🏃 Move🌱 Montessori-inspired🏃 Active🧩 Problem solving
🔨 Peg & Hammer Bench
Tap wooden pegs through a bench — big, satisfying, whole-arm work.
Ages
1–3
Duration
20 min
Cost
$18
👶 Kid challenge
Medium
🧑 Parent energy
Light · no prep
⚠️ Safety first
Stay in the room. Mallet stays on the bench — sit beside them the whole time.
You know your child best — supervise the whole time and skip anything that isn't right for them. See our Terms.
Why this is good for your child
- ✓Whole-arm control
- ✓Cause and effect
🌱 Montessori-inspired · Movement
What you need
Peg benchWooden mallet
Nice to have — not needed today ($18)
Everything we put in your daily three is free and already in the kitchen. This one needs peg bench if you want to try it.
Search Amazon US for peg benchThat link runs a search in the shop closest to you. It isn't a recommendation, we don't check what comes back, and we earn nothing from it.
How to do it
- 1Set the bench on a rug to soften noise.
- 2Show one slow tap, then hand over the mallet.
- 3Flip the bench and start again.
How it actually goes
The honest version — including what "going well" looks like at this age.
- ⏱ 30-second set-up
- Thirty seconds: put peg bench, wooden mallet on a tray or a clear bit of floor, and sit down next to it before you call them over.
- 🧑 What you do
- Show it once, slowly, without talking over yourself. Then hand it over and stop helping unless they ask.
- 👶 What they do
- Climb, carry, balance and wobble — and try it again faster.
- ✅ What success looks like
- At 1–2 they'll tip it out and put nothing back. That's the work — emptying comes long before filling.
- 🧺 How to put it away
- Everything back into one basket or tray, carried back to its spot by them. Naming the spot out loud is what makes it stick.
- 📈 When they outgrow it
- Older? Add a timer, or let them design the next round.