If help and salvation are to come, they can only come from the children, for the children are the makers of men.
MARIA MONTESSORIIf help and salvation are to come, they can only come from the children, for the children are the makers of men.
MARIA MONTESSORINow, what really makes a teacher is love for the human child; for it is love that transforms the social duty of the educator into the higher consciousness of a mission.
MARIA MONTESSORIFree the child’s potential, and you will transform him into the world.
MARIA MONTESSORIThe hand is, in the highest degree, a human characteristic. It is man’s organ of grasp and of the sense of touch, while in animals these two functions are relegated to the mouth.
MARIA MONTESSORIIt is not true that I invented what is called the Montessori Method… I have studied the child; I have taken what the child has given me and expressed it, and that is what is called the Montessori Method.
MARIA MONTESSORIWe await the successsive births in the soul of the child. We give all possible material, that nothing may lack to the groping soul, and then we watch for the perfect faculty to come, safeguarding the child from interruption so that it may carry its efforts through.
MARIA MONTESSORITravel stories teach geography; insect stories lead the child into natural science; and so on.
MARIA MONTESSORIThe chief symptom of adolescence is a state of expectation, a tendency towards creative work, and a need for the strengthening of self-confidence.
MARIA MONTESSORIWhen the child begins to think and to make use of the written language to express his rudimentary thinking, he is ready for elementary work; and this fitness is a question not of age or other incidental circumstance but of mental maturity.
MARIA MONTESSORIThe consciousness of knowing how to make oneself useful, how to help mankind in many ways, fills the soul with noble confidence, almost religious dignity.
MARIA MONTESSORIWe recommend for the training of teachers not only a considerable artistic education in general but special attention to the art of reading.
MARIA MONTESSORIThe development of language is part of the development of the personality, for words are the natural means of expressing thoughts and establishing understanding between people.
MARIA MONTESSORIWe discovered that education is not something which the teacher does, but that it is a natural process which develops spontaneously in the human being.
MARIA MONTESSORIThere are two ‘faiths’ which can uphold humans: faith in God and faith in oneself. And these two faiths should exist side by side: the first belongs to one’s inner life, the second to one’s life in society.
MARIA MONTESSORIWe all know the sense of comfort of which we are conscious when a good half of the floor space in a room is unencumbered; this seems to offer us the agreeable possibility of moving about freely.
MARIA MONTESSORIIt is surprising to notice that even from the earliest age, man finds the greatest satisfaction in feeling independent. The exalting feeling of being sufficient to oneself comes as a revelation.
MARIA MONTESSORI