Montessori Method

by Maria Montessori

Overview

The Montessori Method by Maria Montessori immediately captivated social reformers and educators around the world. First published in Italian in 1909, The Montessori Method has been translated into twenty languages, including the 1912 English translation. Its ideas were new and innovative compared to the traditional Lancasterian method in which large groups of children recited the teachers' words, word for word in unison. Instead of the teacher being the center of the classroom and the students being listeners and observers, Maria Montessori believed in children learning at their own pace and in their own fashion. The book begins with a collection of Montessori's speeches and then moves onto her research in education. Early chapters show how she used scientific methodology of the era, anthropomorphic measurement, to substantiate physiological explanations for children's educational potentials. It depicts Montessori as a scientist using scientific inquiry to validate her ideas and methods as the beginning of pedagogical science.

About the Author
The Montessori Method was written when Maria Montessori (1870-1952) was thirty years old, but she had even earlier success. By graduating from the University of Rome Medical School in 1896, Montessori had broken the Italian educational and cultural barriers that kept women from attending medical schools. Using her scientific training as a physician and her intuition, she developed the Casa de Bambini in the San Lorenzo slums.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780805209228
Publisher:	Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Publication date:	10/30/1988
Edition description:	Reissue
Pages:	416
Sales rank:	1,151,717
Product dimensions:	5.10(w) x 7.90(h) x 1.10(d)

About the Author

Dr. MARIA MONTESSORI was an Italian physician, educator, and innovator, acclaimed for her educational method that builds on the way children naturally learn.

