Montessori Boards: Everything You Want to Know
A child who learns at their own pace is usually a happy child who develops to the fullest by enjoying their surroundings. For this to occur, play is usually a vital element. And within the context of play, toys are key elements. For example, children can learn a lot while they enjoy Montessori boards, which is what we want to talk about today.
Children have an innate need to explore, discover and satisfy their curiosity. For this reason, Maria Montessori – the famous educator who has contributed so much to children’s happiness and optimal development – developed theories and toys specifically designed for our children to learn through play.
What are Montessori boards?
A Montessori board is a toy specially designed for children to develop certain skills. The most common skills are creativity, problem solving, logic and fine motor skills.
How are these boards used? They present games and little mysteries that children need to resolve. How? Generally, by using their cognitive skills – like logic, observation, etc. – they have to find the right solution.
These boards also promote resilience, since children are very likely to make mistakes in their first attempts. However, they must show perseverance and patience to test, think, reason and find the best solutions to the enigmas they face.
The board consists of a series of locks which hide concrete elements. For example, drawings of animals. Through a question or problem, it’s important that children try to guess what’s hiding under each lock, deducing according to their knowledge and capacities.
To all this we must add the improvement of manual skills related to fine motor skills. For example, little ones need to open and close locks and pins according to the type of toy. Therefore, they expand their skills with their hands and fingers.
Benefits of Montessori Boards
Why is it worthwhile for our children to use Montessori boards to play? There are clear benefits for children from the time they’re babies to age six.
Problem solving
These boards help young children improve their ability to solve simple problems, because they involve children in observing and searching for hidden items.
Fine motor skills
We’ve already mentioned this detail. Little ones move pieces of different sizes according to their age. This allows them to train their hand-eye coordination and fine motor skills.
Memory improvement
This is another point in favor of boards designed according to the Montessori Method. The child has to memorize certain illustrations and figures that they’ll associate with concepts. In this way, they use their memory.
Learning environments
Montessori boards have many themes. Some focus on cooking, animals, nature, medicine… In other words, they help children become familiar with their surroundings and, in short, with life and the world around them.
Perseverance
Children become more persistent. When they’re interested in something, for example, a problem that they can’t solve but they really want to solve, they’ll persevere until they achieve it without thinking about giving up at any moment.
Patience
This is a rare quality in children by their very nature. Therefore, it’s important that children learn and internalize it as soon as possible through play. Fortunately, Montessori boards help to do this.
Attention
We also know that children have little ability to keep their attention on anything concrete for long periods of time. It’s a skill that improves as they develop, and these toys help them move forward naturally.
Stimulating curiosity with Montessori boards
To a child, everything in the world is new. That’s why these boards, on which they’ll discover basic elements of everything around them, such as farm animals, parts of a kitchen, etc., are useful in helping little ones begin to know what different things are for, what animals do, why they have to respect every form of life, etc. Montessori boards help them want to know more and more.
In short, Montessori boards are toys that focus on children’s autonomous development and learning from a multitasking point of view. They improve their coordination, logical thinking, and analysis capacity, while also motivating them to search for new challenges and optimizing their cognitive abilities.
All cited sources were thoroughly reviewed by our team to ensure their quality, reliability, currency, and validity. The bibliography of this article was considered reliable and of academic or scientific accuracy.
- Montessori, M. (2021). El manual personal de la doctora Montessori: Traducción de “Dr. Montessori’s own handbook”. CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform.
