Montessori Sound Cabinet with Sound Objects

Description

 

 

Montessori Sound Cabinet by Montessorily

What is a Montessori Sound Cabinet? It has multiple drawers for organizing and storing the sound objects for playing sound games and other language work. Sound objects are miniatures or small items representing common things and objects in our life, ranging from, household items, vehicles, food, animals, plants, etc. They should be items that the child already knows and remembers from his daily life.

Each drawer is labeled by individual letter sound, with the corresponding sound objects stored in it. The letters generally represent the beginning sounds of the objects. With the sound cabinet, the objects are sorted by their sounds. The child could learn more systematically. Parents could use record sheets to track which sounds are introduced, practiced, or mastered while the child continues to work on new sounds.

The Sound Cabinet comes with over 60 sound objects which covers all the 26 letters, with each sound having at least one object, and some sounds with 2-3 objects. It is intended to be a beginning set of objects that the parent can start with. They can collect more miniatures that suit their child’s interest.

The key of the sound cabinet, is to make the once-in-a-life-time language journey a beautiful, fun, interactive and memorable one!

Lettering Labels

The letter labels are supplied for the parents to apply on the cabinet surface (together with the child, if you wish). Some additional illustrations for the letter labels are also included, should parents decide to use alternate illustration for the letters.

Usage

Here are the steps recommended for using the sound cabinet along with other Montessori language materials.

1. Familiarize the child with the objects and sounds only, with I-Spy games, so that the child is able to recognize the beginning sound and say it. (You can look up I-Spy Games or Montessori Sound Games for more details on how to do it)
2. Introduce the symbol of each beginning sound ONE BY ONE with the object and sound the child already know. For example, this is c, c-a-t, c for cat, this is how we write “c.”
3. You may use the Montessori Sandpaper Letters to trace the letter as each letter is introduced. The muscle memory and the movement of tracing help to engrain the letter in the Child’s mind easily.
4. After the child can recognize the beginning sounds, go on to analyze the ending sounds of the words, and then work on the middle sounds. Repeat sound games with objects. Object matching with letter sounds or sorting objects by sounds are useful at this stage.
5. Finally, use the movable alphabet to assist the child to construct a word independently. Show him an object, analyze the sounds, c-a-t, and let him find the letters and put the word together.

This is a process that could take as short as a few months, but for most non-English speaking families, it could take up to a year or more. Be prepared and be patient, and be amazed by the child’s ability to absorb and learn!

Background

When I started working on the design of the project, I was using a plastic drawer cabinet with plain labels. But as I observe the children’s interest level, I knew it has to be beautiful and eye catching, and what’s better than a natural material like wood. For the labels, instead of a plain letter, Vivien Chu, another Montessori mom friend kindly designed and painted the labels with her amazing water color illustrations. The font types were carefully chosen to be on par with the Montessori preferred fonts. We offer two options of letter font, cursive or print letters. You can choose which font to work with the child. Introduce one type first, and only when the child masters it, introduce the other. Please note that for cursive letters, only lower case letters are featured on the label, while for print letters, both upper case and lower case letters are featured. In a Montessori classroom, lower case letters are introduced first.

Age Recommendation

The Sound Cabinet with Sound Objects is suggest for 3 years old and up. Adult Supervision is always recommended during use. Beware of choking hazard, in particular the smaller miniature objects if you have younger children at home that is still in the mouthing stage.

Cabinet Information

• Cabinet:  33 cm wide x 33 cm tall x 15 cm deep.
• Drawers:
  • Exterior: 5.5 cm x 5.5 cm x 12 cm
  • Interior: 4.5 x 4 x 10.5 cm.
• Material: Pine wood
• Weight: ~ 3.5 kg.

Please note: we will update the list of the sound object list from time to time, and the set that comes with each sound cabinet may be slightly different.