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Welcome |
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Today is September 5, 2010 |
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About
Montessori Education |
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According to the American Montessori Society, the basic idea in the
Montessori philosophy of education is that every child carries unseen
within him the person he will become. In order to develop his
physical, intellectual and spiritual powers to the fullest, he must
have freedom a freedom to be achieved through order and
self-discipline. The world of the child is full of sights and sounds
that at first appear chaotic. From this chaos, the child must
gradually create order and learn to distinguish among the impressions
that assail her senses, slowly but surely gaining mastery of herself
and her environment.
Dr. Montessori developed what she called the "prepared environment"
which already possesses a certain order and disposes the child to
develop his senses and intelligence at his own speed, according to his
own capacities, and in a non-competitive atmosphere in his first school
years. "Never let a child risk failure, until he has a reasonable
chance for success," said Dr. Montessori, understanding the necessity
for the acquisition of a basic skill before its use in a competitive
learning situation. Between the ages of three and six, a child most
easily learns the ground rules of human behavior. These years can be
devoted constructively to "normalizing" the child freeing him through
the acquisition of good manners, work habits, the development of
control of movement, and the ability to concentrate to take his place
in his culture.
The child who has had the benefit of a Montessori environment is freer
at a later age to devote himself more exclusively to the development of
his intellectual faculties. The structure of Montessori learning
involves the use of many materials with which the child may work
individually. At every step of his learning, the teaching materials
are designed to test his understanding and to correct his errors.
Dr. Montessori recognized that the only valid impulse to learning is
self-motivation of the child. Children must move themselves toward
learning. The teacher (director) prepares the environment, programs
the activity, functions as the reference person and exemplar, offers
the child stimulations; but it is the child who learns, who is
motivated through the work itself (not solely by the teacheršs
personality) to persist in his chosen task. If the Montessori child is
free to learn, it is because he has acquired from his exposure to both
physical and mental order an "inner discipline." This is the core of
Dr. Montessorišs educational philosophy.
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