Montessori Methodology

A teacher with a higher medical education, Maria Montessori, whose method of education was universally known, was an outstanding personality of her time. Her bold approach to pedagogical theory and practice is still controversial.

The methodology of Maria Montessori - the child's self-worth and prepared environment for development

Investigating the behavior of children, Maria Montessori came to the conclusion that the laws of the development of the human body, the stages of maturation of its physiological systems in conjunction with higher nervous activity are highly individual. The teacher has no right to actively interfere in the process of becoming a person. Any encouragement or punishment violates the natural course of development. Traditional teaching, aimed at imposing general rules on the child without regard to his individual abilities, hinders the disclosure of the potential of the individual. The task of the teacher is upbringing. The main meaning of the word lies in the root - nutrition. From this postulate follows the natural conclusion that the teacher's true task is to create a nutrient medium that will nourish sensations and emotions, nourish the creative forces and thereby give food for the development of the intellect. If this principle is met, every child can become a full-fledged, highly developed, harmonious personality. Without a prepared environment, the method of Motessori can not function. The environment only then has a stimulating development, when it allows the child to make feasible independent actions to transform it.

The Montessori Methodology - the concept of a sensitive period of development

The first and most important stage of personality development, according to Motessori - age from birth to 6 years. At this time, the child absorbs the sensations, impressions, emotional signals coming from the environment, and they become a part of his personality.

One of the basic aspects of the Montessori method is the concept of a sensitive period of development. Sensitive is the period of greatest sensitivity to the environment, when the child is capable of full concentration, the most favorable period for the maturation of certain mental functions and the acquisition of various practical skills. Intellectual development of the child occurs through sensations: a natural interest in the study of the environment, fueled by tactile sensations that are transformed into cognition.

If the child does not have the opportunity to develop certain skills through feelings and sensations in the appropriate period, then their formation can be significantly hampered or even impossible. So, for the development of speech a sensitive period is the age from birth to six years. A child deprived of full human communication during this period, can never learn to speak. Conversely, an infant who, from birth, constantly hears emotional human speech, will learn to speak without difficulty.

The method of Montessori involves the active use of special didactic material aimed at developing sensory perception. And the motive for learning is the natural inner need of little ones to imitate the actions of the elders. The role of the teacher is reduced to the recognition of periods of sensitivity and assistance in organizing the independent activity of the child by creating suitable conditions.

Teaching with enthusiasm

Maria Montessori deeply believed that the natural need to learn is embedded in every human being from the very beginning. A child who learns at a natural pace, experiences the joy of teaching and acquires confidence in his powers, which helps him achieve more. The Montessori method applied in kindergarten provides a vivid demonstration of the fact that children, through imitation, are fully capable of learning how to wash, dress, pack objects and perform other socially significant and practical activities. In addition, in the process of games with didactic materials, children learn the properties of objects, the meaning of letters and numbers, learn to solve logical problems.

Montessori's method in the pre-school development of the child has obvious advantages. The application of this method in mass school education raises objections from the point of view of the impossibility of organizing a strictly individual approach to the education of each child. From the arc of the side - this is the ideal to which one should strive.