Montessori-Inspired Playdough Math Activities for Summer {Free Printables}

Since playdough is so popular with young children (and great for fine-motor coordination), I’ve been designing some playdough math activities for each season. Now we have free playdough printables for fall, winter, spring, and summer. Today, I have some Montessori-inspired playdough math activities for you using the summer math printables.

Free Summer Playdough Math Pack (Montessori-Inspired Instant Download)

You’ll find the free summer playdough math pack in yesterday’s Montessori Monday post. It has printables for activities related to seasons, fine-motor skills, counting, DIY cards and counters, addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, greater than, and less than. Go here to download the free pack.

Montessori-Inspired Playdough Math Activities for Summer

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Here are some examples of activities you could have on summer playdough trays.

Montessori-Inspired Snake Playdough Math Tray

Materials used:

• Montessori Services large plastic tray
• Green playdough from my spring playdough math tray (See recipe in my “How to Prepare a Simple Spring Playdough Tray” post. The playdough lasts so long that it’s still soft and fresh!)
• Container for playdough
• Summer photo playdough mats, printed and laminated
• Numbers and counters cards, printed and laminated
• Number and number symbol squares, printed and laminated
• Small containers to organize pieces
• Sponge for cleaning surfaces after using playdough

This tray was designed for a homeschool or classroom with multiple ages. Younger children would generally create playdough snakes to make a picture or to make the snakes for one number. Older children could use the playdough snakes for addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, greater than, or less than. If you have one child, prepare the activity to be appropriate for your child’s age and ability level.

Making Snakes Using the Playdough Numbers and Counters Cards

This is a fun variation of Montessori cards and counters. I recommend choosing a number your child is working on. In a classroom, you could have the numbers 1-10 available and let the children choose which number they want to use.

My 3-year-old granddaughter, Zoey, used the 9 card to make 9 snakes. She made 9 playdough balls on the card and then rolled each ball into a snake. It’s nice if your child has practiced making worms with the spring playdough pack, since it takes more coordination to roll the playdough into the thinner snakes.

Playdough Snake Addition

This is a simple hands-on addition activity. The playdough snakes could be used for simple hands-on addition, subtraction, multiplication, or division.

Montessori-Inspired Golf Ball Playdough Math Tray

I typically put out one of the playdough math trays at a time, so you can use the same green playdough for this one.

Materials used:

• Montessori Services large plastic tray
• Green playdough from my spring playdough math tray (See recipe in my “How to Prepare a Simple Spring Playdough Tray” post.)
• White playdough using the recipe in my “How to Prepare a Simple Spring Playdough Tray” post or “How to Prepare a Simple Winter Playdough Tray” post
• Container for playdough
• Summer photo playdough mats, printed and laminated
• Numbers and counters cards, printed and laminated
• Number and number symbol squares, printed and laminated
• Playdough rolling pin (Playdough Tools, such as the Melissa & Doug tools, which I often use)
• Golf tees
• Small containers to organize pieces
• Sponge for cleaning surfaces after using playdough

Making Golf Balls Using the Playdough Numbers and Counters Cards

For the golf ball work, Zoey lightly rolled out some green playdough for grass, added 6 golf tees, made the number 6 with playdough, made 6 playdough balls, and placed 6 playdough golf balls on the tees. It took lots of fine-motor coordination and concentration to balance the playdough golf balls on the tees!

Zoey was proud of her completed work! She repeated the activity a few times before putting it away.

Golf Ball Playdough Greater Than/Less Than Activity

This is a fun reinforcement for the greater than, less than symbols. If your child is confused by the greater than and less than symbols, be sure to check out my greater than, less than alligator work.

More Montessori-Inspired Playdough Activities for Summer

Montessori-Inspired Playdough Activities 101

Montessori-Inspired Summer Playdough Activities

This post is part of the 12 Months of Montessori Series 2017!

12 Months of Montessori Series – Summer Themes

Check the posts below for a variety of summer themes.

• Montessori Theme Ocean Preschool Activities & Printables | Natural Beach Living
• Handwriting Flower Activities for Kids {Montessori-Inspired Printable} | The Natural Homeschool
• Montessori-Inspired Playdough Math Activities for Summer {Free Printables} | Living Montessori Now
• Montessori Inspired Seed Study (Free Fruits & Seeds 3-Part Card Printable) | Mama’s Happy Hive
• Montessori Friendly Books for Summer | The Kavanaugh Report
• Montessori Inspired Farm Activities for Preschoolers | The Pinay Homeschooler

I hope your child or children have fun with some hands-on learning activities this summer! 🙂

Learn more about my eBook Montessori at Home or School: How to. Teach Grace and Courtesy!

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