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28 Nov

It’s All Science

Christine Carrillo by Christine Carrillo | Montessori Blog
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“What is a scientist?…We give the name scientist to a man who has felt experiment to be a means guiding him to search out the deep truth in life, to lift a veil from its fascinating secrets…” -Maria Montessori

He was crying pretty hard. No, he was weeping. His face of was red and his eyes were swollen. He was angry, confused and overwhelmed. Despite the successful orientation just a few days earlier, it has not been easy to say goodbye to mom and dad and make the journey down the hallway to our classroom. In addition to the difficult separation, there was a bit of a language barrier. He spoke another language at home and was not yet fluent in English. I helped him wipe his tears, and took him gently by the hand. I showed him the cylinder blocks. He was immediately interested, although still hesitant. Using a friendly smile and gestures, I invited him to sit beside me as I began to work with the material.

As soon as I began to remove the cylinders from the block, his eyes lit up. He locked his eyes on mine and reached for the next cylinder, clearly showing me that he wanted to go for it. After I finished my presentation, he went right for it, tears forgotten and enthusiasm in full swing. I watched him for a long while, mesmerized, as I often am, at the draw, pull, enticement and attraction, as well as the calming quality of these beautiful materials in my environment.

I observed him as he mulled over the holes, working with purpose until finding the right one in which to gently slide the cylinder. He tried one cylinder in several of the holes before finding just the right fit. I could practically see the gears turning in his mind. Through trial and error, observation, testing and testing again, he was able to return each cylinder to its correct space. He sighed with contentment as he finished, and then started the process all over again.

Montessori materials allow the child to teach himself. Through trial and error, these didactic materials give feedback, this case both visual (he can see that it doesn’t fit) and mechanical (some cylinders just do not fit in some holes), which allow the child to work independently. The child in the prepared environment tests his hypothesis (this one goes here) again and again. He records data in his mind as to which cylinder goes where. He tests and retests. The child finds contentment in his exploration. He feels a calm sense of accomplishment when finished. He desires to repeat the process again from the beginning.

Maria Montessori, herself a scientist and a physician, created her pedagogy through following the interests of children and did not name the approach after herself. We call it “The Montessori Method”, but she called it “The Scientific Method” or “The Child’s Method.” Our approach to education is the only pedagogy based in science, and based on one woman’s dedication of over 50 years of research and practice to create a developmentally based approach to education that follows the child’s natural growth process.

In our classrooms, children teach themselves concepts through trial and error, using didactic materials. These didactic materials provide a child with a sense of purpose and are repetitive and calming. Children are unhurried and can practice, err, correct themselves and explore deeper at their own pace.

When I look around my classroom, I see twenty-seven scientists. They are making mistakes, making observations, testing and retesting, repeating, recording data and engaging in that process over and over again. Once they are confident with one material, they are likely to desire to work with another. This sense of calm, self- assuredness builds wonderful members of our community who are, in turn, a gift to our society because calm, confident, self-assured children become calm, confident, self-assured adults. In the words of Dr. Montessori, “The child is the maker of man.”

As for the little boy who was tearful on his first day, he has happily been working his way through many of the materials on the shelves, with a special love for the sensorial. He does not cry in the morning. Though he continues to be the strong, silent type, this morning he raced across the room to me with a grin, grabbed my hand and led me to the beautiful pink tower he had built. The little girl working next to him shared in his joy and said, “YOU DID IT!” And my heart sang with joy for him and gratitude for this wonderful scientific approach to education that allows children to become the best versions of themselves.

Filed Under: Montessori Blog Tagged With: calm, children, classroom, didactic, materials, montessori, science, scientist, sense, work

24 Oct

Montessori’s Aeroplane

Jennifer Rogers by Jennifer Rogers | Montessori Blog
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Passage to Abstraction

“There is nothing in the intellect which was not first in the senses.” -Aristotle

When our oldest son was six years old, he arrived home from school one day in an unusually chatty mood. “Mom,” he said. “Did I tell you I can do division abstractly now? You know, in my head?”

You had not mentioned it, I said. I was certainly glad to know.

