© MariaMontessori.com
In Part I of this article, we talked about the importance of offering reality to the young child during the first six years of his life, when he is building impressions of the world around him. If these impressions are accurate, they will strengthen his intelligence and allow him to continue learning effectively. We discussed how fantasy could confuse young children, and why it didn’t lead to the development of their own imagination.
Before we go any further, let’s consider the difference between fantasy and imagination. In our daily lives, those words are used interchangeably. But are they really the same thing? Absolutely not!
The definition of fantasy is: “ideas that have no basis in reality”. Fantasy can be a great tool for escape and entertainment for those of us who have a strong grip on reality. However, young children (before the age of 5 or 6) are not able to differentiate between fantasy and reality; a phenomenon that has dire repercussions on their ability to learn and problem-solve.
“Pretending is largely assimilation of reality to one’s own thoughts, rather than adjustment of one’s own ideas to fit reality,” writes Dr. Angeline Stoll Lillard in Montessori: The Science Behind the Genius. Our goal as parents and educators is to give our children a firm grounding in life, so they will be able to deal with whatever challenges come their way, instead burying their heads in the sands of a fantasy world.
How is imagination different from fantasy? Let’s look at the definition of imagination: “1. The ability of the mind to form new and original ideas that have their basis in reality. 2. The ability to be creative and resourceful”.1
Why does imagination have two definitions? Because there are two types of imagination! When the child is young (before the age of 6), he uses reproductive imagination. Simply put, this is the ability to see something, close your eyes, and continue seeing it in your mind. Reproductive imagination plays a huge role in the early formative years of a Montessori child. It allows him to develop math and language skills, and permits him to understand abstract concepts such as colors, shapes, and other aspects of the world around us.
We use reproductive imagination to help the young child expand his horizons. If we want to talk about the desert to a young child who has never experienced it, we use concepts he is familiar with to help him build a mental picture of an unfamiliar place. We tell him the desert is hot during the day; hot like the heat that comes from a fireplace. At night it gets very cold; cold like the air inside a refrigerator. The desert has hills, like the ones he’s climbed; but they’re made of sand, like the sand he plays with at the beach.
The child begins to develop an image in his mind (literally, he’s image-ining). This image’s accuracy depends on the precision and variety of his experiences. If he has never been allowed to get close to the fireplace and feel its heat, he will not be able to imagine the heat of the desert. If he has never been allowed to play in the beach (or heck, even a sandbox), he will not understand the grittiness of the desert sand.
Young children can certainly use their imagination, but their main focus is the reality around them. They want to touch everything and are driven by Nature to orientate themselves with their immediate surroundings. However, around the age of six, the child begins to question how everything around him works. He’s no longer content with learning through his senses: feeling, seeing, tasting a fruit, and finding out its name, for example. He wants to know where it came from and how it was made!
At this point, Nature, in its infinite wisdom, sends the child’s ability to imagine into overdrive to satisfy his burgeoning curiosity for the Universe (just like in the previous stage of life it drove the child to learn through his senses). In the Montessori Elementary classroom, we meet the six-year-old child in this new stage of his life and offer him Cosmic Education.
© MariaMontessori.com
Cosmic Education presents the inter-relatedness of everything around us. Just like in the Children’s House environment, we use materials that transmit concepts concretely, but these materials are only the starting point in the Elementary child’s learning process. The child uses the Montessori materials to understand certain ideas, but will then use his powerful imagination (well-prepared by real experiences in the earlier years) to reach accurate conclusions. This new type of imaginative ability, called creative imagination, will allow him to understand the wider implications of his new knowledge, and he will use it as an agent of creation and problem-solving.
In the Elementary classroom, the Universe comes to life through the child’s imagination. He time-travels to ancient Egypt to discover triangles with the help of a magic rope, and before that to Babylonia to learn how to measure angles by following stars. He studies grammar, where the Pronoun becomes a rocket that orbits the Sun (the Verb). Math – that most dreaded of subjects – becomes delightful when the divisor in long division turns into an ancient Roman troop leader, and squaring and cubing are viewed as a story of a monarchy. The subjects explored in Elementary are as wide as our knowledge in our world and the child’s imagination takes center stage.
