I have recently introduced a Montessori Stereognostic bag to my 18-month-old toddler with great success. I quickly learned that these mystery bags provide endless opportunities for fun and learning while improving the stereognostic sense.
Stereognostic sense or Tactile gnosis is the ability to identify objects employing touch alone. Stereognostic or mystery bags in Montessori form part of the sensorial curriculum where they assist children from 3 to 6 years to refine their Stereognostic sense.
The best part about these mystery bags is that anyone can put this activity together at no cost and it can easily be tweaked to suit children at every age.
Everything you need to know about Stereognostic/Mystery bags in Montessori
Stereognostic bags, also known as Mystery bags, are traditionally introduced at age 3 as part of Montessori’s Sensorial curriculum. They are usually found under the haptic or Stereognostic category. The other sensorial categories are:
- Thermic
- Baric
- Auditory
- Visual
- Olfactory
- Gustatory
What is a Stereognostic bag?
The Stereognostic bag is traditionally a drawstring bag with a silk lining. A few known objects of different sizes and textures are placed inside the bag. The child is invited to feel inside the bag, without looking, and describe or find specific items. There are many extensions and variations of games to be played depending on the child’s age and verbal abilities.
What is the purpose of a stereognostic bag?
Montessori education is known for placing a strong emphasis on learning through senses and the Stereognostic bags are a fine example.
‘What the hand does, the mind remembers’
MARIA MONTESSORI
The purpose of the Stereognostic bag is to help the child develop a wide range of skills and cognitive functions:
- Material visualization
- Tactile sense
- Working memory
- Concentration
- Increased vocabulary
- Haptic sense
- Preparation for geometry
- Spatial awareness
How do you use a stereognostic bag?
This is one of those brilliant activities that is genius in its simplicity. It consists of these 3 basic steps:
- Choose a bag
- Object selection
- Presentation
This is just the jumping-off point and the basic framework that you can build on and create dozens of activities for children aged 18 months to 6 years.
#1 Find a bag
It is recommended to use an ‘attractive’ bag. The traditional Montessori bag has a silky lining but I’m sure you don’t have to go that far. You could easily fashion a bag out of a pillowcase.
Make sure the bag is big enough for the child to reach in with both hands and feel around inside.
#2 Object selection
- The objects must be items your child can name
- The objects must be very different from each other in shape and texture
- The younger the child – the fewer the objects
- Look for items with interesting tactile qualities
#3 Presentation
You invite your child to sit next to you at a table or to roll out a mat on the floor. You ask your child to reach into the bag and either find something specific or choose and identify an object. The presentation will be different depending on the child’s age.
A Mystery bag for every age
Babies (0-1)
Babies enjoy heuristic play (exploring real-life objects). You can use discovery baskets from the time your baby starts to crawl. This is a precursor for the mystery bag and even though it doesn’t make use of the stereognostic sense, it is still a sensorial activity that makes use of the tactile and visual senses. It is also considered an exploratory activity.
An open basket is filled with items for your baby to explore. You can place the basket near their movement area where they can see it and reach for it or place it on a low shelf within eyesight.
The basket can be filled with familiar or unfamiliar objects as long as they are safe for a baby to interact with on their own. The items should be real-life objects that are sensorily interesting.
- shiny/matt
- rough/smooth
- hard/soft
- scratchy/silky
The contents of these baskets can also be themed
- Kitchen items
- Things we find in nature
- Self-care
- Shapes
- Colors
18 months and up
Start by first explaining to them that you don’t want them to look inside and that you want them to feel with their hands. Look into their eyes when explaining and keep their gaze while they reach into the bag. You can give them a little demonstration by closing your eyes and reaching inside the bag with two hands.
Remember they might not get this from the start. They will want to peak and might not be able to do this while closing their eyes. It’s a lot of coordination so just have patience and have fun.
When you introduce a stereognostic bag to an 18-month-old you should start with 2 – 3 items. You can add more if they need more of a challenge later on. These items should be very well known to your child.
If they are verbal and can name the items – you can ask them to name them at the end but you should probably just start by asking them to find the ball or block or toothbrush.
Once they have found the item they can take it out of the bag to inspect it more closely.
2 years old
At 2 years old your child will probably be able to name the objects so you can ask them to feel around the bag and tell you what they find. Ask them if they can describe it to you. Is it smooth or rough? Warm or cold? Light or heavy?
