Montessori Nature's Smile

Sometimes terms like "positive discipline" and "peaceful parenting" can be interpreted in way that confuses many parents, leaving them believe that creating proper boundaries, rules and discipline is damaging for their child's development. I am a very strong believer that every child needs boundaries and discipline in their life.  In fact, according to the studies "Children whose parents are warm and responsive yet also set limits and have reasonable expectations for their children tend to have better outcomes than their peers whose parents show less warmth and responsiveness, have low expectations, or both". 

“Language lies at the root of 

that transformation of the 

environment that we call 

civilization” -Maria 

Montessori.

As Maria Montessori said, language is a "root". It is something that helps us to connect to outside world, our inner world, develop, grow, become part of the society. As a mum and educator I like to provoke deeper thinking look in the matter of things. Essential skills like reading and writing are skills that help to create person's world. For some reason becoming mum made me take completely different perspective on education and led me to decide to homeschool our children in future. As a part of my plan I have made a decision to past upon teaching reading and writing until the age of six or even seven. Here is why.

 Maria Montessori was a legendary woman. She was the first to break the social stigma about women -she became the first woman to enter medical school in Italy at the age of 22. Maria was a strong and compassionate woman. In 1896 she added the appointment as surgical assistant at Santo Spirito Hospital in Rome to her portfolio of tasks. Much of her work there was with the poor, and particularly with their children. As a doctor she was noted for the way in which she ‘tended’ her patients, making sure they were warm and properly fed as well as diagnosing and treating their illnesses. In 1901 Montessori immersed herself in her own studies of educational philosophy and anthropology.

 Maria Montessori had such a profound view on parenting, she said: [L]et us think, for a moment, of the many peoples of the world who live at different cultural levels from our own. In the matter of child rearing, almost all of these seem to be more enlightened than ourselves – with all our Western ultramodern ideals. Nowhere else, in fact, do we find children treated in a fashion so opposed to their natural needs. In almost all countries, the baby accompanies his mother wherever she goes. Mother and child are inseparable . . . . And this lasts for the whole period of maternal feeding, which is the reason for this close alliance. For the mother has to feed her child, and therefore she cannot leave him at home when she goes out. To this need for food is added their mutual fondness and love . . . . Mother and child are one.
Except where civilisation has broken down this custom, no mother ever entrusts her child to someone else. The child shares the mother’s life and is always listening.”