What Are The Philosophies Behind the Success of Montessori Daycare?

During the first decade of the 20th century, Maria Montessori developed the educational method that bears her name. Built from careful observation of children learning and playing, today's Montessori daycare centers are found around the world. Much of that popularity is related to the underlying principles of Montessori, including these important aspects.

1. The Absorbent Mind

Perhaps the most important aspect of the Montessori daycare is that it recognizes the importance of early development and the hunger of young minds to absorb new information. The idea is that children enter the world with an absorbent mind that is eager to discover this strange new world they have only inhabited for a short period of time. This eagerness is why the first 6 years are the ideal time to help children develop into dynamic individuals.

2. Auto education

Maria Montessori observed that children at play are working out new ideas and learning valuable skills. She made play-based learning the core of the Montessori Method, allowing children to play freely with activities that indicate whether it is performed correctly. This self-correcting mechanism feeds back into positive reinforcement for children and helps to create intrinsic motivation.

3. Respect for the Child

An important tenet of Montessori is that children are not lesser individuals based on their age or lack of physical experience in the world. Montessori children are treated with the same respect due to equals. In fact, Montessori education revolves around a contract between children and their instructors that is intended to encourage self-esteem and a positive outlook.

4. Sensitive Periods

Montessori early education focuses on the sensitive periods of education, including order, speech, movement, and sensory comprehension. Montessori daycares engage children through group activities like sing-alongs and physical games imparting vital sensitive learning, vocabulary, and perfecting fine and gross motor skills performance.

5. The Prepared Environment

A Montessori classroom is kept orderly as a matter of course. Children always know where to find materials appropriate to different skills, and are taught to return materials when they are no longer in use. But the prepared environment is more than orderly; it is also designed to match the viewpoint of children, providing them with a place that is scaled to children and adults seem oversized for the environment-- a place respectfully known as the Children's House.

The Montessori Method is a carefully laid out educational system that revolves around the development of many early skills. It uses unique activities and specially trained instructors who are experienced in social and emotional education to guide children into appropriate development..