Interview with Maria Montessori
Maria Montessori talks about her Montessori schools: play vs. work, mixed ages, freedom and discipline — and more.
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ABOUT JESSE MCCARTHY
For over 20 years, Jesse McCarthy has worked with thousands of children, parents, teachers and administrators — as a principal for infants to 8th graders, an executive with a nationwide group of private schools, an elementary & junior-high teacher, and a parent-and-teacher mentor.
Jesse received his B.A. in psychology from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) and his Montessori teacher's diploma for ages 2.5 to 6+ from Association Montessori Internationale (AMI), the organization founded by Dr. Maria Montessori.
Jesse has spoken on early education and child development at schools around the globe, from Midwest America to the Middle East, as well as at popular organizations in and outside of the Montessori community: from AMI/USA to Twitter. Jesse now heads MontessoriEducation.com and hosts The Montessori Education Podcast.
TRANSCRIPT, with references
INTRO
There is so much out there about Montessori.
Everything from flashy toy suggestions on social media, to course offerings at major universities.
But what’s real, and what’s not?
And what would Maria Montessori have to say about it all today?
We can never know for certain, as she passed away some 70 years ago. (She was born in 1870 and died in 1952.) So she’s not here to make, say, parenting posts on Instagram, or to Tweet her take on current events.
But when it comes to some topics, and deeply important ones, we have A LOT to go on, because Maria Montessori spoke and wrote a great deal in her time.
So what I’ve done is created an interview with her.
I ask the questions. She answers them. With every answer being taken verbatim from a lecture or book of hers. And I’ll be sharing the exact references, at MontessoriEducation.com under the podcast title ‘Interview with Maria Montessori’.
The only liberty I take with Maria Montessori’s words is to order them based on my questions. But I have not changed a single word of what she actually said.
Put in a different way, everything you hear in this recording is Maria Montessori herself talking. I mean I’m not going to try and recreate her voice. I don’t speak Italian, for one. And I’m a somewhat deep-voiced man, and she wasn’t; so, um, it’d be tricky to match her pitch, to say the least.
But I try my best to ensure you know when I am asking questions, and when she is ‘answering’.
That’s it for the basics.
Only other point before we start, is that Maria Montessori is a hero of mine. I’ve done and seen a lot in education and parenting, over about 20 years now, and the Montessori approach is the best in practice from my vantage. But of course everyone must judge for him or herself. Maria Montessori was very clear that she was not after followers. During her life, she said over and over again, to instead ‘follow the child’. Not her.
On that note, let us hear from this world-renowned educator, whom I actually call ’La Maestra’; or in English, ‘The Teacher’.
Oh, and if you’re looking for biographical information on Maria Montessori, you can easily Google that of course, or just head to Wikipedia. Otherwise, I think my guest today needs no introduction.
PLAY & WORK
Jesse McCarthy: Welcome, Maria Montessori. Hopping right in, with a hard-hitting question. Some people say that your kind of schooling, the Montessori approach, is just about children playing. What do you think of that?
Maria Montessori: “I have to defend my method from those who say it is a method of play. Such people do not understand that work is natural to man … that man builds himself up through work.” [1] “…children would rather work than play.” [2]
Jesse: Ok, one second, sorry to interrupt you. But is that really true? I mean, I don’t want to offend you here, but parents who don’t your schooling would find what you’re saying a little crazy, given their experience at home; and many teachers too, given their experience in the classroom. Do you really mean that children would rather work than play?
Montessori:
I do mean it, but the difference is that I do not think of children’s work and play in quite the same way as most people do. Perhaps you think of children working only when they do their lessons or carry out simple tasks at home — in any case they don’t seem to enjoy either very much and are always eager to go off playing.
But you will be surprised when I tell you that the greater part of what you call ‘play’ is really work. Grown-ups think of play as a purposeless occupation that keeps children happy and out of mischief, but actually when children are left to play by themselves very little of their activity is purposeless. Children have a keen instinct of self-defense and, since most grown-ups do not understand their work, they often hide quite cunningly the importance of what they are doing when mother thinks they are just playing.
