Review, Part 2: World Classification Photo Cards by Laughing Star Montessori

We were so fortunate to receive three items from Laughing Star Montessori from their World Classification Photo Cards Series. With this series, you receive a pdf that contains cards that are meant to be cut out and laminated, as well as a directions cards. The directions card for each one of the pdfs received was great, in that it laid out how you could use the cards.

Our family was already familiar with their World Classifications Cards Series, as we had purchased the wonderful Caribbean Sea Life Cards and the all of the World Animals Black line Masters at last year's Montessori conference in Sarasota, so we already knew how nice their cards and masters are before even trying out these cool pdfs. 
We love what we had purchased from them last year and were just thrilled to get to try out their pdfs. We actually took the Caribbean Sea Life Cards with us when we went on our Caribbean cruise and will do this again when we go back to the Caribbean in the future. Was so nice for the boys to be able to identify many of the Caribbean sea creatures, largely due to using these cards and doing this work.



World Transportation - Elementary
This pdf included a directions card plus fifteen land vehicles, fifteen air vehicles, and fifteen water vehicles photo cards per continent, as well as land, air and water label cards.
The photos on the cards are great. The variety and interesting attention to detail makes this transportation work enticing to an elementary aged student, as we quickly found out with Big Bro.

Even though this work is geared for Elementary, both boys enjoyed the cards. Big Bro did them as a work as suggested by Laughing Star...
Little Bro had fun using the cards as sorting cards for land / air / water transportation.
Both boys also had a great time playing a version of I Spy, where they had to look for vehicles similar to the ones on the cards while we were on vacation.

World Reptiles - Primary
This included a directions card plus eight cards per continent with the label of each reptile underneath the photo of the animal (It includes seven reptiles per continent, plus one Montessori color coded Continent card per Continent.). Little Bro used these cards and enjoyed working with them. He learned a great deal about reptiles using these cards.


World Reptiles - Elementary
This included a directions card plus eight cards per continent with a two to three sentence description of each reptile underneath the animal. The descriptions present interesting facts to the child, but also could be used either for discussion during group time or else, as sentences for copy work, if the cards are being used in a homeschool setting that uses copy work in conjunction with Montessori presentations. Big Bro loved these cards!
He also used the sentences on the cards for grammar work. Big Bro copied the sentences from the cards onto paper and then, used the grammar symbols to do the grammar work.

By having both the Primary and the Elementary cards, I was able to compare the two sets of cards. It is nice for a younger child to just be given the name of the animal, but then, it works great for an older child to have more factual information on each card. Really makes the lesson presentations and the accompanying Montessori work very age appropriate, although you can use the older cards with younger children and have that work pretty well, too. It all depends on if you want to be able to use the cards for the purposes of naming the animals or for being able to learn some neat facts to accompany the names.  
Again, highly encourage you to check out  Laughing Star Montessori. They have terrific materials for both the classroom and homeschool,  including their newest offer of high quality,   affordable pdfs, as well as free downloads for you to try.

There are also some things that would work great as holiday gift items, especially the two woodworking books, Children Can Build! and Children Can Build More! 

Laughing Star Montessori also offers a free newsletter you can sign up for that will keep you up-to-date about any special offers they have. they also offer free shipping in the continental U.S. only.  

Full disclosure: 
 Our family was given six free pdfs to try in exchange for an honest, thorough review of their materials. 

The feedback is my honest perception as to how my sons enjoyed using these materials, how effective these materials were at presenting concepts, and the quality of the materials we were given.

Laughing Star Montessori Review, Part 1 (Beautiful Handwriting Series)

Recently, our family had the privilege to get to review some wonderful Montessori materials made by Laughing Star Montessori. The materials were sent as compressed files so it was super easy to download all of the files at once.Laughing Star Montessori sent us included three items from their Beautiful Handwriting Series, as well as three items from their World Classification Photo Cards Series.

In order to be able to share a comprehensive review about Laughing Star Montessori, am breaking the review down into two parts, Beautiful Handwriting Series and World Classification Cards Series...
In this post, will focus on telling you about the three items from their Beautiful Handwriting Series.

From their website:
"Beautiful Handwriting" was created in Montessori classrooms 20 years ago. It is based on a 3-period sequence~students trace, then copy, then compose. Use it to introduce the correct formation of cursive, D'Nealian or Print writing when children are drawn to it, usually ages 4 - 4.5 for girls and 4.5 - 5.5 for boys. 
 
This series includes recommendations for supplies, suggestions for lesson presentations, and ideas for extensions.


First, we sampled Letter Writing and then, Number Writing...
These two pdfs are designed to help a child learn letter and number formations, as well as how to trace or copy letters and numbers. If you have a child who is trying to learn the correct way to form either letters or numbers, these pdfs are very helpful. What makes them nice is that they are not overly cluttered, but instead, are very straightforward, with nice, clean, simple drawings for each concept. They effectively worked at helping both of my sons to work on their handwriting.  Little Bro used both the number and letter writing practice pages, while Big Bro just tried out the number writing. The best thing was that both boys really took pride in doing their writing and enjoyed their work. What is also nice is that the booklets contain blank templates for additional practice or for extensions...


Then, what ended up being just a huge hit with the boys is the  
Farm Story Masters...
First, a basic lesson for story writing is given to the child.
This pdf contains wonderful directions on how to do this in a Montessori inspired way.
Then, children trace and illustrate their own farm animal stories to practice writing on lines.
In addition to having a child trace and then illustrate their stories, they can  also copy stories onto lined paper for additional writing practice. An explanation is also given on how to have a child use the Farm Story Masters to find parts of speech and to use grammar symbols or stamps. There are many options for using the Farm Story Masters...

In our Montessori inspired homeschool, each day as we were reading realistic books about farm animals, Big Bro and Little Bro then added a page to their own Farm Animals book.
They each selected different animals and then, would share their work with each other.
 Big Bro did the suggested work of using his farm animal pages with our box of wooden grammar symbols. He seemed to really enjoy doing this work.
Little Bro did a different extension with this work.
He had a basket filled with farm animals and had to find the animal as he read the page about the animal in his book. He then did an additional extension using both the Farm Masters and the Number writing Masters. Little Bro sorted the basket of farm animals and then, counted and wrote the numbers of each group on a paper.
They also did a very fun extension together by making a little farm finger puppet show to go with what they had learned. 


The Farm Story Masters are excellent...very effective at getting the boys to enjoy their handwriting work. If you have a child who is generally a reluctant writer, as Big Bro can be at times, try this set of Farm Story Masters. What a difference! 
So much fun yet such good writing practice, as well as opportunities for multi-sensory learning extensions, too.


All in all, the pdfs that Laughing Star Montessori sent were high quality, very interesting, and well planned. We feel so blessed to have been able to review their products for them and to tell you about their products, as both boys really enjoyed these as Montessori inspired activities!

 Please be sure to check out Laughing Star Montessori to see these great products.
They would be nice additions to any Montessori inspired homeschool or classroom. They are also quite affordable. They offer a wide range of  materials that are very professionally made and already laminated for you, as well as their newest offer of excellent,  affordable pdfs, plus some
free downloads for you to try.

Full disclosure: 
 Our family was given six free pdfs to try in exchange for an honest, thorough review of their materials. 

The feedback is my honest perception as to how my sons enjoyed using these materials, how effective these materials were at presenting concepts, and the quality of the materials we were given.