Maria Montessori: The Woman and Her Method

Maria Montessori was well known for her interests in medicine, but more specifically she was interested in diseases among children. This later perked a greater interest in education and educational methods, thus creating her very own method in education. In her experiences of medical practice, Montessori clinical observations fascinated her, leading her to analyze how children learn, which she concluded that children build themselves from what they find in their environment. Then shifting her focus from the body to the mind.

Maria Montessori believed that education of the senses developed first, then the education of the intellect would follow soon after. Montessori developed a teaching program that enabled 'defective' children to read and write. She sought to teach skills not by having children repeatedly try it, but by developing exercises that prepare them. These exercises would then be repeated: Looking becomes reading; touching becomes writing.

The success of her method then caused her to ask questions of 'normal' education and the ways in which failed children. Maria began to test her program and ideas with the establishment of the first Casa dei Bambini (Children's house or household), Rome in 1907. The house and those who believed in what it represented, were designed to provide a good environment for children to live and learn. An emphasis of self-determination and self-realization was instilled. This developed a concern for others and discipline, and to engage children in exercices de la vie pratique (exercise in daily living). Her main contributions to the work of those of us raising and educating children are in these areas:

• Preparing the most natural and life-supporting environments for the child

• Observing the child living freely in this environment

• Continually adapting the environment in order that the child may fulfill his or her greatest potential, physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually.

With great knowledge comes deep inspiration, children teach themselves. This was the simple but profound truth that Montessori's lifelong pursuit of educational reform, methodology, psychology, teaching, and teacher training—all based on her dedication to furthering the self-creating process of the child.


http://www.montessori.edu/maria.html
http://www.infed.org/thinkers/et-mont.html
http://www.montessori-namta.org/NAMTA/geninfo/mmbio.html