This week’s winner is Trish Wymore, who said:

“One of my resolutions for the new year ahead is to help create a continuity of care between home and school through parent education. SO many parents are anxious for their children to “get ahead” and I find they are giving them workbooks and such at home. I want to help parents see that the best education they can give their children involves quality time spent doing family things – not “school” things. Cooking, reading, and playing outside together are far more beneficial to the well being of the child (and her family!). I am sure this will be no small task! ”

Great comment, Trish! Thanks for entering our giveaway and enjoy the lovely weaving loom!

Happy New Year to everyone from me and my husband Bruce here at Montessori for Everyone. Remember, the 10% discount code “december” is only good until tonight at midnight!

Welcome to the last giveaway between Montessori for Everyone and Alison’s Montessori! I hope you’ve been enjoying the giveaways, especially all the great comments that have been left. If you haven’t already, take a look at the holiday tradition comments, the holiday lessons comments, and the multicultural ideas.

This week’s giveaway is our grandest! The winner of this giveaway receives a $50 gift certificate from Montessori for Everyone and this lovely weaving loom from Alison’s Montessori:

To enter the giveaway, leave a comment sharing some kind of resolution you’re making for the new year when it comes to education – something you’ll do differently in the classroom or try for the first time.

For example, my resolution is to stop myself each time I’m tempted to step in and help my children right away and instead, let them figure out the issue themselves – even if it is frustrating to them and takes them some time to work out. That is really hard for me!

The guidelines:

The giveaway will close on Wednesday, December 30th at midnight CST.

The prize ships to the US only – weaving loom will be mailed, gift certificate will be emailed. If you are outside the US but have friends or family here that could get the loom to you, feel free to enter.

One entry per email address is permitted. The winner will be selected using random.org and announced on Thursday morning, December 31st.

Best of luck to everyone!

I’m delighted to announce this week’s winner:

Congratulations, Monica! Love the idea of having a huge map available at all times. Hope you enjoy the prizes!

This next Sunday will be the last giveaway from Alison’s Montessori – please check back because it’s going to be the best one of all!

The winner of our second giveaway is Julia S.:

Congratulations, Julia! Lovely thoughts for the holiday season. I hope you enjoy your movable alphabet and gift certificate!

Please come back on Sunday to learn about the next giveaway!

Just a reminder – use the code “december” (with no quotes) to get 10% off any order at Montessori for Everyone. This code is good until December 31, and can be used multiple times.

If you’ve purchased a CD-ROM from me, email me (montessoriforeveryone@gmail.com) for a code good for 60% off during December – I’m always making new items so you should be able to find something you like.

I’m excited to add materials in two new languages this month: Russian and French. Check out the Russian Vertebrate Card Set and the French Vertebrate Card Set. I’ll be adding more of those languages (and more Spanish too) in the coming months.

Now that my husband is working with me full time, he’s committed to making lots of new work for all of you! This month he’s contributed a lovely Water Cycle Set.

This month’s freebie is an Ordinal Numbers Activity – it’s simple but fun!

If you haven’t already, please subscribe to my email newsletter and become a fan of my Facebook page. That’s the first place you’ll hear about specials, new materials, helpful links, and more!

Here we are, already starting our second holiday giveaway! The first giveaway generated some fantastic ideas for holiday traditions, so take a look at the comments there if you haven’t already.

This giveaway is for one $25 gift certificate from Montessori for Everyone and one printed Movable Alphabet from Alison’s Montessori:

You can even choose the color of the movable alphabet (black, blue, green, or red) and style (print or D’Nealian)!

To enter, please leave a comment sharing one thing you hope to pass along to your children or the children you work with during the holidays. As an example, I want my children to always do something for others less fortunate during the holidays. One yearly tradition is to save all our change during December (they contribute their allowances as well) and then we donate it to a charity that they help choose.

Prize ships to US only (if you live outside the US but have friends or family here that could pass it along to you, feel free to enter).

Contest closes Thursday, December 17th at midnight CST. One entry per email address. Winner will be chosen by random.org and posted on Friday, December 18th. Good luck!

I’m excited to announce that the winner (the comment # was chosen by random.org) is:

Congratulations, Liz! I love your last name and the theme you use for your tree! I hope you enjoy the prizes.

Come back on Sunday to find out about our next giveaway – and remember, during December you can use the code “december” (without the quotes) to get 10% off at Montessori for Everyone.

