Montessori on the Move: Principles Behind the Stuff
The Montessori method of education does not at first glance go well with being on the move. The special objects and environment setup is core to the method, but our environment is always shifting and we live out of suitcases. My sixteen month old is into her toddlerhood. The method is mostly applied to children from three years old onwards, and supposedly very hard to pull off with toddlers. Yet I felt compelled to apply it as it intuitively made sense to me.
So I went deeper into the source of the teaching to find the essence. I have been rewarded. As I slowly extract the Montessori meta, I find an essence that can work with our nomadic lifestyle. Montessori is a lot more fluid than it looks like.
There are some simple and powerful notions in the method. Maria Montessori was deeply philosophical and she is not afraid to voice her take on how life works. The primary principle is to wait and watch. And Montessori did just that. Her work emerged out of her ability to study the nature of children when they are given freedom to do what they need to do.
I stopped and started to observe my child, getting out of her way yet remaining attentive. It is not passive. It is a very active observation. I can't check out and daydream. I submerge myself in being present with Ruya. Just doing this has been powerful. It lets me see when Ruya shifts into deep focus, the activities she is currently working on and when she might need my help.
Beyond the wait and watch principle is an idea of facilitating the child. You teach by modelling, slowly and with presence. You only help when necessary. Sounds easy but it has been hard to hold back my impulse to help her. And that 'help' was more often than not me doing it my way, not assisting her to find her way. The help given is to encourage independence - a capacity for the child to do for themselves. I know I have got it when I do involve myself and that assistance helped her flow.
Often I will play with her, so we are doing together and she loves this. I like this idea of helping, and my style is more collaborative than the method suggests. We sweep together and I help her put the leaves in the bucket, and then pick it up so she sees the handle. And when she starts to unpack the bucket, at first I help her to put the leaves back in. But then I realise we are playing the pack and unpack the bucket game. Then my help becomes supporting her to drop the leaves on the ground and then sweep them up, and search for containers to put the leaves back into. I have learned that she, like all children, can usually work it out for themselves without any adult interference.
The central goal of the method is to encourage deep concentration - being in the flow and fully immersed in the activity. For Monetessori all healthy character development starts with the ability to concentrate. So when you see that happening you do all you can to protect that space. It has made me ultra attentive to when Ruya shifts into her focused zone. Her stillness is palpable. When she gets into her zone I become like a mother bear, making sure my cub is safe to get totally immersed into what she is studying.
The way in which Montessori encourages concentration is to give freedom and structure the environment. The child can do whatever she or he wants. But that choice is within a specially set up space with particular stuff inside of it. The space offers calm, like a temple or beloved writing desk. And the special equipment emerged from Montessori watching children play with toys and noticing the ones they preferred and used the most. The environment they created is like a dolls house for children. A world made with child sized stuff, composed of the activities we adults busy ourselves with.
At first I got very caught up in trying to have the right equipment - yet still be lightweight. Since most equipment is wooden that proves difficult. I ended up choosing a few central items which I rotate between nests. Mostly I examine the equipment online for the age group Ruya is in, and then use that as a model for stuff I create. I source material around us and find activities that align with what the equipment is supposed to inspire. I have realised that it is not so much the type of environment we are in but how I navigate it with Ruya. I adapt our home space where I can so that her work tools (toys) are ordered and in easy reach. I source materials in different places for new activities.
When we were recently in Lisbon I found button shops that had been around for a hundred years. I got her beautiful beads and buttons, and pretty bags to put them in. We used jars I found in the rental apartment and the play emerged from that. However nature has proved the most perfect environment for deep focused learning. I take her into natural surroundings whenever I can. No matter where we are or what we have, I keep remembering that all the equipment that emerged from Monetssori's study, came from the desire to encourage concentration. Concentration is not owned by place or stuff.
Toddlers are often met with the label of naughty. Montessori's solution to the issue of discipline is to give freedom. Specifically the freedom to spontaneously focus on work. She noticed that so called problem children would spontaneously lose those problems when they found work they loved. As I work I offer Ruya the chance to work with me, to sweep or clean the table or wash her hands. I try to follow her as she finds work to do, moving from play to play. What I love about the method is that instead of labelling her naughty when she so called acts out, I stop to look at what she is trying to do that is not being given space to happen. When she started dropping food on the floor from her high chair, I looked down at it with her in interest. I talked about how it went down. It was all very interesting and we experimented further with gravity. After a few weeks she had enough of doing that work and we moved onto how to clean up any scraps that found there way to the ground. Then she started pouring water out of the bath using her cups. Eventually I had to redirect her experience to avoid a constant river Nile being formed. So I asked her to pour water on me, then she tried to pour water on herself. We got jugs and tubs into the bath and poured water into them. Instead of focusing on her being naughty by pouring the water out of the bath, the act of pouring became the work needing to be done.
When it comes to the Montessori activities the focus is on the hands - meaning the use of the body in the process of learning. Montessori spoke of the development of character being linked to the capacity of the hand. The development of the inner life is deeply linked to the development of the body - how we use and make use of our muscles. All of Ruya's work is hands on. I started involving her in cooking each meal. I find something she can do - help mix the tahini, strip the kale leaves off the stem, whisk the egg and so on. Usually I assist her because she can’t yet do it on her own. Slowly I will work into involving her in setting the table and folding clothes. She helps unpack the dishwasher (when we have one), moving the cutlery to the cutlery tray which I usually put near her reach. Being hands on has let me loosen up and get dirty. We take off our shoes and put our feet into the water, touch the earth to find out what it feels like, move the mud around and carry heavy objects.
The child is seen not as something we need to mould, but someone who has an intent and a self-moulding character. I love this about Montessori because it fits with my value system. I feel like the way I am raising Ruya supports her to become more of who she is, not so much of who I thinks she should be. And so far she is thriving with this approach. I am still learning the system and exploring others but the experiment is developing both Ruya and I. Some days I feel like I am the one who learned the most. I don't follow the method religiously but the core principles sing to me, and I dance along.
The method of Montessori has also given me a different view on mothering. Montessori's advice to mothers was for us to offer our children work, only help when necessary and avoid interrupting them in the work they do. Not only do I feed, bath, change diapers, play and cuddle, but beyond that I teach Ruya to teach herself. She will always be under my wing, and the best of my mothering, I hope, will allow her to find her own wings and fly.
