Inspiring Montessori Quotes

Maria Montessori was born in Italy in 1870.  She became the first female physician in Italy.  In 1906 she accepted the challenge to work with a group of children in the San Lorenzo district of Rome.  It was there that the first casa dei Bambini, Childen's House, was founded.

In many ways Montessori was ahead of her time.  It is estimated that there are 20,000 Montessori schools worldwide on six continents.  Over one hundred years later, the Montessori method and Montessori graduates continue to shape our world.  Famous Montessori graduates include the founders of Google and Amazon, NBA basketball superstar Stephen Curry and Prince William and Prince Harry.  

Here are some of our favourite Montessori quotes.

Children are human beings to whom respect is due, superior to us by reason of their innocence and of the greater possibilities for their future.

Five Classes of Vertebrates - Bird Puzzle

The child has a mind able to absorb knowledge.  He has the power to teach himself.

Large Button Dressing Frame

It is the child who makes the man, and no man exists who was not made by the child he once was.

Making a Scarecrow

  The child's progress does not depend only on his age, but also on being free to look around him.

Story Alphabet

The first essential for the child's development is concentration.  The child who concentrates is immensely happy.

Planting Flower Seeds

A Drawing by a Four Year Old

Happy Mother's Day 2019

The children at our little yellow school have been busy preparing a special surprise to celebrate their moms.

What's inside the envelopes?

They have been very good at keeping it a secret.  Now that it's Mother's Day, it is safe to share it.

There is something special inside the card.

We asked the children to finish the following sentence.

I love you because....

Their answers made our hearts melt.  They are so precious.  Here are some of them.  (Note:  The older children wrote their own.  The teachers wrote those of the younger children.)

Perhaps this next one speaks for all of us.

Thank you, moms, for all that you do.  Most importantly, thank you for being you!

Happy Mother's Day!

Happy Birthday Beverly Cleary! ~ Beloved Author of the Ramona Series

Henry and the Paper Route

The Mouse and the Motorcycle

Beezus and Ramona

Ribsy

Socks

Ramona the Pest

Do you recognize any of these classic children's stories?  For many, these stories bring back warm memories of childhood.  These books and many more were written by American author Beverly Cleary.  Today she turns 103!

At our little yellow school, our afternoons begin by coming together to listen to a few pages from a chapter book.  It is a precious part of our day.  Beverly Cleary's Ramona stories are some of our favourites.  We were first introduced to a four year old Ramona in Beezus and Ramona (1955).  We have followed her adventures and growth through Ramona the Pest (1968) and Ramona the Brave (1975).  We are currently immersed in Ramona and her Father (1977).

A Few of the Ramona Series Books

Ramona Geraldine Quimby began as an accidental character in Cleary's book Henry Huggins (1950).  Cleary kept having story ideas for Ramona and wrote Beezus and Ramona in 1955.  More books followed.  The last book in the series was written in 1999.   

Although the books were written so long ago, they continue to resonate with children. Ramona is an energetic and curious little girl with a complex personality that changes as she matures.  She deals with things that the children deal with such as parents, siblings, pets, teachers, bullies and tattletales.  We empathize with Ramona as she deals with her feelings - being afraid, emotional, jealous and impulsive.  As we read about her adventures, we are all rooting for her.

We asked the children why they like Ramona.

"We love the stories so much!  Remember when she pulled Susan's boing boing curls and crushed her paper owl? "

"She gets into all kinds of funny trouble!  Sometimes she has a noisy fuss.  That's a meltdown."

Ramona making a great big noisy fuss.

"Remember when Ramona was so angry and wanted to say a bad word.  She said 'Guts, guts, guts!'  It was funny!"

Ramona and Beezus

One of our six year olds was very reflective.

"The way she acts reminds you of how you were when you were little."

Thank you, Beverly Cleary, for the characters and stories that you shared with us. 

"She was not a slowpoke grownup.  She was a girl who could not wait.  Life was so interesting she had to find out what happened next." - Ramona the Pest

           

The Arithmetic Materials ~ Golden Beads ~ Operations ~ Addition

~ This post is the third in a series about the Golden Bead Material. ~

Once a child is able to form and read complex numbers with the Large Number Cards and Golden Bead Material, operations are introduced.  This post will focus on addition, both static (no carrying over) and dynamic (carrying over).

Static Addition

Gather three children for this activity.  Two children are asked to set out the Small Number Cards. 

One child is asked to set out the Large Number Cards.  This child will be the banker.