There is one thing most parents firmly believe — that work is hard for children, and only aimless play is easy and natural. And so when they see a little brow frowning over a reading book, desperately trying to learn, they say the child is at work and it is obvious that work is difficult. But if they were to see the same little boy in one of our schools tracing the outlines of a set of wooden cut-out letters as well as recognising the letters by sight, and arranging the letters so that they spell out words, chuckling to himself with satisfaction and delight, they would not call that work. ‘He is learning,’ they would say, ‘but he is so happy it is quite plain he is playing too. And yet learning should be difficult. This is very confusing.’
It is confusing only because they have not yet discovered that learning is natural to a child, aimless play is not. We make learning difficult for children by trying to teach them by means of grown-up methods; the natural and happy way for children to learn, however, is by touching and moving solid objects, not by trying to memorise rules. Our notion of children’s play is wrong because we have not noticed that a child is always busy working on his own development.
When a grown-up thinks of work, he thinks of doing something as a means to an end — spending his days in an office for the sake of a salary — but a child’s work is based on doing things for their own sake. There is an end towards which his work is taking him: through his work he is building the man he will become. But the child doesn’t know this, he only knows that he takes delight in doing certain things. This is his work.
When a little girl is busy dressing and undressing her doll, her mother does not mind interrupting her play for something quite trivial. But see how absorbed she is, this is her work which should not be interrupted, the small fingers are growing skillful, the young mind is learning the meaning of order, for the doll must have her clothes put on exactly right.
We are completely on the wrong track when we believe that expensive toys should keep a child happy, or that the child who has a nanny to do everything for him is particularly fortunate. In reality it is the child of the busy mother, who is left to try and do things for himself, left to improvise toys from simple things and use his own ingenuity, who is fortunate. He is free to work in his own way and so he turns play into profitable work suited to his needs, whereas the rich child is often left to play in the way grown-ups imagine he would enjoy most. That is why children with cupboards full of toys are often bored and naughty, while the child left alone takes pleasure in very simple things and is happily absorbed for hours at a time in work of his own choosing.
Grown-ups, in spite of all their psychology, have not yet fathomed the motives of the child — it is hard for us, for our own motives are so different. We want material things, whereas the child only wants an occupation that interests him. His present happiness and development as well as his character and intelligence in the future depend so much on this work of his own choosing.
The wise mother will remember that play time is never wasted. So long as the children are busily absorbed, they are working at their own development — for children would rather work than play. [3]
Jesse: Ok, that’s clarifying, thank you.
As a quick side question: you seem to be saying that adults only work for rewards, while children are into the process, a kind of joy in the doing. But can’t we, grownups, also experience a deep love of the work itself? So that say money, although great to make, can fade into the background?
Or going further, and this relates to our current social-media culture, can’t some very healthy adults love the work so much that all else isn’t that important to them, like getting awards and social status; you know, to be liked by everyone?
Actually, in one of your books you talked about this, in relation to how teaching can be deeply rewarding — one can get lost in the work, so to speak, as you related with Thomas Edison and Marie Curie. Do you remember that?
Montessori: “We remember Madame Curie, who felt only annoyance when some university wanted to interrupt her work on radium to confer on her an honorary degree. Edison too, one of the first friends of the Montessori Method, was soon weary of being dragged by a fashionable wife to social functions when his heart was in his laboratory. One day he tore off his tie and dress-suit, tied them in a bundle and threw them out of the window, exclaiming ‘There goes your social husband!’ — and resumed an old dressing gown and slippers for work. People like these counted it no sacrifice to renounce lesser for greater joys. They did what they liked best to do, having acquired an intense interest which transformed and ennobled them, and the teacher who reaches this stage of interest is similarly transformed. He or she joins the happy group of men who have taken the road of life. As surely as the scientists they penetrate life’s secrets, and, win its rewards, not only for themselves but for all.” [4]
MIXED AGES
Jesse: Such a great story about Edison, and I really appreciate your overall perspective on work, both for adults and of course for children. Now I want to move to another interesting aspect of your approach: Mixed ages. Can you talk a little about this?
