The Montessori method is not an educational model that can only be used in schools. You can apply the basic principles of Montessori at home, even if your child does not attend Montessori school.
SO, WHAT ARE THESE BASIC PRINCIPLES?
1. Slow down and observe your child:
Let your child explore his surroundings at his own pace. Encourage him to act, speak, share, cooperate. In short, plan less, observe more. Observe the relevant areas well. Think about how I can offer him opportunities to support these interests.
2. Put aside assumptions and prejudices and focus on understanding your child’s point of view:
Montessori has a child-centered approach. According to him, each child should be approached according to his/her developmental speed and interests. Therefore, it is very important to observe your child’s behavior, communication skills, preferred activities, sleep and eating patterns, and understand his perspective.
3. Build on respect in your communication:
Communicate with your child like an adult. listen to him. Remember that he models you in his communication skills.
4. Encourage learning by research and experimentation:
Help her find the answers to her questions herself. Teach to experiment, to experiment when necessary, to research.
5. Include in daily work:
One of the basic principles of Montessori is that children learn to do their own work independently from a young age. This is crucial for them to become self-confident, independent, problem-solving adults. Therefore, in the Montessor method, children are included in housework from an early age in accordance with their developmental level. They enjoy being involved in tasks such as helping to set the table, emptying the washing machine, preparing a shopping list, and preparing simple snacks.
6. Use alternatives other than the reward-punishment method:
In Montessori, methods of motivating the child with external factors such as winning a reward or avoiding punishment are not used. It is important for the child to learn the skills of producing solutions to problems and calming himself in moments of anger under the guidance of his parents.
7. Guide:
According to Montessori, parents are adults who guide their children and only help them when they need help. They are never bosses who rule their children or they are slaves who do whatever you want. Since the main purpose of Montessori is to raise self-confident, independent, and self-aware adults, it is of great importance to find the truth and educate oneself by trying and sometimes by making mistakes.
HOW SHOULD HOME ORDER ACCORDING TO MONTESSORI?
In order to apply the Montessori method at home, the first step is to make your home environment suitable for your children. Here are some suggestions for you:
1. Furniture and equipment suitable for children: Get kid-friendly items such as chairs, tables, small brooms, watering cans that are suitable for children.
2. Make arrangements in your home so that your child can easily access the appropriate materials: Arrangements such as low shelves for easy access to the activity materials, clothes hangers suitable for his height, baskets in sizes that he can lift and use will allow you to organize your home according to Montessori.
How to practice Montessori at home
3. Apply the principle of ‘less is more’: Very crowded environments, where a lot of material is mixed, are definitely not suitable for Montessori. It is very important that your child’s interests at that period are selected in accordance with the developmental stage, that a small number of activity materials are accessible to the child and that there is no crowd of distracting materials.
4. Change the materials from time to time: The basic principle is to remove and store the unused and finished activity materials, and to replace them with new materials suitable for that period. Materials that are removed and stored can be reused in another event or in another development period.
SİMPLE MONTESSORI ACTIVITIES
Montessori activities are activities that support self-efficacy, independence, problem-solving skills, motor development, and are created according to the needs of the child’s interests and developmental periods. We can summarize the main activity categories as follows:
1. Music and Movement Activities: Activities such as dancing, singing, playing musical instruments, running, climbing, cycling.
2. Language Activities: Books, lots of dialogue, conversation, activity baskets created with objects suitable for certain interests can be used in language activities. For example, you can create an autumn basket filled with seasonal objects such as leaves, pine cones, picture cards about autumn and books.
3. Art Activities: It consists of art activities such as scribbling, painting, painting, cutting, sticking, sewing, works made with clay.
How to practice Montessori at home
4. Daily Life Activities:
It includes activities of daily living that can be arranged according to the age and skills of the child, such as setting the table, preparing simple meals, preparing snacks, watering the flowers, wiping the table, tidying the bed.
5. Hand-eye Coordination Activities:
They are activities that support hand-eye coordination and manual skills such as categorizing objects appropriately, placing them in appropriate places, attaching-removing, disassembling.