Sitting down on a kitchen stool, he folded his hands in his lap. “Give me an equation,” he said. “Division.”

I started with nine divided by three. “Oh Mom,” he said, “At least give me a number with thousands, or maybe a remainder.”

Almost ten years have passed. The equations I suggested are lost to memory, and irrelevant to the story. He could indeed complete division problems in his head, without the aid of a calculator or any of the materials he had been using at school. He was neither proud nor humble, just a little boy who loved math and wanted to share something about his day at school. He was, above all else, deeply satisfied.

Our oldest is not a genius, but he is smart and has always been a good student. He has never been one to talk about the details of his school day, never what he learned at school. We gather our information about his learning by listening and observing. This particular conversation was memorable not only because it was so unusual for him to share, but especially because he was so conscious and articulate about a transition in his learning that was completely intangible.

He knew that he had accomplished something the rest of the world could not see, and the knowledge made him happy.

All children in Montessori classrooms absorb mathematical concepts in a pattern that is both intelligent and fun. We expected as much for our children. Until that moment, I did not know a young child could be so conscious, articulate, and nonchalant about the process Maria Montessori called the “passage to abstraction.”

Similar stories have unfolded in our kitchen several times since then. Our middle son told us one Saturday morning that he had learned to count in binary, on his fingers. His demonstration left me flummoxed.

“Oh mom,” he said, “It’s just for fun. Here, I’ll write it down so you can understand.”

Just a few days ago, our nine-year-old daughter told us she was working with prime factorization at school, and could already do a lot in her head. Like her older brothers, math fascinates and excites her. Unlike her brothers, she is eager and willing to talk about details. She recited, and then drew a diagram of the factorization process she pictured in her head.

Talking like a teacher, she suggested we try factoring another number together, showing us how to draw the familiar descending diagram on paper. It was important to her that we see together, and understand the process in her mind.

Materialized Abstractions
Maria Montessori introduced mathematical concepts to the children in her classrooms through the use of concrete materials. She insisted that children be given as much time and opportunity as they needed to work with concrete materials, until they had absorbed the concepts that the materials were designed to represent. Children work with their hands until the mathematical concept or process was absolutely clear.

Montessori called these lessons “materialized abstractions,” a highfalutin phrase for the common-sense observation that human beings learn best through the use of their senses. Children especially build their intellects most effectively through the combined use of their hands, eyes, and ears.

The Golden Beads are the heart of the Montessori primary math curriculum. Children in primary Montessori classrooms work with Golden Beads as they continue to learn about the decimal system. The differences in weight and dimension between a unit, ten, hundred, and thousand are obvious, because the children carry the materials in their hands and on trays as they learn. As they count, they also touch, look, and hold. When they complete their first addition problems, they can clearly see that when several small numbers are combined, the final quantity is larger.

As Montessori children progress through the math curriculum, the materials become increasingly abstract. The difference in weight and dimension of the Golden Beads is replaced by a difference in color, then by materials that require students move their fingers in simple patterns to find answers to addition, subtraction, multiplication and division equations.

When a child in a Montessori School masters a mathematical concept, he will often continue working uninterrupted, setting aside the learning material that had been an aid to development. The shift is barely noticeable, but hugely significant. For the child, a fundamental mathematical concept exists within him. He can complete mathematical operations with the same ease he demonstrates as he ties his shoes, or buttons his shirt, or prepares his table for lunch.

The Story Rug
Observing in my own primary classroom a year ago, I overheard a conversation between children that at first confused me, but still delights me. Three five-year olds were working with Golden Beads independently. Their work had just begun. One of the boys reminded his friend to get the story rug.

“I’ve already got it out. It’s right here,” his friend said, pointing to the empty rug at his feet.

Although it was my classroom, I did not know what a “story rug” was. As I watched, I understood that the children were referring to the place where they would organize their final equation. The story rug is the spot where they would discover an answer to their equation and read it aloud together. For these children, mathematical operations were tangible and, most remarkably, stories to be enjoyed with friends.

