Montessori | Language

 Montessori language work with toddlers follows a particular progression and can cover a wide variety of topics and interests.

A language shelf may have baskets or trays with objects that are all related by type, area, or subject, such as a kitchen tools basket. This is a concrete, visual way to group objects of the same category together. These are often called language baskets or treasure baskets.

You are also likely to find trays with replicas or small objects with cards that have an exact picture and size of those objects to match. These are called exact match language works.

You will likely also find cards that have real-life photographs of the replicas or objects on a tray with them. These are similar matching cards and objects.

As the difficulty progresses towards the bottom of the shelf, you may find baskets of just picture cards, called nomenclature cards, as well as go-together card sets or opposite cards. On a Montessori shelf, work progresses from easiest to hardest, left to right, top to bottom.