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JennGM
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| Posted: Oct 19 2005 at 1:05pm | IP Logged
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Ds at the old age of 2 wants to dress himself now. I'm trying to breakdown steps to putting on shirts and pants. I could do this on my own, but then I thought that Montessorians have probably already mastered and know the best way to teaching this. Is there someplace where I can find this written down that I can relate to him? In Hainstock's book? (I loaned my copy). Online links would be even more helpful! Thanks for any help or hints!
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Jennifer G. Miller
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Family in Feast and Feria
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Marybeth
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| Posted: Oct 19 2005 at 10:42pm | IP Logged
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Jenn,
You are such a good Mom! I just gave ds the clothes and let him figure it out or watch me.  I didn't even think to break it down for him. 
Marybeth
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JennGM
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| Posted: Oct 20 2005 at 8:27am | IP Logged
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Maybe it was the memory of my mother teaching us how to put our coats on. I think it's a little Montessori thing. You lay the coat down on a flat surface, front side up, arms and neck upside down. The child slips his arms into the armholes and flips the coat over onto himself.
I just wondered if there were other tricks. Two nights ago "dressing himself" without any coaching means he's running around with a diaper.  He likes to keep trying, but not satisfied with the final product. 
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Jennifer G. Miller
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Family in Feast and Feria
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Tina P.
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| Posted: Oct 25 2005 at 9:34am | IP Logged
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My 2 yo likes to run around as *un*dressed as he can possibly be! A diaper is his favorite bit of clothes. We've tried the underwear over the diaper with lots of oohs and aahs, but he's not buying it. He'd rather wear a diaper, and that alone, than anything else on this earth. *sigh* So I suppose we have a few more months of diapering him. Thank goodness for nappy sacks. 
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Genevieve
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| Posted: Oct 26 2005 at 6:48am | IP Logged
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In Kim's comment, she mentions videos which might be what you are looking for.
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Genevieve
The Good Within
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JennGM
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| Posted: Nov 03 2005 at 8:53am | IP Logged
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My sister just sent a link for reasonably priced Dressing Frames from Oriental Trading Company. Looks good!
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Jennifer G. Miller
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Mari
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| Posted: March 17 2006 at 7:49am | IP Logged
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Hi there,
I will try to bring in some of my thoughts of dressing in a Montessori environment. Practical life (everyday work activities such as care of oneself and of the environment - cleaning tables, laying the table, watering plants) is the most important thing to help "normalise" (Montessori term) a small child. Practical life activities are important for developing self- worth/esteem which is all important for the healthy development of a child.
Dressing definitely comes under this. My kids learned to dress very early on. I always let them choose there clothes - when they are very young you can just get them to chose between two things (or if you need them to dress in a certain way when they are older, just give them two options or colours that mix and match!)
I came across the Montessori dressing frames and made some myself - about 8 of them - it's not difficult you just need start looking for the velcro, buckles etc. I just glued the frames together. In any case, they looked great (to me!) and the kids really used them way more than I had ever hoped, even after they had mastered it. Another way for buttons and zips would be to put an appropriate sized shirt/jacket done up over the back of a chair....then you have your dressing frame ready for unbuttoning /unzipping.
What is great about the frames is that they have their place on the shelf and whenever it takes their fancy, a child can choose one and concentrate on it 100% without any distractions. This level of 100% concentration where the child forgets all else, just repeating his needs, is what Montessori aims for.
Follow on activities can be folding clothes (just folding in half is fine for starters beginning). To isolate this task for the child to concetrate it can be done with a square napkin (folding vertically, diagonally, in halves, quaters,etc)
Also matching socks is fun even if the child's hands are not yet developed enough to fold them together. It will also help out with the laundry!!! Matching colours, sizes, etc is fun and real "work" i.e. participating (therefore helping develop self esteem).
The result will be that your child will probably want to dress and do shoes up on most occasions. What we must do to help and encourage is to make sure we give them plenty of time. It can be difficult when we are late and it is the 10th time they still trying to get the last bit of the shoe lace right. I always explained that we were going out in 15 minutes (or longer with older kids) which would give them time to finish or bring to a pause what they are doing (always trying to respect the child's activity as being as important as our need to go out).
I have always found that children understand and appreciate being informed of plans from a really young age - or things we may not even think about telling them. But if another adult were accompanying us, we would be courteous and inform he or she what we intended to do in advance wouldn't we!
I know I have probably wondered off the subject matter but I hope something in this is useful to somebody!
Good luck to all the little dressers!
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Mari, mother of 2 loving daughters aged 8 and 10
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amyable
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jenngm67 wrote:
| My sister just sent a link for reasonably priced Dressing Frames from Oriental Trading Company. Looks good! |
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I didn't use these particular ones, but bought another set of vinyl dressing frames. They were so stiff the kids hated them - there wasn't enough "give" to allow easy buttoning, snapping, or buckling. Maybe these are different though - they look like a softer vinyl (mine were much more "plastic-y" looking  )
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Mari
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| Posted: March 18 2006 at 4:59am | IP Logged
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Sorry - I meant to add this to my message above. For actual dressing details please see Shu-Chen Jenny Yen's site (that has been proposed on another thread) Shu-Chen Jenny Yen's site
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Mari, mother of 2 loving daughters aged 8 and 10
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Jen L.
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| Posted: March 18 2006 at 1:53pm | IP Logged
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My 2-5 year olds have always enjoyed the Preschool Power videos that Kim posted about. There are quite a few of them available in the Fairfax County library system (you could travel a few miles, or get them interlibrary loan if yours doesn't have them)
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"...the best state in which to glorify God is our actual state; the best grace is that of the moment..." St. Peter Eymard
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4Real Forums : Nurturing the Years of Wonder
Topic: Steps to Dressing Self
