Montessori Monday: Geometric Solids

The geometric solids in its full glory. In no particular order, the names from left to right: cylinder, rectangular prism, cube, square pyramid, cone, ellipsoid, sphere, (For my Korean readers, it helps to know that it's pronounced "fear"with an "s" in front) ovoid, triangular prism, and triangular pyramid.

Below are some impromptu videos that I took for my personal education. I know that my children don't make the best background noise, but I hope you don't mind if I post these. If nothing else, it keeps my videos in some resemblance of order and helps refresh my memory. And yes, I am aware that my oldest was misusing the number cards.

Video #1 Exploring Geometric Solids. Maybe I'm just dense, but I never thought of exploring the solids the way she presented it.

Video #2 Sorting the Solids--Straight and Curved lines

Video #3 Exploring the Different Bases



I love my Montessori directress friend. These videos don't give enough justice to how great her presentations are. In the future, without any children about, I would love to just tape many of her presentations. It is my greatest hope that when we move back to Chicago in a few years, I can send all my children to her classroom.

Note: About the second video, my friend explained that you might want to present a lesson on the definition of a point. Using a very sharp pencil, make a tiny dot and say, "This is a point."

....... many small points make a line.

When the points are all one direction, that is a straight line.
If the points change direction, this is a curved line.

Apparently, there are a lot of activities (here also) that you can do with geometric solids! I love these Geometric Solid Matching Cards from Montessori for Everyone. Don't forget to check out the free downloads she has available in her website. And while I'm mentioning free downloads, Our Montessori Story pointed out that ETC-Press has free nomenclature cards downloads. If only I had a color printer...

Edited to add: I also just downloaded Our Montessori Story's free geometric solids matching cards. Since I don't have a color printer, I just printed and colored them.