Montessori:
Our schools show that children of different ages help one another. The younger ones see what the older ones are doing and ask for explanations. These are readily given, and the instruction is really valuable, for the mind of a five year old is much nearer than ours to the mind of a child of three, that the little one learns easily what we should find it hard to impart. There is a communication and a harmony between the two that one seldom finds between the adult and the small child.
There are many things which no teacher can convey to a child of three, but a child of five can do it with the utmost ease. There is between them a natural mental “osmosis.” Again, a child of three will take an interest in what a five year old is doing, since it is not far removed from his own powers. All the older ones become heroes and teachers, and the tinies are their admirers. These look to the former for inspiration, then go on with their own work. In the other kind of school, where children in the same class are all of the same age, the more intelligent could easily teach the others, but this is hardly ever allowed. The only thing they may do is to answer the teacher’s questions when the less intelligent cannot. The result is that their cleverness often provokes envy. Envy is unknown to little children. They are not abashed by an older child knowing more than they do, for they sense that when they are bigger their turn will come. There is love and admiration on both sides; a true brotherhood. In the old type of school, the only way to raise the level of the class was by emulation, but this too often aroused the depressing and antisocial feelings of envy, hatred and humiliation. The brighter children became conceited and dominated the others, whereas in our schools the five year old feels himself a protector of the younger one. It is hard to believe how deep this atmosphere of protection and admiration becomes in practice. The class gets to be a group cemented by affection. Finally, the children come to know one another’s characters and to have a reciprocal feeling for each other’s worth. The only thing they used to say in schools of the old kind was, ‘So and so has won the first prize,’ or ‘That boy has scored zero.’ True fellow feeling does not develop in such a fashion. Yet this is the age in which social or antisocial qualities are going to be evolved according to the nature of the child’s surroundings. This is their point of origin.
People sometimes fear that if a child of five gives lessons, this will hold him back in his own progress. But, in the first place, he does not teach all the time and his freedom is respected. Secondly, teaching helps him to understand what he knows and even better than before. He has to analyze and rearrange his little store of knowledge before he can pass it on. So his sacrifice does not go unrewarded.
…
Our schools are alive. To understand what the older ones are doing fills the little ones with enthusiasm. The older ones are happy to be able to teach what they know. There are no inferiority complexes, but everyone achieves a healthy normality… [5]
FREEDOM
Jesse: Wow, that was pretty thorough, thank you. Now almost in passing there, you mentioned that in your schools the child’s “freedom is respected’.
This idea of freedom for children seems to be very misunderstood today. To some, and I’ve seen this with a lot of parents and even professors, it’s almost a kind of ‘anything-goes’. So what do you mean by freedom?
Montessori: “The problem is not so easily solved as many modern pedagogues believe when they say, ‘Let’s allow children to do whatever they like. Let’s give them freedom and bow down to this portion of humanity.’ If this were done the world would be turned upside down…” [6] When we speak in education of the freedom of the child, it is often forgotten that it is not the same thing as leaving the child to his or her own devices. Simply freeing children from restraint, so that they do what they like, does not mean giving them freedom. Freedom is always a great positive achievement; it is not easily attained. It is not gained simply by eliminating tyranny or breaking chains. Freedom has to be built; it has to be created both in the inner and outer world. This is our true task and the only help we can proffer to the child.” [7]
Jesse: So what is required for this freedom to exist?
Montessori: ”a prepared environment where the child can be intelligently active.” [8]
Jesse: Ok. There’s a lot there. You’re the maestra, we’re students. Can you break that down for us. I know you would say that your schools are a prime example of just such ‘prepared environments’ — for instance, as we’ve discussed, where there are mixed ages and children work freely. But can you tell me a little more about that, and maybe even how your ‘Children’s Houses’, or these school environments of yours, came to be?
