Toddler Needlework

Some of you may know that Bean goes to a Montessori preschool. I often ask her what she does at school. I am most often given the same answer - "I don't know".

Each week they send home a folder with school information and Bean's handiwork. It is usually crayon drawings or colored pieces of paper glued to a page. Standard toddler work. 

This is what came home with Bean on Monday.

 

I was amazed.  They teach the kids to use a loom and a needle and thread.  The teacher will outline the shape and sit with the child while they stitch around it.  Bean's come home before with a partially completed shape but never a fully completed one.  I used to think that this was one of those projects where the teacher did most of the work while the child sat at watched.  I actually did an observation in Bean's class yesterday morning and watched this process take place.  The teacher did sit with a child while she was doing her needlework.  But the child went and got the needle, cut the thread, took out the loom, did get some help putting the material in the loom but not much, and then sat there and went around the shape sewing back and forth herself.  Again, I was amazed. 

Bean is 3.  She can do better needlepoint than I can.  Do you think my Mom would have handed over a needle to me at age 3?  Nope. She didn't want to give me one when I was 12, especially after the tragic sewing machine incident involving my thumb.  My thumb still twitches when it gets near a sewing machine. 

I just love the Montessori method and am glad Bean has gotten to experience it.