Montessori’s Aeroplane
In Maria Montessori: Her Life and Work, biographer E.M. Standing writes that Montessori compared a child’s passage to abstraction to the flight of an airplane. Technology has changed flight it several ways, but the metaphor endures. Children do need a long running start, firmly connected to the earth, and increasing in speed as their knowledge and understanding grows. Children do still launch into abstraction with apparent ease, but only after they have independently achieved the speed and strength they need to fly.

Filed Under: Montessori Blog Tagged With: abstraction, beads, children, concepts, equations, materials, math, mathematics, montessori, primary, school

14 Dec

A Quest for Reality

Paul Gutting by Paul Gutting | Montessori Blog
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“[It] may be said that in order to develop the imagination it is necessary for everyone first of all to put himself in contact with reality.” -Dr. Maria Montessori

When Dr. Montessori opened her first classroom in 1907 in the San Lorenzo tenement housing in Rome, she had two cabinets of materials for the children’s use. One was filled with the materials she had designed and made for the children based on her earlier work in hospitals, and the other was filled with toys that had been donated to her by her friends.

DSC_7932-mediumDr. Montessori found very quickly that the children in the classroom exclusively chose the materials over the toys. She was surprised, and went so far as to sit down with the children and show them how to use the toys. After sitting with the dolls and so on for a short time, the children returned to the materials and remained with them. This observation brought Montessori to the conclusion that the children preferred reality and real work to toys and fantasy. Her conclusion has since been supported both by Montessori’s own work and that of many educators the world over.

I have found myself wondering on occasion if such a scenario could still take place. Surely contemporary battery-powered toys with flashing lights and a different song for every button would attract attention away from our simple, orderly materials. But I have seen that it is not so.

A year or so ago, my school hosted a fundraising garage sale. We filled part of a classroom not being used for the summer with donations. We had all kinds of things – plastic play kitchen sets, a cat-shaped keyboard, toy cars, dolls, a bin of dress-up clothes, bikes, and the list goes on. The other half of the classroom still had Montessori materials neatly arranged on shelves.

I watched as a two-and-a-half year old girl walked into the room, looked at all the toys, even touching some of them, and went straight to the shelves of materials and took great delight in working with a cylinder block (one of the Montessori sensorial materials). She was not prompted in any way, nor did I put her in the room as a test or experiment. She was not a student at our school returning to the familiar joys of the classroom. She was a child entering into a room filled with choices and after seeing what was available, she chose what she wanted (or needed) most.

Often in Montessori, we speak of the materials calling out to the children, and we do our best to make sure that call is clear. That is why our classrooms tend to be simple and uncluttered, decorated to the point of orderly beauty, not to the point of distraction. The children want to engage in the classroom. They want the experience that the materials will give them because they will get more learning from that experience than from flashy toys or reasoned rhetoric from an adult.

I think this story supports several truths about children, but the thought I want to land on today is that children crave reality. They want to do real work with real things. Nearly every parent of a two or three-year-old child sympathizes with the image of sweeping the floor and having to drag the child along on the end of the broom. The children want to help, they want to understand their own power to do work, and they will be best satisfied in that quest when they have real things to do.

Filed Under: Montessori Blog Tagged With: classroom, materials, montessori, reality, toys, work

08 Dec

A Montessori Guide is an educator, but not a “teacher”

Ed Stanford by Ed Stanford | Montessori Blog
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When we hear a title or label our mind conjures images and stereotypes from memory and repeated experience.  The stereotypical role of the conventional teacher is so different from the role of trained Montessori adults working with children in a prepared environment, that the term teacher misleads and confounds our understanding.  It is for this reason that I consciously choose the term Guide.

Dr. Maria Montessori described the Guide’s role

“Summing up her principal duty in school practice, one may state thus ­ the mistress must explain the use of material.  She is, in the main, a connecting link between the material (the objects) and the child.  A simple, modest duty, and yet much more delicate than when in the old schools, the material was, on the other hand, a simple connecting link, helping to establish intellectual correspondence between the mistress, who had to pass on her ideas, and the child who had to receive them.” (Montessori p206, emphasis mine)

teacher vs guide

In a conventional classroom the Teacher is the source of knowledge and she may use a myriad of approaches to transmit her understanding of a concept to the children.  She may lecture or use materials (books, videos, manipulables, games, or activities).  More progressive Teachers create “discovery based” lessons or engage in “inquiry based” learning, which means they plan lessons that allow children to discover a particular learning or try to pursue the interest of the children.  Methods may vary, but the structure of a conventional classroom continues to be a Teacher shepherding children as a group through a scheduled curriculum (a particular lesson at a particular time).