Table of Contents

	Acknowledgments	IV
	Preface	V
	Introduction	XIII
Chapter I	A Critical Consideration of the New Pedagogy in its Relation to Modern Science
	Influence of Modern Science upon Pedagogy	1
	Italy's part in the development of Scientific Pedagogy	4
	Difference between scientific technique and the scientific spirit	7
	Direction of the preparation should be toward the spirit rather than toward the mechanism	9
	The master to study man in the awakening of his intellectual life	12
	Attitude of the teacher in the light of another example	13
	The school must permit the free natural manifestations of the child if in the school Scientific Pedagogy is to be born	15
	Stationary desks and chairs proof that the principle of slavery still informs the school	16
	Conquest of liberty, what the school needs	19
	What may happen to the spirit	20
	Prizes and punishments, the bench of the soul	21
	All human victories, all human progress, stand upon the inner force	24
Chapter II	History of Methods
	Necessity of establishing the method peculiar to Scientific Pedagogy	28
	Origin of educational system in use in the "Children's Houses"	31
	Practical application of the methods of Itard and Seguin in the Orthophrenic School at Rome	32
	Origin of the methods for the education of deficients	33
	Application of the methods in Germany and France	35
	Seguin's first didactic material was spiritual	37
	Methods for deficients applied to the education of normal children	42
	Social and pedagogic importance of the "Children's Houses"	44
Chapter III	Inaugural Address Delivered on the Occasion of the Opening of one of the "Children's Houses"
	The Quarter of San Lorenzo before and since the establishment of the "Children's Houses"	48
	Evil of subletting the most cruel form of usury	50
	The problem of life more profound than that of the intellectual elevation of the poor	52
	Isolation of the masses of the poor, unknown to past centuries	53
	Work of the Roman Association of Good Building and the moral importance of their reforms	56
	The "Children's House" earned by the parents through their care of the building	60
	Pedagogical organization of the "Children's House"	62
	The "Children's House" the first step toward the socialisation of the house	65
	The communised house in its relation to the home and to the spiritual evolution of women	66
	Rules and regulations of the "Children's Houses"	70
Chapter IV	Pedagogical Methods Used in the "Children's Houses"
	Child psychology can be established only through the method of external observation	72
	Anthropological consideration	73
	Anthropological notes	77
	Environment and schoolroom furnishings	80
Chapter V	Discipline
	Discipline through liberty	86
	Independence	95
	Abolition of prizes and external forms of punishment	101
	Biological concept of liberty in pedagogy	104
Chapter VI	How the Lesson Should be Given
	Characteristics of the individual lessons	107
	Method of observation the fundamental guide	108
	Difference between the scientific and unscientific methods illustrated	109
	First task of educators to stimulate life, leaving it then free to develop	115
Chapter VII	Exercises of Practical Life
	Suggested schedule for the "Children's Houses"	119
	The child must be prepared for the forms of social life and his attention attracted to these forms	121
	Cleanliness, order, poise, conversation	122
Chapter VIII	Refection--The Child's Diet
	Diet must be adapted to the child's physical nature	125
	Foods and their preparation	126
	Drinks	132
	Distribution of meals	133
Chapter IX	Muscular Education--Gymnastics
	Generally accepted idea of gymnastics is inadequate	137
	The special gymnastics necessary for little children	138
	Other pieces of gymnastic apparatus	141
	Free gymnastics	144
	Educational gymnastics	144
	Respiratory gymnastics, and labial, dental, and lingual gymnastics	147
Chapter X	Nature in Education--Agricultural Labour: Culture of Plants and Animals
	The savage of the Aveyron	149
	Itard's educative drama repeated in the education of little children	153
	Gardening and horticulture basis of a method for education of children	155
	The child initiated into observation of the phenomena of life and into foresight by way of auto-education	156
	Children are initiated into the virtue of patience and into confident expectation, and are inspired with a feeling for nature	159
	The child follows the natural way of development of the human race	160
Chapter XI	Manual Labour--The Potter's Art, and Building
	Difference between manual labour and manual gymnastics	162
	The School of Educative Art	163
	Archaeological, historical, and artistic importance of the vase	164
	Manufacture of diminutive bricks and construction of diminutive walls and houses	165
Chapter XII	Education of the Senses
	Aim of education to develop the energies	168
	Difference in the reaction between deficient and normal children in the presentation of didactic material made up of graded stimuli	169
	Education of the senses has as its aim the refinement of the differential perception of stimuli by means of repeated exercises	173
	Three Periods of Seguin	177
Chapter XIII	Education of the Senses and Illustrations of the Didactic Material: General Sensibility: The Tactile, Thermic, Baric and Stereognostic Senses
	Education of the tactile, thermic and baric senses	185
	Education of the stereognostic sense	188
	Education of the senses of taste and smell	190
	Education of the sense of vision	191
	Exercises with the three series of cards	199
	Education of the chromatic sense	200
	Exercise for the discrimination of sounds	203
	Musical education	206
	Tests for acuteness of hearing	209
	A lesson in silence	212
Chapter XIV	General Notes on the Education of the Senses
	Aim in education biological and social	215
	Education of the senses makes men observers and prepares them directly for practical life	218
Chapter XV	Intellectual Education
	Sense exercises a species of auto-education	224
	Importance of an exact nomenclature, and how to teach it	225
	Spontaneous progress of the child the greatest triumph of Scientific Pedagogy	228
	Games of the blind	231
	Application of the visual sense to the observation of environment	232
	Method of using didactic material: dimensions, form, design	233
	Free plastic work	241
	Geometric analysis of figures	243
	Exercises in the chromatic sense	244
Chapter XVI	Method for the Teaching of Reading and Writing
	Spontaneous development of graphic language: Seguin and Itard	246
	Necessity of a special education that shall fit man for objective observation and direct logical thought	252
	Results of objective observation and logical thought	253
	Not necessary to begin teaching writing with vertical strokes	257
	Spontaneous drawing of normal children	258
	Use of Froebel mats in teaching children sewing	260
	Children should be taught how before they are made to execute a task	261
	Two diverse forms of movement made in writing	262
	Experiments with normal children	267
	Origin of aphabets in present use	269
Chapter XVII	Description of the Method and Didactic Material Used
	Exercise tending to develop the muscular mechanism necessary in holding and using the instrument in writing	271
	Didactic material for writing	271
	Exercise tending to establish the visual-muscular image of the alphabetical signs, and to establish the muscular memory of the movements necessary to writing	275
	Exercises for the composition of words	281
	Reading, the interpretation of an idea from written signs	296
	Games for the reading of words	299
	Games for the reading of phrases	303
	Point education has reached in the "Children's Houses"	307
Chapter XVIII	Language in Childhood
	Physiological importance of graphic language	310
	Two periods in the development of language	312
	Analysis of speech necessary	319
	Defects of language due to education	322
Chapter XIX	Teaching of Numeration: Introduction to Arithmetic
	Numbers as represented by graphic signs	328
	Exercises for the memory of numbers	330
	Addition and subtraction from one to twenty: multiplication and division	332
	Lessons on decimals: arithmetical calculations beyond ten	335
Chapter XX	Sequence of Exercises
	Sequence and grades in the presentation of material and in the exercises	338
	First grade	338
	Second grade	339
	Third grade	342
	Fourth grade	343
	Fifth grade	345
Chapter XXI	General Review of Discipline
	Discipline better than in ordinary schools	346
	First dawning of discipline comes through work	350
	Orderly action is the true rest for muscles intended by nature for action	354
	The exercise that develops life consists in the repetition, not in the mere grasp of the idea	358
	Aim of repetition that the child shall refine his senses through the exercise of attention, of comparison, of judgment	360
	Obedience is naturally sacrifice	363
	Obedience develops will-power and the capacity to perform the act it becomes necessary to obey	367
Chapter XXII	Conclusions and Impressions
	The teacher has become the director of spontaneous work in the "Children's Houses"	371
	The problems of religious education should be solved by positive pedagogy	372
	Spiritual influence of the "Children's Houses"	376

Editorial Reviews

[T]he family life educator will find it useful to read the book, especially in this edition with its able introduction by Professor Hunt.” —Rose M. Somerville, Journal of Marriage and the Family

From the Publisher