Free Summer Printables and Montessori-Inspired Summer Activities

This will definitely be an unusual summer. But summer activities can still be both fun and educational. I have lots of great summer resources for parents, teachers, and caregivers of preschoolers through first graders. I also have a new Montessori-inspired summer pack for our newsletter subscribers’ resource library!

Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links (at no cost to you).

Montessori Shelves with Summer-Themed Activities

 

You’ll find Montessori-inspired summer numbers, letters, and and more (part of my subscriber freebie pack, so just sign up for my email to get the link and password … or check the bottom of your latest newsletter if you’re already a subscriber)

You could mix your summer-themed activities among your shelves according to curriculum area. Or you could have a special summer-themed area something like the one pictured. My shelves at the beginning of our unit have a mixture of skill levels mainly from preschooler through early elementary. Many of the activities can be adapted for a variety of levels. If you’re a homeschooler, just choose the activities that work for your child’s interests and ability levels. If you don’t have room for all the activities you’d like to do, simply rotate them.

Even though I have books on shelves, I keep the main Montessori-friendly books for our current theme in a book basket by the themed shelf. You’ll find a few of the books I’ve used here. I’ll publish a summer book post with more details at a later date.

Notice the framed Summertime (1894) by Mary Cassatt print. It’s a free download from Wikimedia … perfect for a Mary Cassatt artist feature for the month!

We used this fun Mary Cassatt book to go with the art print.

For our monthly featured art print, I purchased a Li’l DAVINCI art frame that opens in the front for easily changing a free art masterpiece printable or vintage illustration to fit with the month’s theme. The frame can be switched from horizontal to vertical without changing the hanger, which is perfect!

If you’re wondering about the rugs and rug box I use, both the rugs and wooden rug holder are from Montessori Services. I love the Montessori Services rugs and rug holder! I used to use an umbrella stand something like these. I loved that for 1-3 rugs, but I needed something different when I had more grandchildren and some projects that needed more than one rug.

The Big Book of Blooms and Work with Safari Ltd. Flowers TOOB and Free Flower Printables

My grandkids (2 year olds and 6 year old) all love the Big Book Series! The Big Book of Blooms is the newest book in the series and is fabulous like all the others. I love the series for toddlers (adapted as needed) through early elementary. It’s entertaining for a wide variety of ages!

Free Printable: Teaching with TOOBs: Flowers by Let’s Get Real at Teachers Pay Teachers

The free printable pack has a number of activities. The Teachers Pay Teachers description says they are:

• Photo Matching Game: Instead of a straight “matching the figure to a picture of the figure” approach, I use colorful photos of the animal or object to target the critical thinking skills of comparing and contrasting. To increase the level of difficulty, combine two or more sets.
• Roll and Cover Addition Game: Children roll the dice and cover the answer/photo with the matching TOOB figure. One mat can be used to play independently or with a partner. Several children can play if you have a collection of game mats and figures. The first one to cover all of their photos wins.
• Four-Part Game Cards: Play multiple games with four-part gaming cards. The Flowers set includes a name card, colorful photo, fun facts, and a “Syllable Sound-Off” game card.

I used the Safari Ltd. Flowers TOOB with the printable, dice for the roll and cover addition game, and glass gems for the syllable sound-off cards. I placed them all on a Multicraft tray.

I’m excited to use the free printables with all my grandkids. I already used the photo and Safari Ltd. flower matching with my 2-year-old grandson, Caleb. He loves matching, and he loved this activity!

Older children can enjoy working with the roll and cover addition game and four-part game cards.

The Big Book of Bugs and Work with Safari Ltd Insects and Arachnids and Free Puzzle Printables

The Big Book of Bugs is another amazing book from the Big Book Series.

Free Printable: Insects TOOB Key (that Safari Ltd. game me to host here).

Free Printable: Insect/Arachnid Toob Printable Puzzle by Pinay Homeschooler Shop at Teachers Pay Teachers

I love this printable from the Pinay Homeschooler! It goes with the Safari Ltd. insect and arachnid figures. I just used four of the puzzles on a tray for my 2-year-old grandchildren. Later, I’ll add more.