Dr. Maria Montessori further explains

“In our system, the mistress does nothing more than facilitate and make clear to the child, the very active and prolonged work which is reserved for him, in choosing objects, and employing himself with them.” (Montessori p.206, emphasis mine)

DSC_3938-mediumThe key difference between a conventional classroom and a Montessori environment is found in the scientifically designed materials.  The knowledge and concepts the child will learn are no longer to be found only in the adult, but are now also made manifest in the materials. Children are able to independently interact with materials (after a presentation) and learn without the direct involvement of the adult.  Everyone is liberated in this structure; children can follow their interests through a non­-scheduled curriculum and the adult is free to Guide individual children as needed.

I believe that the role of the Montessori Guide is very like the role of a good party host.

  • A good host diligently prepares the location for safety and ambiance
    • A Guide prepares the environment
  • A good host carefully prepares the guest list to ensure an enjoyable evening
    • A Guide prepares a list of materials and children to ensure developmentally appropriate activities are available
  • A good host greets guests
    • A Guide greets the children each morning
  • A good host introduces guests who she thinks have a common interest
    • A Guide presents materials to children who are interested and ready
  • A good host observes and moves as needed to engage bored guests, never staying too long with any individual or group
    • A Guide observes and moves as needed to inspire learning, never staying too long with any individual or group
  • A good host knows that her purpose is not to entertain the guests, but to facilitate connections between guests.
    • A Guide knows that her purpose is not to Teach, but to connect children with meaningful work that will impart the knowledge through it’s correct use.
  • A good host gracefully diffuses conflicts
    • A Guide gracefully diffuses conflicts

Education is a challenging field, and both Teachers and Guides are highly trained professionals drawn to this work by a deep love of children and a fascination with learning.  However, the methods and mindset are so very different that it is appropriate to to have a different title.

Montessori, Maria. The Discovery of the Child. 1948. Reprint. Madras, India: Kalakshetra Press, 1966. Print.

Filed Under: Montessori Blog Tagged With: children, conventional, environment, guide, host, lessons, materials, montessori, purpose, Teacher

03 Aug

Excerpt from “Montessori Madness”

Trevor Eissler by Trevor Eissler | Montessori Blog
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A Home. A School.

I remember setting foot in that Montessori classroom. I sat down on a chair—a very, very small chair—near the door. I had just stepped into someone’s living room. Or was it a science laboratory? Or maybe an office building? I couldn’t put my finger on exactly what was different at first, but this was unlike any classroom I had ever seen. It felt different too. Peaceful. Purposeful.

©MariaMontessori.com

What there was not struck me as much as what there was. There were no rows of desks lined up. There was no wall-to-wall chalkboard at the front of the room. There was no teacher’s desk at the front of the room. There was no teacher’s desk at all. There was no teacher!

Then I found the teacher. She was sitting on a very small chair to one side of the classroom, whispering with two students. She hadn’t interrupted her conversation with them when I walked in, so I settled into my chair the best I could and began to notice what was there. Low bookshelves wended their way around the classroom, hinting at a partial partition of several areas. The shelves were not all stacked with books. A few were, but the rest held an astonishing assortment of blocks, pitchers, beads, pencils, paper, sandpaper letters, cloth, paints, wooden numbers, maps, globes, flags, bug jars, fish tanks, plants, bells, chalk, flower arrangements, and various objects that I could not identify. It was all in perfect order! Everything was small. The chairs were child-sized. The desks were child-sized. A few low tables graced the open areas. Hand towels, light switches, window shades, door knobs—all were within reach of the youngest child, as was the highest bookshelf.

