Parents' Guide to

Montessori 1st Operations

By Dana Anderson, Common Sense Media Reviewer

age 5+

Math concept work with clear instruction and fun rewards.

App iPhone , iPod Touch , iPad , Android , Kindle Fire Paid Education
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A Lot or a Little?

What you will—and won't—find in this app.

  • Montessori 1st Operations App: Screenshot #1
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Privacy Rating Warning

  • Unclear whether personal information is sold or rented to third parties.
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  • Personalised advertising is displayed.
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  • Unclear whether this product creates and uses data profiles for personalised advertisements.
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What’s It About?

Create a user profile. Then kids tap an activity: addition, subtraction, doubles, or halves. Hear a brief explanation of the concept. Tap the arrow to move to the activity. In the addition activity, the Montessori number rods appear and the narrator says: "Can you solve this addition? Two plus three equals..." Corresponding number rods are shown. Kids slide the 5 number rod into place to solve. Tap Monster Lab to view points earned, purchase from the monster shop, and build a monster.

Is It Any Good?

Our review:
Parents say: Not yet rated
Kids say: Not yet rated

MONTESSORI 1ST OPERATIONS approaches math concepts from different ways, while providing clear instructions about the concepts: "To add up means to put together." Visuals -- such as number rods and counters, and monster parts of all shapes and sizes -- and audio explanations take center stage here, while number symbols are secondary, especially useful for kids who don't take to numerical digits. The games adapt to each user's performance. Unlike some Montessori-based activities, however, kids earn points based on the amount they complete; they use these points to buy parts of monsters to build. The noises that the monsters make are far more frenzied and goofy than one will find on other Montessori-based apps or real-life learning activities, but users can turn off the sounds on the start page.

An excellent Note to Parents section, 11 languages, and detailed settings make Montessori 1st Operations kid- and parent-friendly. While not as clearly aligned with traditional Montessori style as some other recent Montessori-based apps, Montessori 1st Operations is still a good choice to help kids understand the concepts behind math and play with those concepts in new ways.

Talk to Your Kids About ...

  • Create a username for each kid and make use of the many settings to customize play to each kid's current math level.

  • As kids build their reward monsters, discuss how many points each part costs, why they may cost that much, and ask kids how they decided which parts to spend their points on.

App Details

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