Montessori Culture Activities in Montessori Education
Importance of cultural exercises in early years
- The Montessori approach to education has a connectedness between all areas of the curriculum. One area ties into another while the door is opened to a different, yet related component.
- -Culture determines what we know– the sum of all the angles in a triangle; what a screw driver is used for; how to use a computer to find out where Peloponnesians are.
- -Culture determines what we don’t know– how to catch a fish by hand; how to build a dugout canoe and navigate the Seas without chart or compass.
- -Culture determines what we want to be– lawyer; dairy farmer; computer programmer; doctor; shaman; pearl diver
- It demonstrates that all people have the same fundamental needs and places an emphasis on the similarities among the human race. Children are taught to respect people from other races, countries, and religions.
- The geographical factors influence how people live as they adjust to their environment.
- At this point, the teacher involves the class in a study of life and culture on earth. The curriculum then branches into different directions, such as: (a) geography, (b) culture ( mannerism of life ) , and (c) history.
- Children are taught history parallel to the concept of time. Discussions and further studies include paleontology and archaeology, and still further back through time to the beginning of time, or the creation of the universe. The cycle is complete.