Montessori:
We started by equipping the child’s environment with a little of everything, and left the children to choose those things they preferred. Seeing that they only took certain things and that the others remained unused, we eliminated the latter. All the things now used in our schools are not just the result of elimination in a few local trials but in trials made in schools all over the world. So we may truly say that these things have been chosen by the children. We found there were objects liked by all children, and these we regard as essential. There were others that they seldom used, contrary to the beliefs of most adults, and this all happened in all countries. Wherever our normalized children were allowed to choose freely, we always obtained the same results, and I used to think of those insects which only, and always, got to the particular flowers that are suited to them. It was very clear that the children needed these things. A child chooses what helps him to construct himself. At first we had many toys, but the children always ignored them. There were also many devices for displaying colours, but they chose one type only, the flat silk-wound spools that we now use everywhere. In every country this was confirmed. Even as to shape and intensity of the coloured area, we let the children’s preferences guide us. This close determination of all the objects provided, has its reflection also in the social life of the class. For if there are too many things, or more than one complete set for a group of thirty or forty children, this causes confusion. So we have few things, even if there are many children.
There is only one specimen of each object, and if a piece is in use when another child wants it, the latter — if he is normalized — will wait for it to be released. Important social qualities derive from this. The child comes to see that he must respect the work of others, not because someone has said he must, but because this is a reality that he meets in his daily experience. There is only one between many children, so there is nothing for it but to wait. And since this happens every hour of the day for years, the idea of respecting others, and of waiting one’s turn, becomes an habitual part of life which always grows more mature.
Out of this comes a change, an adaptation, which is nothing if not the birth of social life itself. Society does not rest on personal wishes, but on a combination of activities which have to be harmonized. From their experiences another virtue develops in the children: the virtue of patience, which is a kind of denial of impulses by means of inhibition. So the character traits that we call virtues spring up spontaneously. We cannot teach this kind of morality to children of three, but experience can, and because in other conditions normalization is prevented — so that people the world over see children fighting for what they want — the fact that our children waited struck them as all the more impressive. I was often asked, ‘But how do you make these tinies behave so well? How do you teach them such discipline?’ It was not I. It was the environment we had prepared so carefully and the freedom they found in it. Under these conditions, qualities formerly unknown in children of three to six were able to show themselves. [9]
DISCIPLINE
Jesse: Incredible. I mean I’ve seen this kind of inner discipline in action time and time again in Montessori schools. But it really is so beautiful, especially hearing about it from you.
So correct me if I’m wrong, but I want to ensure we’re on the right track here. It sounds like you’re saying a child really develops discipline through concentration in work; and also, because in your schools there’s only one of each material, that helps with patience and respect. But specifically, again, you’re saying that true discipline ultimately comes from a child being focused, on activities and work of his own choosing. So obedience to an adult, say to his parents or a teacher, is not the first step?
Montessori: “If the child is not yet master of his own actions, if he cannot obey even his own will, so much the less can he obey the will of someone else.” [10] We call an individual disciplined when he is master of himself…” [11]
Jesse: So you’re saying that a lot of what we call ‘behavior problems’ are due to children not being able to master themselves. What does such mastering look like in practice? Like if a parent comes up to you and says, ‘This all sounds nice and dandy and fluffy, but what do I do when my child is making a mess of the house, right in front of my face?? Should I just let him to keep at it, do whatever he wants, be a ‘master’??
Montessori: “Do not think for a moment that I maintain that a child should always have his own way.” [12] “Try this policy with a mischievous child, one who takes a great joy in leaving taps running, for instance, though you have told him a hundred times he must never turn them on. Instead, allow him to turn them on, show him yourself how more and more water pours forth as you open the tap and how the flow grows smaller as you turn it off, then leave him to it. [paragraph break] Watch him if you wish to do so, but make sure you are unobserved. You will be surprised how thoughtfully he will turn the taps on and off as though he were solving some difficult problem, and then, when he has apparently mastered the matter of taps it is more than likely that he will have lost all interest in his former mischief and will use them in future only for their proper purpose.” [13]
Jesse: Sounds so easy when you say it! So why is this kind of thing so hard for so many adults? It seems in traditional parenting, and most definitely in traditional schooling, a goal, or at least a desire, is for the child to sit still, listen to us, and not to be ‘intelligently active’ as you put it.
