Montessori and early years
In a nutshell, Montessori is child led learning
Overview
Maria Montessori was Italy’s 1st female doctor (fun fact!), but more importantly she decided to dedicate her life to early childhood education. Her deep commitment to children meant she became one of the world’s leading experts in the development of early years education and her practices have been studied and implemented worldwide ever since.
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She led the way in child-led, hands-on learning, and her methods simply came from observing the children she worked with. She concluded that children had a natural love of life and learning, that needs to be nurtured at every stage.
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Here are some of the key conclusions Maria Montessori made, that have become the basis of Montessori methodology.
The Prepared Environment
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“If children are presented with an organised environment, it will bring their inner world into order”.
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External order creates internal peace and harmony. So a learning environment should be calm, engaging and organised, all in order to give the child the best opportunity to concentrate and engage with their environment. All through play!
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“The child who concentrates is immensily happy”
Materials are also key to this part and should always be simple, appealing and ‘open-ended’ allowing multiple possibilities and outcomes…
Children are Active Learners
Children’s brains in the first years of life are like little sponges. Their brains grow faster at this time, than any other time in their lives.
Over 80% of a child’s core brain structure is developed in the first 3 years of their life. This fact hopefully gives you an indication of how crucial our role is as adults to support and enhance this development.
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“The hand is the pathway to the brain…”
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Children are active and sensory learners, meaning they need to use all five of their senses in order to learn naturally and effortlessly.
Our role is therefore to simply help them learn and develop at their own pace, in their own way, by providing the right learning environment, hands-on material and activities, whilst using simple communication techniques.
Observation
Every child is unique, with their very own pace, interests and needs. One of the most important things we should do as parents, is to learn to stand back and take time to observe the child, so we can understand how to best follow those interests. Not interfering or correcting can be one of the most challenging things to do, but one of great importance.
Areas of child development
As part of any child’s education, even in their very early stages of life, there are a number of key areas of development that can be observed and helped. We’ll look at these in more detail throughout the How2Montessori journey, but I thought it would be useful to share the sort of ‘standards’ followed internationally, to aid a child’s development.
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Every country is slightly different in the way they focus on these different parts and will nationally have their own set of standards that are followed, as a child goes through their overall development.
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In the UK, these standards are called the EYFS. Wherever you are in the world, these standards will all be very similar. Not only helping ensure children have the knowledge and skills they need to start school, but they can also be used as a rough guide when supporting your child’s development at home. All these areas of development start right from birth! And you’ll be amazed to see how interrelated they all are in your child’s every day life and learning. Again something you will discover with us!
Personal, Social and Emotional Development (PSED)
Everything around their language and communication. So everything from early language, with the exploration of any new sounds, the ability to listen, understand, follow instructions and later develop confidence, skills in expressing themselves, and taking turns in conversation.
Creativity - expressive art and design
Anything to do with creativity and harnessing their imagination. From role playing, to drawing/painting, playing with dough, to building with blocks and magnets. The possibilities are endless. Any opportunities for them to share their thoughts, ideas and feelings through art, music, movement, drama and design.
Literacy
Linking sounds and letters / begin to read and write.
Understanding the world (KUW)
Children learning about their surrounding environments, make sense of their world, find out about people, animals and places.
Mathematics
Anything to do with problem solving, reasoning and numeracy. From numerals, quantities and shapes, to size and dimension, as well as understanding of space, measurements and weights. You’ll be surprised to see how early in life this can be indirectly introduced.
Physical development
Anything to do with their body, gross motor skills (eg: walking or lifting) and fine motors skills (eg: holding a spoon or a pencil), From the development of their five senses, to their hand-eye coordination, ability to walk, push/pull or carry heavy objects. All about developing body awareness, coordination, control and movement.
Communication and Language
Anything linked to children's language development. From early sensory activities helping develop and prepare the ear for language, such as music instruments, singing, stories, puppets, first language baskets to more advanced activities like matching