Montessori (1870-1952) saw education as assisting the psychological development of children rather than as imparting knowledge. She felt that teachers often overlooked the importance of unconscious elements in the human psyche, and that understanding children who had difficulty in adapting to society was the key to contributing to their successful development (Wolfe 2002).
32 Montessori believed that the spirit of a human being is developed through interactions with their environment and she extended the notion of developmental stages to include the idea of a “sensitive period” of a child‟s life, where the child is ready for acquiring certain skills and knowledge.“These periods are transitory, and confined to the acquisition of a determined characteristic. Once the characteristic has evolved, the corresponding sensitivities disappears.” (Montessori, 1966, p.38). According to Grazzini (1996), although the sensitivities disappears, the acquired abilities remain for the whole of the individual‟s life. When the needs of the sensitive period have been met, the child will have formed an „inner conceptual framework‟ which will serve him/her in the next developmental phase as he/she moves to more abstract thinking.
Montessori believed that the goal of education was to be in control of oneself, and this would be achieved through independence, self-discipline, concentration and motivation (Wolfe, 2002). The Montessori learning materials, with specific characteristics of self-correction, sensory orientation, concept development and graduated difficulty/ complexity (Henniger, 2005) were developed to meet this goal.
An ordered, welcoming environment was the first principle of Montessori‟s Casa de Bambini, or Children‟s House, founded in 1907 in Rome. She believed that order in the external environment helps children to organise their often chaotic perceptions of the outside world and build a sense of predictability and security (Roopnarine & Johnson, 2005). Liliard (1972) outlined six essential components of the Montessori learning environment. They are: first, freedom, where the choice of learning experiences will bring about the development of focus and self-discipline in the child; second, structure and order in the learning environment depict and promote the internal order unfolding within the child; third, reality and nature, where the materials are authentic and represent the real world and the child‟s inherent interests in the natural world is being catered for in the classroom environment; fourth, beauty and atmosphere that encourages positive and spontaneous response to life; fifth, Montessori‟s didactic learning materials that progress from simple to complex
33 help meet children‟s development and learning needs; and finally, the development of community life through mixed age grouping.
Montessori believed that children should select their own materials and claim responsibility for clean up as well. As part of the development of this responsibility; Montessori disapproved of rewards and punishments, believing that the child‟s self dignity could best be developed by intrinsic motivation. She also believed that useless adult assistance to children formed the root of all future repression and that adults too frequently give messages to children that they are incompetent. She noted that teachers should hold back their own agenda and authority so that children could solve their own problems. In summary, the good Montessori teacher operated on three principles: a carefully prepared environment; possession of an attitude of humility and constantly evaluating her/his own motives and the needs of the children; and respect for children‟s individuality (Roopnarine & Johnson, 2005).
Some of the major criticisms of the Montessori approach from well known educators such as William Kilpatrick (1874-1965) and John Dewey (1859-1952), include the lack of opportunity for free play, and social dramatic play because she saw these types of play activities as frivolous, unfocused and undermined the dignity of the children. Montessori‟s ideas were ahead of her time, but she failed to keep up with other thinkers in the field of psychology and education (Wolfe, 2002). Not only were the sense and the intellect important but so were feelings, the unconscious, and fantasy, all of which had no part in Montessori‟s programmes.
a) Previous studies on the Montessori Approach
One of the most important recent works on Montessori by Lillard (2005) showed that except for the devaluation of pretend play for children under six years of age, all of Montessori‟s major ideas that have been studied have been validated by research on human learning and development.
34 Another study by Lillard and Else-Quest (2006) compared students from a Montessori public school programme with students who were not in the programme. Comparisons were made between the Montessori group and the control group at two age groups : five year olds and twelve year olds. In this study, there were 59 students in the Montessori group and 53 students in the control group. The five year old Montessori children achieved better on three of the seven scales in the Woodcock-Johnson test battery : letter-word identification, word attack, and applied problems (math). On social/behavioural measure, the Montessori five year olds were more likely to use higher level of reasoning by referring to justice or fairness on a test in which they were given stories and asked how to resolve the problems presented. However, there were fewer significant differences when the Montessori and control children were at the age of 12. Stories written by Montessori children were judged as more creative and used more sophisticated sentence structure. Montessori children were more likely to choose the „positive assertive response‟ to social problems. On a questionnaire about feelings toward school, Montessori 12 year olds reported greater sense of community.
b) Implications for practices in early childhood education
Montessori‟s central vision as well as the key principles, remain viable and relevant today. The practices such as respect for the individual‟s inherent potential, multi-age groupings, holistic education, individualised and child-centred learning, prepared and learner-responsive environment, the role of the teacher as an observer and guide, and the use of hands-on manipulatives as tools for learning are still being practised widely today (Roopnarine & Johnson, 2005). One of Montessori‟s greatest contributions to early childhood education and it is widely being used by many preschools today are the hands-on manipulatives with specific characteristics such as careful attention to concept development, graduated difficulty/complexity, self correcting features and the sensory orientation of the learning materials (Henniger, 2005). For example, the cylinder blocks, which are blocks of solid wood containing 10 knobbed cylinders of graduated dimension, each of which corresponds to an equally sized socket; the tower of cubes, which is a series of 10 cubes, graded in
35 size at exact increments. Each cube is exactly identical except for the single variable of size. This draws the child‟s attention to that quality, allowing the exploration of the size relationships among the cubes without unnecessary distraction.
In Singapore, the Montessori approach has been widely adapted by preschools. Some kindergartens and childcare centres have adopted the entire approach. Others have adapted and contextualised only aspects of the Montessori approach; in particular, the provision of hands on manipulatives in classrooms and the use of sandpaper letters to develop the mechanics of writing. Montessori had the foresight early in the history of preschool education of seeing education as „assisting the psychological development of children rather than as imparting knowledge.‟ It is also interesting that she directed attention to the importance of the „unconscious elements‟ in the human psyche. Perhaps if more research attention and effort were directed at this, it may have set the path and the stage for a cognitive curriculum much earlier in history.
Montessori believed that the goal of education was to enable children be in control of oneself, and this would be achieved through independence, self-discipline, concentration and motivation. This finds similarities in Feuertein‟s (Feuerstein et.al., 2006)and Haywood‟s (Haywood, 1992) theory of developing self regulation in children. Another essential component in Montessori‟s approach is her belief that materials in the classroom are authentic and represent the real world and the child‟s inherent interests in the natural world is being catered for in the classroom environment. This is similar to Feuerstein‟s and Haywood‟s concept of transcendence where the child applies learning in the real world.
Montessori‟s appreciation of the psychological development of the child gave her the insights and understanding into what Vygotskians would have termed as ZPD- zone of proximal development. She was aware of the need to prepare the child and meet his needs in order to progress into the next development phase.
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