I’ve been making some updates to the Montessori Physical Education curriculum lately, and I wanted to share a few highlights.
First up, the Hunting Bison lesson plan. This one now has clearer, more explicit rules, so it’s easier to follow and run right away. I also added new diagrams made in Canva to show how the game flows, where to set things up, how players move, and what roles they play. It feels much smoother and more intuitive now.
The Invention of Math lesson also got a refresh. I simplified the write-up so it’s easier to understand at a glance, added a few new gameplay elements to make it more interactive, and again, included some new visuals. The diagrams really help connect the dots for both the teacher and the students.
The last update isn’t about changing the lesson plans themselves but more about how I’ve been adapting them for one of my current lower elementary classes. One of this year’s classes is very young, with an overwhelming number of first-graders. They’re sweet and enthusiastic, but they also struggle to sit and listen for very long, especially at the start of a lesson. So I’ve been trying to keep things simple and get them moving as soon as possible. “Less is more” has definitely been my mantra.
This week, they were finishing up their studies on planets, stars, and space, so I pulled out a couple of lessons from the first Great Lesson: Nebula Tag and Cosmic Dance of the Elements. Both are simple, high-energy, and fit perfectly with what they’ve been studying. My concern was that they’d get bored if we stuck with one game for too long. I needed to keep it fresh, but still manageable. So I decided we’d do both.
We started with Nebula Tag, and I connected it to the experiment where students stir the water with bits of paper to represent how particles form globules. That little reminder clicked right away. Then, about halfway through class, before the energy started to dip, I had everyone take a quick seat while I explained the rules for Cosmic Dance of the Elements. This gave them a breather, and since they were tired from running, they were actually able to listen better. We played the second game for the rest of class, and by the end, they were calm and ready to talk through the debrief (again, which is not easy with this group)!
If your class sounds anything like mine, I’d definitely suggest combining these two lessons in one session. It keeps the kids moving, keeps their attention, and creates a natural rhythm between high energy and quiet focus. Sometimes, the best adjustments aren’t about rewriting lessons at all, but about reading the room and finding the right balance for your students.