Why Toddlers Need Real Work, Not Toys
Pouring, carrying, sweeping, dressing: the everyday Montessori activities that build concentration, coordination and independence in the first three years.
Through meaningful everyday moments, from pouring, carrying, and sweeping to dressing and caring for the environment, each purposeful action strengthens both body and mind. These hands-on experiences help children understand their world, make informed choices, and become capable, caring individuals.
- Available immediatelyThe full 90-minute webinar, including the Q&A
- Watch online at your own pace30 days of access to the recording
- €17 per personAccess opens right after payment
The most underestimated work in the room
It's easy to look at a young child pouring water, carrying a basket, or wiping a table and see something the adults arrange to keep small hands busy while the "real" learning happens elsewhere.
This talk argues the opposite. These ordinary, purposeful actions are the child's real work: every pour, every carry, every sweep asks for concentration, coordination, sequence, and care, and gives back exactly that in return. A child does not develop order, independence, or a sense of belonging by being told about them. They develop through doing, with their own hands, in an environment prepared to let them succeed.
So the reframe isn't "daily chores keep children occupied." It's that daily life is where the whole child, body, will, and mind working together, actually gets built, one everyday moment at a time.
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Montessori guides, assistants, school leaders, parents, and anyone caring for a child under three are all welcome. No prior AMI training is required.
The full 90-minute webinar with Heidi Philippart, including the Q&A.
- Full webinar recording (90 minutes)
- Q&A with Heidi Philippart included
- 30 days of access, starting right away
- Longer access of 2, 4 or 6 months available at checkout
Optional extras
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Keep the recording for 2, 4 or 6 months instead of 30 days.
Heidi Philippart's video course on preparing the Infant Community environment.
What the webinar covers
Four themes in 90 minutes, and how order in the physical world becomes the foundation for everything that comes after.
The prepared environment for everyday life - child-sized tools and real materials that make ordinary tasks genuinely possible for small hands.
Daily life as reality training - real tasks with real consequences, and why that teaches judgment no worksheet or screen can.
Movement, order, and sequence - why unrestricted purposeful movement, and a consistent process rather than a finished result, are what actually build the child's mind.
From dependence to independence - dressing, feeding, toileting, and caring for the environment as real passages to autonomy.
What you will take away
A working vocabulary for a conversation you're probably already having - with colleagues, parents, or yourself.
By the end of the webinar, you will be able to
- Explain why everyday life activities are not "just chores" but the primary vehicle for building concentration, coordination, and independence in a child's first years.
- Tell the difference between an activity done to keep a child busy and one prepared with real purpose, real tools, and a real place in the child's own world.
- Take home a short list of everyday moments you can prepare at home or in the classroom this week, sized correctly for a child under three.
What people say about learning with Heidi
Heidi is open-minded, engaging, and wonderfully humorous in the way she connects real-life examples with theory. Her deep knowledge and rich experience make learning with her feel like walking through inspiring stories and discovering new insights along the way.
Heidi was a wonderful mentor and trainer; she managed to create an atmosphere as if we were actually there; it was extraordinary! Thank you so much, MIP and Heidi. I highly recommend the 0-3 course!
My expectations were high but this course exceeded all my expectations!
Heidi has worked with Montessori educators in the Netherlands, the UK, the US, Poland, Switzerland, Australia, Vietnam and many more countries.
Ready to go deeper?
Meet your trainer
Heidi Philippart
Heidi was introduced to Montessori in the late 1980s, guided early on by mentors Patty Wallner and Silvana Montanaro, and trained on the Assistant to Infancy level in Denver with Judi Orion. That grounding shaped a career built almost entirely around the first three years of life.
Since 1996, Heidi has directed a bilingual Montessori school in central Amsterdam, working with 80 to 90 families every year. Alongside the Nido and Infant Community classroom itself, her practical focus reaches into the home: preparing a home environment for a young child, guiding parents through toilet independence, bilingualism, and the everyday application of Montessori principles outside the classroom.
Heidi holds the credentials M.A.(Edu), A.M.I.(Dip), and is an AMI Trainer of Trainers for Assistants to Infancy and an AMI External Examiner. She has lectured, trained, consulted and examined in the Netherlands, the UK, the US, Poland, Switzerland, Australia, Vietnam and many more countries, carrying the same core conviction everywhere: the everyday moment, done by the child's own hand, is where real development happens.
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Watch Heidi Philippart explain why the small, ordinary moments, pouring, carrying, sweeping, dressing, are not a detour from a child's development. They are the work of it.
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