Advanced Practical Life

 The elementary aged children have been very much interested in practical life works. I am slowly but surely adding new items on the shelves to accomodate their interest and needs. I observed that they all liked the lock and key work that I had on the shelf before so I set up this.

                                                        The Combination Lock

                         The child must follow the four steps on the card to succesfully open the lock.
What I really enjoyed while observing them doing this work was how they had to really work hard on their hand eye coordination,and pincer grasp to line up the numbers with the dial.  They reviewed left and right.  Understanding how to count between numbers was also reviewed. There are a lot of  teachable moments with this work. I also heard one child say when they opened the lock "all I had to do was follow the directions". That is a great reward for a child to be able to recognize the process and the result on their own.
                                                                          

Having this work avaliable on the shelf allowed the children to understand the importance behind other works. Now they ask me "why did I put this on the shelf " asking about different works. I answered one of them using the correct language used to describe the aim of that particular work.  Then I asked her "why did you  think I put works on the shelf" ? She said "So we can have fun". That statement made my day.