(For this post, two numbers will be added together.)  The teacher selects four different Small Number Cards for the children.  These are placed on the children's trays.  The children are asked to go to the banker and ask for the amount of Golden Beads that correspond to the numbers on their tray.They are asked to meet the teacher back at the mat.

1,425

2,361

When the children return to the mat, each child is asked to verify the amount of beads on their tray.  These beads are then placed on the mat.  The child slides his/her number cards together and is asked to read the numbers.  The number cards are placed at the top right corner of the mat.

1,425 + 2,361 ~  Symbol and Quantity

The children are asked to put the Golden Beads together and count them.  This begins with the units.  Once the number of units is known, the child goes to the banker to get the Large Number Card that corresponds to this amount.   This is done for all the categories - units, tens, hundreds, thousands.

Putting the Beads Together

Slide the Large Number Cards together to get the total amount of beads brought to the mat.  Place it under the Small Number Cards in the top right corner of the mat.  "When you add small quantities to get a larger one we call it addition."  Note the two numbers added together (the addends) are represented with the Small Number Cards.  The answer (the sum) is larger and is represented with the Large Number Cards.

The Sum

Dynamic Addition

Once the children have had practice with static addition, dynamic addition is introduced.  The lesson is similar to the introduction of static addition.  The difference occurs when the children put the Golden Beads together.


Number cards are selected.  Quantities are retrieved from the banker and brought back to the mat. 

2,136

3,425

The quantities are placed on the mat.  The Small Number Cards are slid together. 

Small number cards and quantities ready to be added together.

In this example, the carrying over occurs in the units category (6 + 5 = 11).  Ten is a magic number.  When we have ten of one category, we must exchange for the next category.  In this case, we exchange ten units for one ten.  We are left with one unit.

The child has made a ten with the units.  The ten individual units are exchanged at the bank for a ten bar.  One unit is left.

The children continue to put the categories together and retrieve the corresponding Large Number Cards.

The Large Number Cards are slid together to get the total amount of beads brought to the mat.

"When we add small quantities together to get a larger one, what did we do?"  The children say "Addition."

The purpose of these activities is to give the children an impression of the nature of addition.  It is also to show how numbers can carry from one hierarchy to the next.

The Arithmetic Materials ~ Golden Beads ~ Formation of Complex Numbers

~ This post is the second in a series about the Golden Bead Material. ~

Once a child has been introduced to the Decimal System material, they will begin to use it to form complex numbers.  The purpose of this exercise is to make the child aware of the hierarchy of the decimal system.  The digits 1 to 9 remain the same.  It is the place the digit occupies in the complex number - units, tens, hundreds, thousands -  which gives it its meaning.  It is also to show that zero is a place holder for an empty category.  (In the number 2, 307, zero shows us that one of the categories, the tens, are missing.)  Through this material, the child is given practice in the interpretation of complex numbers and is introduced to the proper wording.

The child is asked to set out the Golden Bead Material on one mat and the Large Number Cards on another mat. 
 

Setting Out the Large Number Cards

Setting Out The Limited Bead Material

(r to l) Units, Tens, Hundreds, Thousand

For the first exercise, the teacher sits at the mat with the number cards and places one card from the units category on a child's tray.  The child is asked to go to the mat with the Golden Bead Material and get this amount.  When the child returns, the child is asked to count the beads to confirm the amount.

When the child is familiar with the units, a card from the next category is added.  Now the child has a card from the units category and another card from the tens category.  Again, the child is asked to go to the mat with the Golden Bead Material and get this amount.  When the child returns, the child is asked to count both sets of beads aloud, first the units and next the tens.

2 Units, 6 Tens

The teacher will then “do something special with the cards” and place the units card face up on top of the tens card (the units card is not placed on the zero of the tens card at this point). 

The units card is placed on top of the tens card.

While the child is watching, the teacher gently pushes the edge of the bottom card against the palm of the hand so that the units card slides down over the zero on the tens card.

The teacher slides the unit card down over the zero on the tens card.

The teacher will ask ‘What did you bring?’  The child will say ‘two units’ and ‘six tens’.  The teacher says “We call six tens and two units, ‘sixty-two’”.  This work continues with new numbers.  Once the child has mastered two categories (units and tens) another category is added.  After the first presentation, the child may slide the cards.

Sixty-two

The formation and reading of complex numbers (example - 4,239) leads to work with the operations (addition, subtraction, multiplication and division).  A future blog post will discuss operations with the Golden Bead Material.

This material is used extensively in the Montessori preschool (casa) and early elementary.  It is introduced to children at 4 - 4 1/2 years of age.