Work with Safari Ltd Butterflies TOOB, Key, and Color Matching with Montessori Color Box 3

Free Printable: Butterflies TOOB Key (that Safari Ltd. game me to host here).

I used the Safari Ltd. Butterflies TOOB along with Montessori color box 3. You can find DIY and inexpensive versions of the color box here.

I love using the Montessori color box 3 to match colors to Safari Ltd. figures. I first saw this activity by Momducator on Instagram. It’s not a traditional Montessori activity, but it’s such a great extension!

Work with Sandpaper Letters, Phonetic Objects, and a Mystery Bag

This is another non-traditional activity that’s perfect for working with letter sounds at home. While sandpaper letters are normally introduced alone, I’ve found that using the objects with the letters is so inviting for young children that they view learning letter sounds simply as a fun game. This is especially helpful in the home environment where there isn’t the positive peer pressure of students in a Montessori classroom who are working to learn their phonetic sounds.

My 2-year-old grandchildren are in love with miniature objects. I’m careful which ones are available so that they aren’t tempted to put them in their mouth. Often, with a featured letter for a unit, I might have objects that all start with the same sound. Caleb loves learning phonics so much that he knows almost all the phonetic sounds already. So I used summer-themed objects for s, m, t, a, p, f, c. As you can see, he loved the activity!

Letter S for Sun Font Cards with Salt Tray and “er” for Summer Phonogram Card

Free Printables: Sun letter s for salt writing tray (part of my subscriber freebie pack, so just sign up for my email to get the link and password … or check the bottom of your latest newsletter if you’re already a subscriber).

You’ll see a variety of simple letter writing trays in my previous unit study posts. I often used the wooden tray from the Melissa & Doug Lace and Trace Shapes. You can use whatever tray or container work best for you, though.

I typically now use this lovely spelling/alphabet tray from FamilyTreeWW on Etsy. Since Zoey is 6, she is focusing on spelling a lot. She needs more room for writing longer words. We’re also working on cursive. (Note: If that spelling/alphabet tray isn’t available, there some other great Montessori sand trays on Etsy.)

If you would like help with introducing phonetic sounds, introducing objects with sounds, or beginning phonics in general, check out my DIY Beginning Montessori Phonics with Preschoolers.

Cursive Movable Alphabet with Beach Ball Alphabet Cards in Manuscript and Cursive and er Summer Phonogram Work

Free Printable: Beach ball alphabet cards in manuscript and cursive (part of my subscriber freebie pack, so just sign up for my email to get the link and password … or check the bottom of your latest newsletter if you’re already a subscriber).

When we started working with cursive letters, I used a cursive tracing board with themed alphabet letters in manuscript and cursive. I got the 2-sided version (with capital letters on one side and lowercase on the other), since capital cursive letters aren’t commonly seen on written materials.

After tracing the letters on the tracing board, Zoey would  place the manuscript letters in alphabetical order. Then she matched each of the cursive letters to the manuscript letters. We don’t typically use the cursive tracing board now, but we’ve added the wooden cursive movable alphabet letters.

We’ve been using a traditional small wooden manuscript movable alphabet, although we’re now working with the cursive wooden movable alphabet. There are a number of price ranges available. You can find more movable alphabet resources in my “Inexpensive and DIY Movable Alphabets” post.

Free Printable Summer er phonogram card ( (part of my subscriber freebie pack, so just sign up for my email to get the link and password … or check the bottom of your latest newsletter if you’re already a subscriber).

Free Printable: er Sound with Letters from MontessoriSoul

I’m featuring er for summer as the phonogram for our unit. These activities are very simple to prepare. I simply print out and make booklets with the printables from MontessoriSoul. I have a post and video on how to introduce words starting with phonograms, even with very young children.

DIY Beach and Sea Star Cards and Counters

Free Printable: Beach and Ocean Number Cards 1-10 (part of my subscriber freebie pack, so just sign up for my email to get the link and password … or check the bottom of your latest newsletter if you’re already a subscriber)

I like to make DIY themed cards and counters to introduce odd and even and add interest and variety to cards and counters.

I thought it would be fun to use miniature sea stars for this activity. There are a variety of types and sizes of sea stars you can use. I chose a set that contained enough to have 55 for cards and counters 1-10 and allow for some broken sea stars because they’re so fragile. Using them is a special way for children to focus on handling materials gently.