The 3 objects should be familiar to the child and the purpose should not be to test them. This is about exploration and focussing on specific senses. If your child is not verbal enough to name the objects you can continue asking them to find the item you name. You can ask them yes or no questions regarding the qualities of the item.
When they have found the item and described it or answered questions about its qualities you can encourage them to remove the item from the bag so they can continue exploring the item while looking at it.
2.5 years old
You can now present your child with a bag containing up to 5 objects and ask them to name and describe them. They should have enough vocabulary to describe the items through the previous exercises but if they can’t or don’t want to you can continue asking the questions to build that vocabulary. It is so much easier to learn what scratchy means when you are feeling something scratchy.
When your child can comfortably find, name, and describe the 5 items in the bag you can move on to placing matching pairs of objects in the bag and ask the child to find the matching item.
The items should be familiar to your child and they should know what they are called.
3 years old
You can make the mystery bag more challenging at this stage by adding more items to your bag. You can also think of adding more complex geometric shapes but only if you have already started teaching these shapes. Remember – your child should already be able to name whatever you decide to place in the bag.
The stereognostic bag in the Montessori Sensorial Curriculum is usually introduced in the classroom to the 3 to 6-year-old group. The objects inside are usually three-dimensional geometric solids:
- ovoid
- sphere
- cone
- ellipsoid
- cube
- square-based pyramid
- triangle-based pyramid
- triangular prism
- rectangular prism
- cylinder
If you are presenting this activity at home and you do not own the geometric solids – don’t be discouraged. You do not need to buy every Montessori material known to man. You can find most of these geometric shapes at home.
Start looking at your child’s wooden blocks and shape sorters. You should be able to find at least a cube, rectangular prism, and perhaps a cylinder. You can also use a large wooden bead for the sphere.
You could also just skip the geometrics and just keep adding more items with interesting shapes and textures. This activity never gets old!
9 Montessori Mystery Bag Ideas for toddlers under 3
Think about what tactile experience you could offer your child when considering which items to select for your mystery bag. Ask yourself the following questions:
- Does it have a distinguishable shape or can it easily be confused with something else?
- Does the object have any definite tactile characteristics?
- How would you describe it?
Think about the different sensory qualities:
- Cold – metal objects
- Heavy – bean bag or rock
- Light – feather or sponge
- Rough – nail brush
- Soft – cotton wool ball
Themes
Children find it easier to learn when the information is categorized like using a theme to select items for your mystery bag. You can also use themes to further, reinforce or support a current topic of interest.
#1 Metal (cold) items
- Enamel mug
- Nut and bolt
- Chain
- Stainless steel jug
- Spanner
- Metal spoon
#2 Fruits and vegetables
- Banana
- Lemon
- Orange
- Courgette
- Red pepper
- Pear
#3 Self-care items
- Toothbrush
- Sponge
- Washcloth
- Hairbrush
- Bath plug
#4 Cleaning Items
- Sponge
- Glove
- Laundry peg
- Cloth
- Feather duster
- Dropper bottle
#5 Kitchen Items
- Hand whisk
- Silicone brush
- Measuring spoons
- Basting brush
- Manual whisk
- Tea sieve
#6 Items from Nature
- Acorn
- Pinecone
- Stone
- Stick
- Leaf
- Coral
#7 Every day Items
- Laces
- Flashlight
- Measuring tape
- Coin purse
- Makeup brush
- Lock and key
#8 Getting dressed
- Shoe
- Glove
- Hat
- Watch
- Sock
- Bracelet
#9 Toys
- Wood shapes
- Crayon
- Ball
- Peg puzzle piece
- Bean bag
- Building block
7 Tips and tricks when using Stereognostic/Mystery bags
- Always consider safety first by choosing items that are neither too sharp nor too small.
- The blindfold is optional and should only be introduced to children around 3.
- Keep changing the objects inside to keep the activity stimulating and interesting to your child.
- Use the bags in combination with any current unit study or area of interest your child has.
- These bags make for wonderful screen alternatives during long car/train/plane journeys. You can even play it on the go with the contents of mom’s handbag or other luggage.
- Try to use real objects instead of imitation items like a toy car or animal.
- Make sure your bag is big enough to accommodate the items while still leaving enough space for your toddler to put both hands and arms inside.
8 Step Stereognostic bag presentation
- Invite your child over to come and sit next to you at a table or on the floor.
