MARIA

MONTESSORI

(1870 - 1952)

Life Sketch

• Dr. Maria Montessori(1870-1952) was an Italian Doctor.

• She prepared a scheme for the education for the feeble-minded

children.

• She was appointed as a director of special schools.

• She establish a school for children named ‘casa de Bombini’ or

children’s house on January 6, 1907.

• She discovered the training of senses and muscles.

• She wrote a book which was very famous named ‘Discovery of

the child’.

• In 1939, she visited India and stayed till 1951.

Montessori’s Educational Ideas

• Feeble mindedness of child was due to dullness of their senses.

• Proper training would enable them to overcome feeble mindedness.

• Too much emphasis is laid on the psychology of the child.

• Discipline must come through liberty.

• She introduced ‘ A Didactic Apparatus’ for ‘self education’.

• Education must provide proper training of senses.

• She employed three methods in achieving the aims of education:

a) Motor education training for the head, heart and body.

b) Sensory education with the help of a didactic apparatus.

c) Language teaching consists of desk, small balls, cards with letters pasted on

them colour boards and so on.

Didactic

Apparatus

Materials used in the sensory training

• For perception of size.

• For perception of forms.

• For discrimination in weight.

• For touch.

• For sense of temperature.

• For auditory acuity.

• For the colour sense.

• Tactual activity.

Montessori Materials

Principles of Montessori System of

Education

1. Principle of individual development.

2. Principle of freedom or liberty.

3. Principle of Self-education or Auto education.

4. Principles of sense training.

5. Principle of muscular training.

6. Principle of no Material rewards and Punishments.

7. Principle of no fairy tales.

Principle of individual development

• She believed that every child is peculiar and unique.

• Every child progress at his own speed and rate.

• So each child should be treated as a separate individual.

• Collective method of teaching crush the individuality of the

child.

Principle of Freedom or Liberty

• There should be no interference or hindrance in the child’s

growth and development.

• Restraints will stifle the innate powers of the child.

• The school should provide free & natural manifestation of the

child.

Principle of Self-education or Liberty

• She believed that self-education is the true education.

• She advocates that the child should remain undisturbed by

adult interference.

• She devised the didactic apparatus which attracts the

children. It keeps them busy spontaneously.

• It leads them to learn the power of movements, reading,

writing and arithmetic etc.

Principle of Sense Training

• She asserts that our senses are the gateways of knowledge.

• She pointed out that the senses are very active between the age

of 3 and 7.

• She advocates that the sensory training is the key to intellectual

development.

Principle of Motor Efficiency or

Muscular Training

• She believed that muscular training facilitates other activities like

writing, drawing, speaking etc.

• She takes muscular activity as purely physiological in character.

• She stress that running, walking etc, all depend on muscular

training.

Principle of no Material Rewards & Punishments

• According to her rewards and punishments are unnatural

incentive or forced effort.

• The development that comes with their help will also be

unnatural.

Principle of no fairy tales

• She wants to banish fairy stories from the curriculum of

young children.

• Because the stories will confuse & hinder them in the process

of adjusting themselves to the real world.

Functions of a Teacher

1. Teacher as a gardener.

2. The directress and not the Teacher.

3. Doctor-cum-scientist-cum-missionary.

4. Faith in personality of the child.

5. Moral qualities.

Teacher as a gardener

• The teacher should take care for the child like a gardener

who cares for the plants.

• So that the natural growth of the child is properly guided

and aided.

The directress and not the teacher

• She thinks that the primary duty of the teacher is to

direct and not to teach.

• She insists that the directress should have an extensive

knowledge of psychology and laboratory techniques.

Doctor-cum-scientist-cum-missionary

• The directress should be partly doctor, partly scientist and

completely religious.

• Like a doctor she should avoid scolding or suppressing the

patient in order to avoid worst situations.

• Like a scientist she should wait patiently for the results and

should conduct experiments.

• Like a religious lady she should be there to serve the child.

Faith in the personality of the child

• The directress should allow the child to grow according to

his own inner law.

• Her business is to provide suitable environments.

• She should provide children with suitable opportunities to

think for themselves.

Moral Qualities

• According to her, virtues and not words are the main

qualification of the directress.

• She must banish anger which is a great sin & which prevents

from understanding the child.

• The soul of the child, which is pure and very sensitive,

requires her most delicate care.

• Her motto should be ‘I must diminish to let you grow’.

Merits of Montessori method

1. Freedom for children:

The children are provided with self-directed activities.

2. Sense Training:

She aims at educating children through sense training.

3. Reverence for small children:

She considered her school as the temple & the child as a God.

4. Individual Attention:

Against collective method, stresses individual method of teaching.

5. Learning through living:

Practical exercises are provided to enable the children to learn good habits

like cleanliness, order, self-help and the dignity of labour.

Demerits of Montessori method

1. Mechanical & artificial nature of Didactic method:

Too much importance has been given to didactic apparatus. It will hand-cuff both

the teacher and the student.

2. Imagination is neglected:

Since there is no place for fairy tales, there is less scope for the imagination.

3. Lack of suitable teachers:

Successful working of the this method depends on teachers who posses extensive

knowledge of child psychology.

4. Very expensive:

it is very expensive to set up a school on the lines suggested by Montessori.

5. There is little scope for project:

In Montessori method there is little scope for utilizing projects.