.
j) Carrying a chair.
The list is endless.
3) Music and Movement: playing instruments, dancing, acting. etc.
4) Walking on the line: and all the graded exercises that go with this activity.
5) Outside: here children are free to express themselves, experience and do large motor activities, riding bikes, skipping, kicking or throwing balls, climbing on climbing frames, sliding down slides etc. Interacting and unaware practice, practice, practice of large motor skill development.
6) Organised PE. It is also fun to have an organised PE class once a week at least, where children learn taught skills that are fun and engaging. Set up a simple obstacle course and /or do what I call “Story Gym” I tell a story as we exercise together.
An example is:
Gather in a circle…pretend you are at Disney land, picture you are on a ride. Bend over and touch your toes then slowly slowly “climb up” the roller coaster …have the children join in the sound of the journey..”tick tick tick tick…..all the way to the top”, move your body slowly up until you hands are reaching the sky…then “whoosh….down down down” bend back down and let your hands swing down to your toes. Great fun. You can cover all sorts of common movements with a story to make it enjoyable.
7) Use your imagination to tell a story for all sorts of different movements, keeping it age and topic appropriate. You can tie it in with a theme you may be working on for example Dinosaurs, The Farm, Transport, City Life/ Country Life, The Time Line etc.
An example: Travel through the Time Line with music and movement. What sounds and movements could you imagine in each period and have the children act and “sound” it out from a tiny cell, a growing plant, a slippery fish to a reptile, a flying dinosaur to bird..a dinosaur to a mammal.
A Montessori School allows a child the freedom to develop movement and offers a path to independence through movement.