- Show them the bag and tell them that you are going to be working with the bag – give it a name if you want.
- Take out each object inside the bag, name it, then hand it to your child to hold and feel.
- Place each object on the floor or table, from left to right, as you move on to the next item.
- When your child has finished touching each object, you can recap the names of each item and place them back into the bag.
- Now you can ask your child to put their hands inside the bag and either find a specific object or pick something and describe and name the item before removing it from the bag.
- Take turns finding, describing, and naming objects with your child.
- The child can take some time again to inspect the object before placing it on the table or floor from left to right before moving on to the next object.
Stereognostic Bag Extensions and games
#1 Mystery Bag Extension: Phonetics
When your toddler becomes interested in the moveable alphabet you can think about playing the phonetics mystery bag game with them. You will place the alphabet letters that they know (3-5) inside the bag and let them pick a card with a picture of an object that starts with the letter they need to find in the bag.
#2 Mystery Bag Extension: Nomenclature
You can place a few miniature objects of animals inside the bag and have their corresponding nomenclature cards to show your child which one you would like them to find and name. You can also play this game as part of the Montessori three-period lesson.
I wrote an entire article about how to use the three period lesson that you can find here
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Montessori-friendly sensory activities for toddlers under 3
The Montessori Sensorial materials are designed to be used by children between the ages of 3 and 6.
It is also frequently mentioned that sensorial activities should only be introduced after the child has been offered enough time to practice practical life activities. This is because sensorial education is meant to help categorize and organize sensorial information that the child has already acquired. The information should be absorbed through real-life experiences that start at birth.
To make sure your child has enough sensory exposure, you should prioritize practical life activities between 1 and 3. These activities offer your child an opportunity to experiment and explore all the things they see us do. Through most of these actions, they are refining their hand-eye coordination, their fine motor skills, and learning through all of their senses while simultaneously learning practical skills and independence.
As a guide, I would recommend making practical life activities the foundation onto which you add these extrasensory experiences.
Tactile activities
Fabric/Texture box
6 months +
Simply cut strips or squares from fabric offcuts and put them in a basket. You could also use short pieces of ribbon and rope
Playdough
18 months +
Please save yourself some money and try making some playdough at home – just once! It takes less than 10 minutes
This recipe is not only straightforward but the dough itself stays soft for months without being refrigerated. Just store it in an airtight container or ziplock bag.
Playdough recipe
makes 1 orange-sized ball
1 cup flour
2 tablespoons cream of tartar
Half a cup salt
1 cup boiling water
1 tablespoon cooking oil
Food coloring
*Optional: Lemon essence or any food essence of your choice. This will just give your dough a nice scent. It could be nice to match the color to the scent for example green playdough with peppermint essence.
Instructions
Sift the dry ingredients together in a bowl – except for the salt.
Boil the water and dissolve the salt in the water.
Add the boiling water, food coloring, and oil to the dry ingredients and stir until the mixture starts to pull away from the sides of the bowl.
When the mixture has cooled – knead the dough until smooth
Store in an airtight container
Auditory activities
Playing musical instruments
Listening to music together
- Walking to the rhythm of the music
- Dancing
- Singing
Olfactory activities
6 months +
Scent bottles
Young children’s sense of smell is far superior to that of adults. You can take advantage of this by providing them with some scent bottles. You can use something like a salt shaker or empty spice containers and fill them with any of the following:
- Rose petals
- Lavender
- Lemon rind
- A ball of cotton wool with a drop of essential oil
- Cinnamon stick
- Fresh herbs from the garden (mint/rosemary)
Visual sense
Shape sorters of any kind are great for toddlers from 12 – 24 months. The younger the child – the fewer the shapes. Make it as simple as possible and slowly add shapes as they master each shape. You can cover some of the openings and start by only providing them with easy shapes like the circle and square.
Color or shape sorting activities are perfect for toddlers around 24 months. You can create many different variations of sorting games by using different kinds of dried beans (large dried butter beans work well), Pasta, or colored buttons for them to sort.
Activities for all 5 senses & all ages
Cooking and baking is a wonderful practical life activity to enjoy with young toddlers. You can give them things to stir or knead. They can taste, feel, scoop, pour and learn.
Being outside and exploring nature is the best sensory experience on offer and requires no preparation or instruction. Take a sensory walk outside with your child. Ask them to isolate one sense for example to only focus on what they hear or what they smell.
Enjoy exploring and learning!