Montessori: “very often the adult also imposes conditions which he himself has not the fortitude to accept even partially ... as, for instance, the task of listening motionless for three or four hours every day, during a course of years, to a dull, wearisome lecturer.” [14]
Jesse: You’re basically saying many adults can be hypocrites, and expect the impossible of children. It’s almost like discipline in this old-school sense is doing what the teacher says, maybe being still, not causing any challenges for her.
Montessori: ”In our system we obviously have a different concept of discipline. The discipline that we are looking for is active. We do not believe that one is disciplined only when he is artificially made as silent as a mute and as motionless as a paralytic. Such a one is not disciplined but annihilated.” [15]
Jesse: Wow. You’re not holding back. I appreciate directness though, so thank you.
Time is flying with you. We’ve covered A LOT — and we haven’t even hit on the famous practical-life work in your schools, like in your ’Children’s Houses’ for 3 to 6-year-olds, where the children are sweeping.
Montessori: “and dusting, making things tidy, setting the table for meals, waiting at table, washing the dishes.” [16]
Jesse: Yeah, and so much more no doubt. I wish we could get into it, and just keep on hearing from you about all aspects of your schooling. I mean, we also haven’t even tackled independence yet!
Montessori: “If teaching is to be effective with young children, it must assist them to advance on the way to independence. It must initiate them into those kinds of activities which they can perform themselves and which keep them from being a burden to others because of their inabilities. We must help them to learn how to walk without assistance, to run, to go up and down stairs, to pick up fallen objects, to dress and undress, to wash themselves, to express their needs in a way that is clearly understood, and to attempt to satisfy their desires through their own efforts. All this is part of an education for independence.” [17]
Jesse: But what is independence?
Montessori: “the essence of independence is to be able to do something for one’s self. … man achieves his independence by making efforts. To be able to do a thing without any help from others: this is independence. If it exists, the child can progress rapidly; if it does not, his progress will be slow. With these ideas in mind, we can see how the child must be treated: they give us a useful guide in our handling of him. Although our natural inclinations are all toward helping him in his endeavors, this philosophy teaches us never to give more than is absolutely necessary.” [18]
Jesse: I love that, never give more than is absolutely necessary. I do want to ask you one last question.
Before I get to it, as I’d like to end with your words, not mine, I have to tell the listeners out there a few quick closing points.
——
Hey everyone, I hope this back and forth is working for you! So first quick note, as mentioned in the opening, every word of Maria Montessori’s on this episode is hers, and can be found on the transcript at MontessoriEducation.com, under the podcast title ‘Interview with Maria Montessori’. It’s all referenced there, with links to the specific books or lectures of hers — 10 of them in fact — so you can check it all out for yourself: see the original context they were in, etc.
Incidentally, many of the books Montessori wrote are published by Montessori-Pierson Publishing Company, the family-owned organization that has kept her works alive after all these years. I note this because I want to offer them a huge thank you for their continued efforts, and I highly encourage you to read Montessori directly.
For beginners, I recommend ‘Maria Montessori Speaks to Parents. Wonderful little book.
For everyone, new and old to Montessori, read or re-read The Absorbent Mind. Just fantastic.
And for those who want to dig deep, read her California Lectures of 1915, my absolute favorite.
[These books, and most referenced, can be found @ Montessori-Pierson Publishing Company.]
There’s so much more of course. And I should say that reading never replaces experience. Get in a classroom and observe, if you haven’t maybe even become a teacher yourself if you’re not already.
Ok, next point: if you enjoyed this “interview’ with Maria Montessori, please share it. Took a bit of work to put everything together, and your sharing with others is much appreciated.
Last note here: If you follow the overall Montessori Education Podcast, with me Jesse McCarthy, please rate it and leave a review, wherever you listen. Please don’t forget this step.
Ok, that’s it for you listeners out there, now back to Maria Montessori..
