My children love activities that involve natural materials. Where there is something for them to hold, feel, touch. Where there is something that is interesting, with fascinating little details. Today I am featuring some Montessori Shell Activities that I know you will love.  

Above and below is a shell sorting activity that I presented to Otis this week. The child sorts the shells (into the large jars) into Univalve or Bivalve.  

The Shell Poster (left in top picture) is from Montessori Materials and the Univalve/Bivalve sheet is from Montessori for Everyone. 

Cleaning a large shell - Brosser un gros coquillage at Le blog de Sylvie d'Esclaibes. This is a fantastic idea, most of our shells are unclean and could do with a good scrub! 

Matching shells to cards - Apprendre avec des coquillages at Les ateliers de Céleste Pédagogie Montessori et éducation biologique. This post has a free download of the shell cards. Another example of matching shells to cards can be found at Les aventures chez nounou Marie.

Sea shell sorting with cards with labels at Very Montessori. I believe they are using the lovely shell collection and matching cards from Michael Olaf! The cards have the name of the shell which introduces the language component and allows the parent or caregiver to provide the child with the correct terminology. 

This is from one of my favorite nature tables (which included lots of shells) where Otis is making imprints with the shells into sand. 

I remember one of Caspar's favorite activities when he first started in his Cycle One classroom (in Canberra as a three-year-old) was a tray with all different types of shells and a simple magnifying glass. There is something special about sea shells!