THE
MONTESSORI METHODS
Maria
Montessori (August 31, 1870 – May 6, 1952) was an Italian
physician and educator, a noted humanitarian and devout Catholic best known for the philosophy of education which bears
her name. Her educational method is in use today in public as well
as private schools throughout the world
Maria Montessori was born in 1870 in Chiaravalle, Italy,
to Alessandro Montessori and Renilde Stoppani (niece of Antonio Stoppani).[1] At the age of thirteen she attended an all-boy
technical school in preparation for her dream of becoming an engineer. At
the time, she insisted specifically that she did not want to be a teacher
because the teaching profession was one of the few that women were encouraged
to take part in at the time. Montessori was the first woman to graduate from
the University of Rome La Sapienza
Medical School, becoming one of the first female doctors in Italy. She was a
member of the University's Psychiatric Clinic and became intrigued with trying
to educate the "special needs" or "unhappy
little ones"[2] and the "uneducable" in Rome.
In 1896, she gave a lecture at the Educational Congress in Turin
about the training of the disabled. The Italian Minister of Education was in
attendance, and, sufficiently impressed by her arguments, appointed her the
same year as director of the Scuola Ortofrenica, an institution devoted to the
care and education of the mentally retarded. She accepted, in order to put her
theories to the test. Her first notable success was to have several of her 8
year old students apply to take the State examinations for reading and writing.
The "defective" children not only passed, but had above-average
scores, an achievement described as "the first Montessori miracle."
Montessori's response to their success was "if mentally disabled
children could be brought to the level of normal children then (she) wanted to
study the potential of 'normal' children".
"Scientific observation has established
that education is not what the teacher gives; education is a natural process
spontaneously carried out by the human individual, and is acquired not by
listening to words but by experiences upon the environment. The task of the
teacher becomes that of preparing a series of motives of cultural activity,
spread over a specially prepared environment, and then refraining from
obtrusive interference. Human teachers can only help the great work that is
being done, as servants help the master. Doing so, they will be witnesses to
the unfolding of the human soul and to the rising of a New Man who will not be
a victim of events, but will have the clarity of vision to direct and shape the
future of human society".
Because of her success with these children,
she was asked to start a school for children in a housing project in Rome,
which opened on January 6, 1907, and which she called "Casa dei
Bambini" or Children's House. Children's House was a child care center in
an apartment building in the poor neighborhood of Rome. She was focused on
teaching the students ways to develop their own skills at a pace they set,
which was a principle Montessori called "spontaneous
self-development". A wide variety of special equipment of increasing complexity
is used to help direct the interests of the child and hasten development. When
a child is ready to learn new and more difficult tasks, the teacher guides the
child's first endeavors in order to avoid wasted effort and the learning of
wrong habits; otherwise the child learns alone. It has been reported that the
Montessori method of teaching has enabled children to learn to read and write
much more quickly and with greater facility than has otherwise been possible. The
Montessori Method of teaching concentrates on quality rather than quantity. The
success of this school sparked the opening of many more, and a worldwide
interest in Montessori's methods of education.
Speaking
with the School Head of Sarah’s Nest Montessori School, Mrs. Toyin Adeniran
revealed the advantage of Montessori Education to the overall development in
the life of the Child.
CUE IN…
CUE OUT…
The Montessori
classrooms provide a prepared environment where children are free to respond to
their natural tendency to work.
The
prepared environment offers the essential elements for optimal development. The
key components comprise the children, teacher and physical surroundings
including the specifically designed Montessori educational material.
Characteristics
of the prepared environment include:
Beauty, order, reality, simplicity and accessibility.
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Children must be given freedom to work and move around
within suitable guidelines that enable them to act as part of a social group.
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Children should be provided with specifically designed
materials which help them to explore their world and enable them to develop
essential cognitive skills.
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Mixed age groups (eg. three to six, six to nine, nine to
twelve) encourage all children to develop their personalities socially and
intellectually at their own pace.
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"Beyond the more obvious reasons why it is sensible to
group the ages three by three, such as the little ones learn from the older
children and the older ones learn by teaching the younger, every child can work
at his own pace and rhythm, eliminating the bane of competition, there is the
matter of order and discipline easily maintained even in very large classes
with only one adult in charge. This is due to the sophisticated balance between
liberty and discipline prevalent in Montessori classrooms, established at the
very inception of a class. Children who have acquired the fine art of working
freely in a structured environment, joyfully assume responsibility for
upholding this structure, contributing to the cohesion of their social
unit."
There
are prepared environments for children at each successive developmental plane.
These environments allow children to take responsibility for their own
education, giving them the opportunity to become human beings able to function
independently and hence interdependently.
The role of a Montessori teacher called
‘the directress/director’ is that of an observer whose ultimate goal is to
intervene less and less as the child develops. The teacher creates an
atmosphere of calm, order and joy in the classroom and is there to help and
encourage the children in all their efforts, allowing them to develop
self-confidence and inner discipline. With the younger students at each level,
the teacher is more active, demonstrating the use of materials and presenting
activities based on an assessment of the child's requirements. Knowing how to
observe constructively and when, and how much, to intervene, is one of the most
important talents the Montessori directress.
“Children are human beings to whom
respect is due, superior to us by reason of their innocence and of the greater
possibilities of their future.”