——-
Jesse: My last question for you, Maestra, is really about us, adults.
I think there’s this general sense in the world that children are innocent beings, joyful and pure, but as we grow up we become tainted, corrupted in some way.
This is not my personal view, but I know it’s widespread enough.
And today, it feels like as a culture, us grownups, we do more complaining than ever, and often it’s finding the worst about things, and about others. Seems to me we’re less positive nowadays. We’re less carefree, less child-like. Not as many heroes, you know. We’re more often looking down, not up.
I think you hinted at your take earlier, but do you feel this attitude, this kind of negative sense of life, is inherent in human beings and society, or?
Montessori: ”We only have to look at civilization to realize the greatness of which man is capable. But we are focused on his errors and mistakes, not on his greatness. The fault lies with us. Think how many things man has created — the wireless, to mention but one. Look around at all we have — small, great, or beautiful — whatever it is, it has been created by man. But while asking for more and more of these marvelous inventions, we never think of the man who created them. We do not consider him at all. Although we try to do everything we can to enhance our comfort, we do not consider the greatness of man, we only consider his defects. We do not consider man, the creator. Therefore I say we must refocus our hearts. We must put the creations of man at the center, and not his defects." [19]
————
E.M. Standing, Maria Montessori: Her Life and Work (New York, NY: Penguin, 1998), p. 345. [1957]
Maria Montessori Speaks to Parents: A Selection of Articles (Amsterdam: Montessori-Pierson Publishing Company, 2017), p. 19. [possibly 1931]
Maria Montessori Speaks to Parents: A Selection of Articles (Amsterdam: Montessori-Pierson Publishing Company, 2017), p. 17-19. [possibly 1931]
Maria Montessori, To Educate the Human Potential (Oxford: Clio Press Ltd, reprinted 1993), p. 84-85. [1948]
Maria Montessori, The Absorbent Mind (Oxford: Clio Press Ltd, reprinted 1997), p. 206-207. [1949]
Maria Montessori, Education and Peace (Amsterdam: Montessori-Pierson Publishing Company, reprinted 2008), p. 50. [1949]
Montessori: Teaching Materials 1913-1935, Furniture and Architecture (München: Prestel Verlag, 2002), p. 1. [1922]
Maria Montessori, To Educate the Human Potential (Oxford: Clio Press Ltd, reprinted 1993), p. 16. [1948]
Maria Montessori, The Absorbent Mind (Oxford: Clio Press Ltd, reprinted 1997), p. 203-204. [1949]
Maria Montessori, The Absorbent Mind (Oxford: Clio Press Ltd, reprinted 1997), p. 237. [1949]
Maria Montessori, The Montessori Method (New York, NY: Frederick A. Stokes Company, 1912), p. 86.
Maria Montessori Speaks to Parents: A Selection of Articles (Amsterdam: Montessori-Pierson Publishing Company, 2017), p. 29. [possibly 1931]
Maria Montessori Speaks to Parents: A Selection of Articles (Amsterdam: Montessori-Pierson Publishing Company, 2017), p. 49. [possibly 1931]
Maria Montessori, The Advanced Montessori Method I: Formerly Entitled Spontaneous Activity in Education (Amsterdam: Montessori-Pierson Publishing Company, reprinted 2010), p. 24. [1918]
Maria Montessori, The Discovery of the Child (Amsterdam: Montessori-Pierson Publishing Company, reprinted 2009), p. 51. [1948]
Maria Montessori, From Childhood to Adolescence (Amsterdam: Montessori-Pierson Publishing Company, reprinted 2008), p. 66. [1948]
Maria Montessori, The Discovery of the Child (Amsterdam: Montessori-Pierson Publishing Company, reprinted 2009), p. 58-59.
Maria Montessori, The Absorbent Mind (Oxford: Clio Press Ltd, reprinted 1997), p. 142. [1949]
Maria Montessori, The 1946 London Lectures (Amsterdam: Montessori-Pierson Publishing Company, reprinted 2013), p. 5-6.