The room was square, with large picture windows along three sides, allowing in a flood of natural light. A door in the rear wall opened onto a flower garden, a vegetable garden, and a small grassy area surrounded by several trees. The side of the room without windows had a door for each of two restrooms and a third door connected to a kitchen area shared with the adjoining classroom. Three faucets with large basins and tiny footstools stood in a corner. Three faucets! (I recalled a videotaped interview from the 1980s of my late father, who at the time was the architect for the Memphis City Schools. He described a major renovation project he was attempting to spearhead throughout the city’s schools, tearing out walls and putting in a faucet and sink in each of the classrooms of these ancient, neglected buildings. His face had lit up at the prospect of inner-city kids being able to mix sand and water, splash, fill containers, pour, watercolor, and do all the “wet things” young kids need to learn how to do. This had not been possible with the existing faucets sequestered in the community bathroom down the hall, and a hall pass needed to leave the room. His jaw would have hit the floor to see three faucets.)

Thirty children were in this class, but I counted no more than ten desks. I was reminded of the outraged pleas of teachers and parents in “under-funded” schools, begging for more money because some students did not even have a desk at which to sit. Here, there weren’t enough desks by design. I looked to my left. There a child lay, stretched out on the floor, reading a book. (When I was a child, you got sent to the principal’s office for this sort of thing. Here, it was encouraged.) In front of me two children crouched on the floor arranging cut-out letters to form words on a board. Other students would remove objects from the shelves for use, or return them after use. One or two were at the sinks or in the bathrooms. I even saw one child stand up, walk to the back door, open it, and go outside into the garden! The teacher never batted an eye. In various places around the room groups of two or three children huddled, discussing this or that or working on something of interest.

I gasped. To my right a child of no more than four sat at a chair, alone, brandishing a needle! Actually, it became apparent she wasn’t brandishing it at all. She was sewing. And she was entranced by her solitary work.

Across the room I spied two children with a knife! I soon realized these two little children, surely no older than three, were taking turns using a rounded butter-knife. They were slicing carrots and celery, which they would later serve to the class as a snack.

Everything here was real. The flower vases were not plastic, they were glass. Even the glasses were glass! The pitchers were ceramic, as were the plates.

The comings and goings of the children were remarkable. They seemed so assured and confident and decisive. No one was telling them where to go or what to do. It was hard to believe that I was observing a room of children ages three through six. If a child chose to do his “work” on the floor, he would first get a rolled up mat the size of a doormat from a bin of several, bring it to his chosen location on the floor, and meticulously unroll it. Then he would go get the work (or the “material” as the various pieces of work from which to choose are called) he had chosen and bring it back to the mat on the floor. Whenever he decided he was done, he’d put the work back where it came from and then re-roll the mat, placing it back in its bin. When something spilled, or it was noticed that a spot on the floor was dirty, a random child would choose to get the broom and dustpan out, or maybe hand towel, and simply clean it up without waiting to be told. I almost had to pinch myself.

The noise level was also notable. I remember two noise levels in elementary school: very loud and very quiet. When the teacher’s back was turned, or she was out of the room, pandemonium broke out. As soon as she turned around or came back in the room and shouted, “Quiet! NOW!” there was a terrified hush. The noise bounced from one to the other: loud, quiet, loud, quiet, loud, quiet—punctuated by the teacher’s occasional shout. In this class there was a hum. It was neither loud nor quiet. I think this is why “living room” and “laboratory” and “office building” initially came to mind. They are all places where there can be activity and communication without necessarily having distraction. There certainly was activity, as I’ve described. Communication was actually encouraged, not discouraged. It was expected that children work with a friend or ask for help, or give help, or talk with the teacher, or read aloud, or daydream aloud. Yet at the same time, many of the students were working quietly by themselves without seeming to be distracted by the hum of activity flowing around them. Whispered strains of classical music floated across the room from a CD player. As I sat there, I saw a child walk over to a set of bells and play a few notes before moving on to something else.

