letter writing montessori style

Who doesn’t love mail?

In our house, my daughter is the official mail opener. Any card she receives she rereads daily for weeks, and then hoards it in her specail paper box. Or, if the card is from my mom, it usually sings, and then she and everyone in the family listens to tinny renditions of You Say It’s Your Birthday. So, in a class of preschoolers and kindergarteners, what better work could there be to encourage writing than letter writing, complete with mailbox and delivery person.

This mailbox, while very cute, is temporary. I made this one for Imogen about two years ago and it is just on loan. If you are interested, I followed this tutorial. I have a more permanent one planned, I just need to find it and buy it.

This is what’s on the tray:

Basket of envelopes (Dollar Tree has boxes of 80, for you know, $1)
Box holding pictures of all the children in the class with their name on the bottom. I had planned on making a directory of all the children with their pictures on one piece of paper, but we had these individual cards already prepared from our classroom children 3 part card work.
Cup of colored pencils and a writing pencil
Half sheets of paper

Presentation:

The child takes the work to the table
The child finds the picture of the friend they want to send a letter to
Child writes the letter and draws a picture
The child puts the letter in the envelope
The child writes the name of the recipient on the envelope, or asks an adult or older child to write the name for them
The child places the envelope in the mailbox and checks that the flag is up!
The work is returned to the shelf

We are not limiting this work to the children who can write, it is a work that is available to all that have had a lesson. For the older children, we are really encouraging them to write a letter. In kindergarten we write thank-you notes monthly, so they understand starting a letter with dear and signing it, and now we are talking about that as we give this lesson to our second year children. Our younger children are working hard just copying the names of their friends onto the envelope, and they are loving it.

At the end of the morning work cycle, we invite a child that is able to read to deliver the envelopes to the folders of the recipients – it is usually rather full!

Letter writing has become a very popular work in the short time that it has been on the shelf. I am excited to see where it goes and what other works that will evolve from it.