28 Montessori Inspired Activities for Toddlers
This is week 4 of a four week (28 activities total) Montessori Inspired Activities for Young Toddlers series. These hands-on activities are for the young toddler who is 9 months to 1.5 years old. These activities will help your child develop fine motor and gross motor skills. There are plenty of sensory and object permanence activities also included. Several of the activities that I am going to share with you are inspirations that I gathered from other Montessori moms and blogs. Many of the activities are uniquely my own DIY ideas. Enjoy!
Please also visit Week One, Week Two, and Week Three
Veggie Treasure Bowl Exploration
Plastic Scissors: Concept of Open & Close
This was an activity I set up for Little Bee to learn about the concept of "open" and "close." I presented Little Bee with each pair of scissors and then said "open" or "close" with the correct action.
Stacking
Rice Sensory Bowl
I made Little Bee a fun sensory bin filled with white rice and interesting colorful creatures. Little Bee had fun throwing the rice, trying to eat it, and finding the creatures hidden within.
Velcro Fruit
I set up an activity using velcro. I used these wooden fruit shapes by "Melissa and Doug." Little Bee loves to pull them apart and then put them back together again. He also likes to run his fingers along the rough velcro. And of course, Little Bee likes to play his favorite game of "hide-n-seek!" In the photo below he has hidden a few pieces of the fruit between his legs. He is signing "where" is the fruit to me. Silly little boy! 🙂
Discovering Lids and Caps
Let me start out by saying that I enjoyed playing with these caps as much as Little Bee! I got creative and made a few circle designs. What made this activity a bit more challenging for me was looking around the house to find all these caps and than seeing which ones fit inside of each other. It was also important to find a fun variety of colors! What do you think? Does this look like fun to you? 
Little Bee liked exploring flip caps, caps that fit perfectly inside one another, and he even enjoyed caps that he could peer through!
Wipes Container and Lids
Little Bee enjoyed placing his caps inside a wipes container. He loved opening and closing the top lid. Then he would pull the caps out through the small hole.
There are three more weeks of activities to enjoy in this series!
See the collage image below to get a sneak peak.
Please visit the other weeks in this series:
I would love to hear your story of an activity that you found enjoyable with your little one. Please leave your feedback in the comment section below.
Thank you. 🙂
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You are such a creative mom! With the shaving cream, my kids just now got so they liked the feeling and they are 3 and 5. My favorite sensory activity is moon dough. Baby oil and flour. My kids love it and it is vacuumed up really easily.
That sounds like a GREAT idea! 🙂
Aww hes getting cuter by the day! Great montessori ideas, as usual Vanessa 🙂
Love the pillbox open and close activity. And the shaving cream looks like so much fun!
Cute ideas. Was the rice cooked or dry?
Dry 🙂
I used to love playing with shaving cream while my dad was shaving! Great idea! By the way, I did a similar hide-and-seek exercise with my daughter, but instead of rice, I used Easter basket grass and plastic insects!
Such a cutie!! I just love all your ideas! I think half the fun is exploring around the house to find the next activity. Do you spend time hunting at consignment/thrift shops to for little do-dads?
Yep! I just look all over 🙂
I love these!
I love these it’s amazing to see how much they learn so quickly! My two year old knows his way around my iphone already it’s crazy lol! But I will be doing some of these activities as soon as my daughter is old enough can’t wait :]
These are all activities my 16mo would love! She is not interested in “baby toys” and prefers to fix things, like buckling her car seat, high chair, etc. and putting things together. I’ll have to try some of these ideas!
Awesome! I’m so glad you will give these activities a try! 🙂
Saw the pillbox activity on pinterest I came here to find details but I dont see it anywhere on this page 🙁
Hello Danielle, I decided to update the post and not use the pillbox because it probably is not a good idea to teach a child how to open a pillbox. Thank you for understanding.
Take care,
Vanessa