The teacher was like a chess grand master. A grand master is one of only a handful of elite chess players so accomplished they can play five, even ten chess matches simultaneously. They stroll around a room of tables, each with a chess board and a determined challenger, glance at each board in turn, make a move, and stroll to the next board. This teacher reminded me of that type of demonstration. She had keen skills of observation and quick analysis. She glided about the room giving a nod here, a whisper there, a glance, a suggestion. Then she would sit on a chair and observe the room, taking notes. In the thirty minutes I was in the room for that initial parent observation, the teacher may have actually “taught” (in the traditional sense) for ten minutes. These were seemingly spontaneous lessons, given to only a child or two at a time: help for an older child spelling a few words, demonstrating the whisk broom and dustpan to a younger child.

Five or six of the children came up to me at different times; some peered at me briefly and then went back to their work. One child asked my name. Another asked why I had come to her classroom. A boy brought something he was working on over to show me. Another girl asked me to watch while she accomplished some sort of task folding a stack of napkins in a basket. However, for the most part I was left alone, a mild curiosity. These kids were seriously intent on what they were doing.

When the thirty minutes were up, I inconspicuously rose and slipped out of the room, feeling relaxed and refreshed. I met my wife back at the school office and asked, flabbergasted, “What just happened?”

THE ROOTS OF MONTESSORI’S METHOD

We had each just experienced a classroom dynamic designed a hundred years ago. This model has been repeated all over the world to great effect in decade after decade, in various cultures, religions, economic systems, and political systems. It is successful with children who are wealthy or poor, energetic or lethargic, of high intelligence or of low intelligence, extroverted or introverted. It is a class, a community of children, designed by Dr. Maria Montessori.

Maria Montessori grew up in Italy in the late 1800s. She was the first female in Italy to graduate from medical school. She shifted her focus from becoming a medical doctor to becoming an educator after working with children in the insane asylums of Rome (she always used the formal “children” and “child” rather than the casual “kids” common today). She had stumbled upon some interesting techniques for teaching these mentally deficient children and realized the positive impact possible on the general population. Her breakthrough came when she seized the opportunity to run a school for children in one of the slums in Rome. These children were housed in a tenement with their families. When the adults left for work during the day, the children stayed behind and got into mischief. The owners of the building wanted to reduce the amount of vandalism and graffiti by somehow controlling the loitering children. Creating a school for them so they could be watched all day seemed an easy and cheap solution.

Montessori created her first Casa dei Bambini, or Children’s Home, in the early 1900s. It was soon successful and warmly received by the struggling parents in this tenement. They began to take a bit of pride in their new school as their children became more accomplished. Montessori built on this early success by opening other schools, refining her teaching methods, and eventually expanding her method worldwide, becoming a sought after speaker in the process. She traveled abroad, lived in several countries during her later years, and incessantly worked to establish Montessori schools in dozens of countries from India to the Netherlands, Australia, and the United States. Though she was a fascinating lady and led an extraordinary life, her work is really not about her. She was the first to acknowledge that she was not the author of her method so much as the children she observed were. That’s what she did: observe children.

A fundamental truth permeates Montessori’s work: children are desperate to learn. This is the beating heart of Montessori schools. But this fundamental truth is not universally recognized. In fact, our traditional schools are built upon just the opposite assumption: children avoid learning. Therefore, they must be taught. They must be motivated by offers of rewards and threats of punishment. They require great teachers with charisma and pizzazz to inspire them and to create interest in learning. It is essential to recognize this split in philosophy at the most fundamental level in order to appreciate the differences in teaching and in classroom style that emanate from this initial difference. Why? Because the Montessori classroom can appear downright wacky to those of us accustomed to traditional schools. However, keeping in mind that children are naturally desperate to learn—and to learn on their own—we can begin to appreciate this unfamiliar method. Indeed, eventually we can recognize that it has been a part of us all along, since it is based on the way we naturally learn. We are actually all familiar with Montessori teaching, whether we know it or not.

