Montessori saw that children learn best by doing and that happy self-motivated learners form positive images of themselves as confident, successful people.
“Education must no longer be regarded only as a matter of teaching children, but as a social question of the highest importance, because it is the one question that concerns all mankind. The many other social question of have to do with one group or another of adults, with relatively small numbers of human beings; the social question of the child, however, has to do with all men everywhere.”---Maria Montessori.
CHILDREN NEED FREEDOM
Montessori saw freedom as the single most important factor in allowing children to develop as spontaneous, creative individuals. She saw the role of education as providing environments in which the children could be set free to follow their natural impulses-to become the wonderfully dynamic, natural learners they were designed to be.
CHILDREN ABSORB THEIR CULTURE
Montessori’s emphasis on children being allowed the freedom to work alone and to develop concentration did not mean that she underestimated the importance of social development. Instead what she saw was that it was precisely because the children were allowed to work in such freedom that they could display such love and care towards others. She saw that children literally absorbed the world around them and that true discipline and harmony was something that came from within and was not something that could be enforced.
BIG TEACHERS
Montessori called her teachers Directresses because she felt that they sensitively guided, rather than controlled, the children’s activities. She asked that they be “more psychologists than teachers” and considered that success lay in the ongoing nature of the teacher’s own personal development as on the sensitivity of the observations of individual children. Ultimately she saw their role as not so much to teach the children as to 'direct' the natural energies that they saw emerging.
LITTLE TEACHERS
As she watched the children busily going about their work Montessori realized it was natural and very easy for the younger children to learn by watching and listening to the older children .In fact she saw that children learn best this way and that something wonderful happened when a community of children could actively support and help each other .Montessori schools therefore encourage children of all ages to work together as a social group and do not normally split children by sex or age.
CHILDREN ARE NATURAL LEARNERS
Montessori saw that children underwent extraordinary transformations in overall happiness, self-confidence and self-discipline when they were allowed to follow their innate needs. She saw that the work of a child, therefore, was fundamentally different to that of the adult: that the child worked for the joy of the process rather than for the end result, that the child had a need to repeat activities over and over until an inner need was fulfilled, and that the child was excited and energized through work, rather than burdened and fatigued by it. She felt that children only stopped loving
learning when they were forced to go against their natural impulses.
PROCESSES NOT RESULTS
Montessori schools believe that children are their happiest when they are busily involved in processes. Children are natural learners who, if left to follow their instincts, will want to constantly explore the world. All too often what stops children enjoying this natural curiosity are external demands that don’t fit with their needs .The only results young children are interested in are the ones that end up making them feel good about themselves and their abilities. When they learn, instead, that there are unacceptable results that make them feel bad about themselves they start to fear the processes. And that fear can cut them off from the joy of learning forever.
Montessori schools therefore believe that each child is an individual and should be encouraged to work at the pace that is right for him or her. There are no grades or tests. Children are never in competition with each other.
And Montessorians continue to fight to preserve the rights of each child to be protected from undue pressure.
