If you’d like some Christmas cutting practice for your toddler or preschooler, I have some special cutting strips for you! These free Christmas bell cutting strips are even an instant download … super simple to access and prepare!
Montessori-Inspired Printables at Living Montessori Now
Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links (at no cost to you).
My daughter, Christina (a former Montessori child), and I are partnering to bring you a series of Montessori-inspired printables. (Note: Christina has some sweet themed kids’ fitness printables that are great for homes or classrooms!)
The printables are typically themed and use a number of Montessori principles (although you don’t need to be a Montessori teacher or homeschooler to use them). The cutting strips use photographs or realistic images to emphasize reality.
Preschoolers love to learn proper terminology, so I typically tell you the name of the objects or animals featured whenever I can. These are Christmas bells, so there isn’t a lot of vocabulary involved. You will see the bells listed on the credits page.
Free Christmas Bell Cutting Strips
To download, click here and then click on the file image in the upper right corner of the PDF to save to your computer (just choose where you want it saved).
Montessori-Inspired Activities Using the Christmas Bell Cutting Strips
Christmas Bell Cutting Strips with Basket
Cutting skills are so important for preschoolers. Two year olds can begin working on them, too. When children are first working on cutting skills, they’ll have an easier time cutting cardstock than paper. So, in the beginning, I recommend printing the strips on cardstock. Printer paper is fine for children with more advanced cutting skills.
But even before using cutting strips, I recommend using an easier object to cut, such as strings of beads. You’ll find lots of tips and ideas for teaching scissor skills in my post on developing scissor cutting skills with Montessori-inspired activities.
Basket with Christmas Bell Cutting Strips
I’m not sure where I got this basket, although the small Multicraft tray would work, too. I’ve always used Fiskar scissors for kids, which are sharp enough to cut paper easily.
For home use, I like to have a small container to catch the paper scraps. I used a small gift box we had, although you could use any small container. For younger children, I recommend keeping the basket or tray up out of reach when it’s not being used.
For classroom use, you might want to use Ziplock bags to catch the scraps. Children have fun taking their scraps home in a bag … or saving them to paste onto a collage.
You’ll find ideas for home and classroom setups in my post on Montessori-inspired paper cutting activities.
These free dinosaur cutting strips are perfect for a dinosaur theme. They include two dinosaurs and their skeletons.
Free Spiderweb Cutting Strips
These free spiderweb cutting strips are perfect for a spider unit or Halloween. Because of the beauty of the spiderwebs, they’re also great for children who are afraid of spiders.
Free Raccoon Cutting Strips
These free raccoon cutting strips can be used for a forest unit at any time or a Kissing Hand unit at the beginning of the school year.
Free Ant Cutting Strips
Many young children either love ants or are frightened of them. These free ant cutting strips can be helpful and high interest in either instance.
Free Snail Cutting Strips
Snails are fascinating creatures for many young children, and I have a post with free snail cutting strips.
Free Car Cutting Strips
Cars are a popular topic with many young children … and I have a post with free car cutting strips.
Free Recycling Cutting Strips
I have a post with free recycling cutting strips … a great way to focus interest on recycling!
Free Butterfly Cutting Strips
I have a post with free butterfly cutting strips … perfect for spring and summer activities!
Free Frog Cutting Strips
I also have a post with free frog cutting strips.
My granddaughter loves using the cutting strips to develop her scissor cutting skills. I hope your child (or students) enjoys using the cutting strips, too. 🙂
More Bell Posts
Free Bell Printables and Montessori-Inspired Bell Activities
Holiday Bell Sensory Bin with Scavenger Hunt
And don’t miss our subscriber freebie bell pack! You’ll get a monthly freebie (and previous monthly freebies) with link and password if you subscribe to the Living Montessori Now weekly newsletter!
Montessori Monday Link-Up
Except for content, this is a no-rules linky. If you have some Montessori-inspired activity trays/lessons to share, please link up below. They can be for home or classroom. It’s fine to link up a post from your archives – and you may link up anytime during the week! Your post may be any Montessori-inspired activity or idea. It doesn’t need to be related to my Montessori Monday post.
If you’re wondering what’s considered “Montessori inspired” and what to link up (or not link up), check out my “What Is Montessori Inspired?” post. Link up your exact post URL so that we can find your activity if we return to the linky at a later date. Don’t link to giveaway posts (unless the giveaway is only part of a Montessori-inspired post). Giveaways in general should go on my giveaway linky. Also, don’t link directly to products. You can link up a review of a Montessori product or activity post related to a Montessori product.
I publish the Montessori Monday post and linky each Monday morning and keep the linky open throughout the week. I do a lot of sharing on the Living Montessori Now Facebook page from the Montessori Monday link-up. Thanks for participating!
Notes: For community discussions, please join us at the Living Montessori Now Facebook page. And don’t forget the Saturday/Sunday weekend sharing days where you may share a kid-related activity of any kind at the Living Montessori Now Facebook page!
It’s also Motivational Monday on Mondays! I invite you to share something positive on the Bits of Positivity Facebook page (Bits of Positivity is my other blog) to help us all get a good start on the work/school week. You might share an inspirational or motivational quote, positive graphic, or post about finding balance or simplifying your life. Or you might share a post on organizing, an encouraging post, a post about making a difference in the world, or a positive parenting post. Just go ahead and share on the Bits of Positivity wall any time today! (Please “like” the Bits of Positivity Facebook page if you haven’t already.) I’ll be pinning a number of ideas to my regular Pinterest boards.
If you have a giveaway on your blog, please add it to my Family-Friendly Giveaway Linky Page! If you enjoy entering giveaways, you’ll always find lots of great giveaways there.
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Learn more about my eBook Montessori at Home or School: How to. Teach Grace and Courtesy! I’m also one of the coauthors of the book Learn with Play – 150+ Activities for Year-round Fun & Learning!If this is your first time visiting Living Montessori Now, welcome! If you haven’t already, please join us on our Living Montessori Now Facebook pagewhere you’ll find a Free Printable of the Day and lots of inspiration and ideas for parenting and teaching! And please follow me on Pinterest (lots of Montessori-, holiday-, and theme-related boards), Twitter (blog posts by me and others along with the Parent/Teacher Daily and other interesting information), and Google+ (post updates). You can find me on bloglovin’, Instagram, and YouTube, too.
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May be linked to Practical Mondays Link Up, Hip Homeschool Hop, The Mommy Club Resources and Solutions, A Little Bird Told Me Linky Party, Link-ups at Squishable Baby, Preschool Corner, Sharing Saturday, Tot School Gathering Place.
My son was so averse to cutting, he literally learnt by cutting his candy wrappings! I refused to open any of them, the poor fellow had to do it all by himself! haha.
Thanks for sharing! #practicalmondays
Found myself staring at it for minutes.