The years from birth until kindergarten are everyone’s experience with Montessori-style education. Take bike-riding for example. Let’s look at snapshots of the process of learning to ride. A child may receive a tricycle by the age of two or three. The parent will help him sit on it, place his hands on the handlebars, and show him how to step on the pedals. The child will lurch a little forward or backward, but the parent now steps back and watches. Over the next year or two the child becomes better and better at riding the tricycle. He becomes more daring. He can ride down slopes at breakneck speed, feet pumping so fast they’re a blur. He can ride uphill, putting a lot of effort into each stroke. He can ride backwards and turn, even at the same time. He can put objects on the tricycle and carry them from place to place. Through all this he rides when he wants to, and for as long as he wants to. However, there are restrictions such as not riding in the busy street. Wide latitude for exploration is bounded by firm safety limitations. At some point over the years, he’ll get a bicycle with training wheels and lose interest in the tricycle. Then he’ll notice that the older children don’t have training wheels and he’ll start asking his parents to take them off. Once the wheels are off, he’ll need a few pushes, he’ll fall down a few times, and he’ll get a bloody lip and a bloody nose, but he’ll soon ride effortlessly. There is no syllabus and no schedule, just the external input of providing a tricycle, a bicycle, some other kids to observe, a couple of pushes, and the safety rules of wearing a helmet and not riding in the street. The parent gets out of the way so the child can do it by himself. Children need no urging from parents to want to ride a bicycle. They are eager to do so, and to be able to do so without help.

Toddlers similarly learn to walk and talk solely when they decide to do so. Preschoolers confound us with their individualized timetables for developing verbal, social, and physical skills. We are amazed and surprised by each new “trick” they learn. Even twins follow their own schedules, as I have learned with our own kids. Children are genetically programmed to be masters of their own development. However, we make sure they don’t practice walking beside a road; we have them wear helmets when they ride a bike; and we establish a bedtime routine. It is a freedom with limits. Instead of limits with some freedom tacked on, it is first and foremost freedom, with limits to protect kids’ well-being, not stifle them. When this freedom bumps up against someone else’s rights, or a social custom, or the safety of the child, there is a limit.

This “system of education” for babies and young children is simply daily life. It is in many ways much like a Montessori classroom. It is largely self-directed, and its success is astonishing. Prior to laying eyes on his first teacher, a young child has learned a couple thousand words of a new language, along with proper grammar; the social customs of his time and place; and the ability to lie, cheat, steal, comfort others, bike and swim if he has had access to bicycles and water, feed and dress himself, count, tell stories, throw a ball, play games, and sometimes even to read and write.

Now, fast-forward twenty years and take a look at graduate school, where we are also familiar with Montessori’s style of education. We have world-renowned graduate schools here in the United States where students go to earn their doctorates. There is broad consensus that we are doing something right when it comes to education in graduate schools. Graduate students are expected to literally further human knowledge through the submission of a doctoral thesis. This thesis—the topic of which is self-chosen—should contribute in a tangible way to the academic area of their choice. They are able to work on this thesis for many years. It may take a decade for some to finish. A professor or adviser is available to help out with suggestions or advice, but usually does not teach from a syllabus or lecture or have any of those duties we regularly assign to teachers. Comparing the bookends of our education system, the similarities are evident. Both have a Montessori feel to them: self-direction, self-motivation. The nearby parents and professors are helpful observers, but tend not to equate learning with lecturing or following lesson plans.

The Montessori-style process of learning that is so successful for young children and graduate students alike can be equally successful for those in between. The roots of Montessori’s method are in the natural way children learn. The entire middle section of traditional education, from kindergarten through college, would benefit tremendously from this method. The gaping hole in the middle part of our education system—the part with the desks, chalkboards, tests, and report cards—continues to vex educators and reformers. We continue to dig the hole deeper by arguing for more money, better textbooks, better qualified or paid teachers, smaller student/teacher ratios, or even busing, race, and cultural fixes. We even argue for longer schooldays as if more time in the traditional system will somehow counter its ill-effects! This is futile. It is the fundamental nature of the classroom that needs to be changed. Luckily, we have hundreds of examples of successful and effective Montessori schools around the country. These schools are bridging the gap and bringing this revolutionary method to more and more children. The method began as a children’s home, designed by Maria Montessori over one hundred years ago in a tenement building in the slums. It is now a model for educational success.

Filed Under: Montessori Blog Tagged With: eissler, freedom, learning, madness, maria, materials, montessori, trevor, work

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