Montessori toys make the best playthings
A cosy, organised, safe, playful, and inspiring world – this is our idea of a Montessori room. It combines the clean and functional design of our products with elements of the timeless Montessori approach.
This is why at A Matter Of Style, we have combined our offerings into an interconnected, meaningful whole where the individual elements ideally complement each other. Offer children their own little world, where they can gradually acquire skills that will help them not to get lost in the “big world” is one of our more valuable missions.
Children naturally form closer bonds with playthings
In Montessori education, the environment plays a crucial role. So it’s not only about the toys children play with but also about where they play with them. The Montessori method recommends using toys and books that are rooted in reality. It means it should be inspired by the world around us rather than fantasies and made-up things.
It teaches that the child’s imagination develops naturally in the first 6 years of life and doesn’t need external fantasy sources – quite the contrary, the fairytale characters can actually confuse the little children’s understanding of what’s truthful and real.
They promote creative play—and teach cause and effect
The toy market is saturated with flashing lights, vivid colors, screens, and loud noises. These features offer immediate gratification for young children, but they also eliminate opportunities for imaginative play and problem-solving.
In addition to supporting cognitive milestones, Montessori toys tend to be simpler than flashy ones. Around 9 months, for example, babies begin to understand cause and effect more clearly: banging a block on the ground makes a noise, dropping one makes it disappear. Toys made of wood, such as block sets or puzzles, distill this concept to its essence: “when I do something, something else happens as a result.”
Also, Montessori toys offer an open-ended, beautiful, tactile canvas for children to explore at their own pace. When children play with toys that have extra bells and whistles, they tend to be restricted and directed.
“I do not believe there is a method better than Montessori for making children sensitive to the beauties of the world and awakening their curiosity.”
Gabriel García Márquez (Nobel Prize-Winning Author)
They’re a quiet introduction to the real world
Children learn about how the physical world works through toys: they are among the first objects they touch, mouth, and play with. With wooden toys, children learn about physics, cause and effect, object permanence, creativity, problem-solving, and many other foundational concepts.
It’s true that children can make noise with anything, but wooden toys support a quieter environment, free of the noise (as well as lights, and movement) that comes from many plastic toys.
They are made of natural materials
If somebody says Montessori toys, we often imagine shelves full of wooden toys. While not every wooden toy is a Montessori toy, it’s true that almost all Montessori-friendly toys are wooden toys. Wood has many benefits. It is a unique material that connects us to nature and provides a unique sensory experience for children of all ages. Also, it is safe and durable, so it can be used by children from an early age.
Montessori encourages children to explore toys and playthings in their own way; for babies and toddlers, that might involve repeated mouthing, throwing, and rolling. In other words, when choosing playthings, safety is an important consideration: which ones will last and remain safe as they age? Wood is among the safest materials nature provides for babies and children.
Montessori toys will inspire your child
Montessori toys are perfect for creating new worlds from scratch. Blocks and other wooden toys can be molded into whatever a child wants them to be, and they can follow a child’s development from simple symbolic play all the way to complex imaginative play. Montessori practitioners (and many other educators and caregivers) believe that simple, natural materials generate more meaningful engagement.
Kids can use their imaginations to build, invent, tinker, make-believe, and create whatever they want, whether they’re building a city, zooming a wooden car around, or making a train track.