Division Work with Beach Numbers and Sea Stars

Free Printables: Beach and Ocean Numbers and Symbols for a Division Equation (part of my subscriber freebie pack, so just sign up for my email to get the link and password … or check the bottom of your latest newsletter if you’re already a subscriber). We used the numbers 1-18.

I love to teach division as a sharing exercise. 6-year-old Zoey and 2-year-old Sophia and Caleb enjoyed some hands-on sharing. Zoey would choose a number divisible by 3 (18 in the photo) and share the sea stars equally (“One for you, one for you, one for me….”).”

When we were finished, they had fun using Micro Machines carefully around the sea stars (and Sophia made a bed for her sea stars on a silk leaf). In the photo, Zoey had made parking spaces  for Micro Machines alternating between her 6 sea stars. Caleb decided to put a sea star in the back of a Micro Machine pickup truck. Here, they’re all looking at the sea star in the pickup truck!

As long as materials are used gently, I don’t mind letting children in a home environment lead the activities in a variety of ways after an individual or group lesson. I love observing their creativity!

Free Montessori-Inspired Summer Pack

Montessori-Inspired Summer Pack for DIY Cards and Counters, Number or Letter Matching, Number or Letter Basket, Bead Bar Work, Hands-on Math Operations, Number or Letter Salt/Sand Writing Tray, Letter Tracing, DIY Movable Alphabet, and Creative Writing (subscriber freebie, so just sign up for my email to get the link and password – or check your inbox if you’re already a subscriber).

Free Summer Printables

I’m no longer publishing a list of free printables from other blogs for each theme. Many of the free printables get changed to paid printables or to subscriber freebies with new links. So it just became too difficult to keep all those links updated while adding new ones each month. Instead, I’ll be sharing many free summer printables (along with free holiday printables and some other types of free printables throughout our unit) as my Free Printable of the Day at our Living Montessori Now Facebook page. For the Free Printable of the Day, I try to share only instant downloads and other free printables that don’t require signing up for a mailing list.

Of course, be sure to check the activities above for links to the free printables I used. Those are typically instant downloads, although I’ll sometimes use a subscriber freebie from someone’s site. And I feature our subscriber pack for the month!

More Summer Resources, Including Many Free Printables

For more Montessori-inspired summer activities, check out these posts with lots of activities and resources:

• Top 10 Summer Themes for Preschoolers
• Montessori-Inspired Summer Themes and Activities
• Free Summer Songs and Rhymes for Circle Time
• 20 Outdoor Phonics Activities
• Montessori-Inspired Summer Playdough Activities
• Montessori-Inspired Activities for Casey at the Bat
• Montessori-Inspired Summer Activities with Spielgaben {Free Printables}
• Montessori Nature Tray with Vocabulary – Parts of the Plant
• How to Have a Healthy and Courteous Tea Party Picnic
• How to Have a Healthy and Courteous Teddy Bear Picnic
• 50+ Creative Ways to Use Materials Found on Your Nature Walks
• Free Summer Playdough Math Pack (Montessori-Inspired Instant Download)
• Montessori-Inspired Playdough Math Activities for Summer {Free Printables}
• Montessori Summer Resources for Classroom or Home
• Fun with Montessori-Inspired World Travel Activities and Games
• Free Travel Printables and Montessori-Inspired Travel Activities
• Summer-Themed, Editable Name and Word Tracing Pack
• Free Summer Printables and Montessori-Inspired Summer Activities
• Free Sun Do-a-Dot Phonics Printable (Montessori-Inspired Instant Download)
• Free Summer Songs and Educational Videos
• Free Summer Cutting Strips (Montessori-Inspired Instant Download)
• Free Summer Sports Printables and Montessori-Inspired Summer Sports Activities
• Montessori-Inspired Activities for Winter or Summer Olympics
• Free R for Run Do-a-Dot Phonics Printable (Montessori-Inspired Instant Download)
• Free Summer Sports Cutting Strips (Montessori-Inspired Instant Download)
• Olympic Unit Study Pinterest Board
• Summer Fun Pinterest Board

This article is included in Twinkl‘s blog – “12 Summer Solstice Celebrations Around the World”

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

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