Warning: Unorthodox Use of Math Beads for Christmas!

WARNING:  What follows is NOT a recommended Montessori work -- just plain old fun and the result of having traditional materials in our home.  :)

So as you can see from the photo below of our Math Bead Cabinet it stands merely 10 feet away from our Christmas tree this year.  It was far too tempting to use the Golden Beads as a garland--WHY HASN'T ANYONE TRIED THIS BEFORE?  :) 

See the sparkly Christmas lights on the left?

"Alleluia" has been home with a stomach bug and, well, we got a little bored, so after wrapping the tree with the Golden Beads it seemed natural to build the Pink Tower (to look like gifts under the tree).

We got a little distracted by the trash truck driving by......

But wait--there's more!  Then we noticed that there are 10 cubes in the Pink Tower, just like there are 10 cubes in our Math Bead Cabinet.  So we had to see the cubes near each other.... (this is starting to sound like "If You Give a Mouse a Cookie.")

Hmmm.  That's neat.  There are 10 pink cubes and 10 cubes in the bead cabinet.

All joking aside, although the incorrect use of the Montessori materials is not encouraged, it is important for children to make connections between and among the materials of the classroom.  One benefit of having a classroom at home is being able to be a little more lax about rules sometimes.

While the bead cabinet is a "Math" work and the tower is considered "Sensorial" work, the tower provides indirect preparation for math (our math is done in base 10, for instance).

And in other news, when we extracted the Advent wreath from the attic we learned what the summer's heat can do to wax candles--MELT THEM!  Just a little free science lesson.....

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