This is so exciting! For the whole month of December, I’m partnering with Alison’s Montessori to do four giveaways – something from Alison’s and something from me every Sunday in December.

Back when I began selling on eBay, Kharrum and Michelle of Alison’s were just starting their business too. We became good friends and have always enjoyed working together. So I’m super excited to do this joint giveaway!

This week’s winner will land a set of Grammar Symbol Solids from Alison’s and a $25 gift certificate from me:

So, how do you win these fabulous prizes? To enter, leave a comment on this post and tell us one winter or holiday tradition you do at home or in the classroom at this time of year.

The giveaway will close on Thursday, December 10th at midnight CST

The prize ships to the US only (Grammar Solids will be mailed, gift certificate will be emailed)

One entry per email address is permitted. The winner will be selected using random.org and announced on Friday, December 11th.

We’ll be running one of these giveaways every week during December (each one will start on Sunday and end on Thursday). Best of luck to everyone!

Running a business like mine is interesting. On one hand, I do not need a warehouse or inventory, which greatly simplifies my business; on the other hand, the items I sell could be passed around and used by multiple people without me knowing.

Every time one of you places an order, there’s trust on both sides. On your side, you are trusting that buying from me is safe and that the items I sell are worth the money. Unlike something you buy in a store, you can’t pick it up or look at it first.

On my side, I am trusting that you are going to use the PDFs or CD-ROM only for yourself, and not share or re-sell it. That’s a bit of a leap of faith on my part.

In the past few months I have found out about several copyright violations: one person was trying to sell one of my CD-ROMs on Craigslist, another on eBay, and a third person had uploaded some of my files to a file-sharing service where anyone could download them.

In the cases of the eBay and Craigslist auctions, I was able to get the auctions taken down because they were in violation of my copyright. I was also able to have the files removed from the file-sharing service for the same reason. However it is time-consuming for me to have to take this kind of action and I cringe every time I find out about something like this.

I realize that most of the time when someone tries to share or sell my PDFs, it is because they truly don’t know that it’s wrong to do so. Perhaps they have not read my Terms of Use or they don’t understand how copyright works. That’s one of the reasons I’m writing this post – simply to educate everyone so that we all understand the rules.

My PDFs are protected under intellectual copyright. This is different from the kind of copyright you might have over the design of a lamp or a sweater. Those items can only be used by one person at a time. You can sell them if you decide you don’t want to use them anymore. In the case of intellectual copyright, where something could be copied over and over again and used by many people at once, only the copyright holder is allowed to sell the items.

My entire site is copyrighted, which means that blog posts, articles, pictures, and any other material on the site also cannot be used without permission. Sometimes it’s easy to think that anything on the internet is sort of “fair game” to use as desired but that is not true.

I’d like to boil this down to two easy rules:

1. My PDFs and CD-ROMs cannot be re-sold or shared with others. They are for personal use only.

2. My entire site – including the free PDFs – is copyrighted by me and nothing can be used without permission.

This even includes my free PDFs. They cannot be uploaded to your site or blog or file-sharing service. Just link to my Free Downloads page(s) if you want to mention or promote them. If you would like to use one of my articles or blog posts at your site or in a school newsletter, you need to ask first. (Short quotations are fine without permission as long as you attribute it to Montessori for Everyone).

If you see anyone using my PDFs or any of my site content without permission, please let me know. That way instead of one set of eyes keeping tabs on the internet, there will be thousands. Several of you have let me know of copyright violations you’ve found in the past and I greatly appreciate it.

As you can imagine I’ve poured thousands of hours into my site and my materials. I have been as generous as possible, sharing free materials, keeping my prices super low, and trying to make my blog and site the best Montessori resource on the internet. With your help I can continue to do so.

Some of you might remember that my grandfather passed away last December at the age of 106 (longevity runs in my family!). I didn’t get to see him before he died so I am anxious to spend some time with my grandmother.

Besides the excitement of the trip, today is special for another reason. It’s my husband’s first day of fulltime work for Montessori for Everyone! You might not see the results of his presence right away (one of his first tasks is to transfer our order database to a better program, which only I can appreciate).

But as time goes on, you will definitely notice a difference. We are planning lots of new work, updates to older work, and introducing work in new languages like French and Russian. I am so excited about all we’ll be able to accomplish!

Thanks for hanging in there with us – we appreciate you so much!
While you’re here, take a look at the New Materials for this month (Spanish Vertebrate Cards and Word Lists for Pink, Blue, and Green Series) and download the new freebie if you haven’t already.