In Elementary, all subjects “must be presented so as to touch the imagination of the child, and make him enthusiastic, and then add fuel to the burning fire that has been lit,” Dr. Montessori explains. “Our aim therefore is not merely to make the child understand, and still less to force him to memorize, but so to touch his imagination as to enthuse him to his inmost core.”
Pilar Bewley is an AMI trained Primary teacher. She is currently enrolled in AMI Elementary training in Bergamo, Italy.
Thanks for the overview of this aspect of Montessori. I’m wondering how religious Montessori families cope with the issue of God with their “reality”-grounded kids. I’m the parent of an infant and beginning to explore the world of Montessori, and this is one aspect that troubles me. Actually, I’m not even religious — but I’d like to raise a child who has the capacity for faith in general and room for belief beyond her experience. Thoughts? Thanks.
Montessori herself was strongly connected to her Christian faith, often making analogies between the reverence of Christ and the young child. To truly learn from the child, one must have a deep respect for the child. Montessori saw that taking care of the spiritual needs of the child is just as important as addressing physical and intellectual needs. She introduced the child to the stories of the Bible through hands-on ways, as the young child is a sensorial learner and needs to experience to learn. To the older child, the great stories in the Bible captivate the child’s imagination and as everything in life is inter-related, God is a part of life. I’ve used the Bible as the example, as this is Maria Montessori and my own experience, but the same holds true for other religions and the stories of each faith.
If God is a part of your life, then God is Real and is not contrary to reality grounded children. Involving your child in everyday faith based practices that you personally do is a great place to start. Perhaps this may be prayer or contemplative meditation time, or partaking in rituals such as a religious services. If you wish for your child to have a particular attribute, it is best to role model it yourself, so take the time to realize how you do so in your life and be purposeful about exposing your child to it.
My son is in a Montessori toddler program. He’s 2 years, 8 months old. He has been in the program for more than 6 months, and I attended several orientation sessions before then, but I only heard of this concept that very young children should perhaps not be read stories with talking animals, etc., tonight at a parent program at the school. And it was mentioned in a very off-hand way, so, frankly, I was dumbfounded. I’ve always thought that reading to a child, particularly at a level just slightly above his abilities, would encourage him to reach and expand his cognition and understanding of language. I think this is happening for my son. His language skills are excellent, and he is already making logical connections and expressing abstract thoughts. Almost all of the books I read him are fiction, and nearly all of the fiction books include talking animals. My favorites include Father Bear Comes Home and Little Bear’s Friend, Mike Mulligan and his Steam Shovel (the steam shovel doesn’t talk but she is anthropomorphic), Harold and the Purple Crayon (no talking animals, but LOTS of fantasy in that book!). I do have a couple of new nonfiction faves: Tomas and the Library Lady (but this book talks ABOUT reading fantasy books) and Beatrice’s Goat (this one is completely nonfiction, no talking goats, and a lovely story — but perhaps too steeped in reality. My son was upset when he heard that a family was too poor to send its kids to school) Help me here. Where is the list of books that can be read to (instead of by) a nearly 3 year old that will help him access his grip on reality, rather than his fantasy world.
I am so fascinated by the above discussion. I am a Montessori Elementary 1-2 teacher, with four grown children of my own. I am currently writing my thesis project for my master of art in Montessori Ed, and my topic is fairy tales. Yes, fairy tales. Did you realize that Montessori was an exact contemporary of Sigmund Freud, and that she wrote in To Educate the Human Potential, ” Modern psychology exactly suits our method, for whereas the older science was based on the observation of superficial facts of consciousness, the new seeks to observe the unconscious mind, and probe its secrets in order to discover the mind’s relation to the facts of life. ” (p. 12). I am trying to spread the word that the imagination, the unconsious, and fairy tales are not incompatible! Please visit my blog, 365 Cinderellas, where I am posting a different version of the worldwide Cinderella story every day of 2011, along with cross references to the Montessori Elementary curriculum. Find it at http://rachelhopecrossman.blogspot.com
Oops, second to last line shoud read…” to spread the word that the imagination, the unconscious, fairy tales and Montessori education are not incompatible.” Thanks! RC
Thanks everyone for your comments!
@ Adrian – Carrie explained Montessori’s incorporation of religion very well! (Thanks Carrie!) It’s all about reaching the child where he’s at, from a perspective that he will be able to grasp and associating religious concepts with real-life experiences.
@ Ember – Reading to your children, regardless of the topic, is always a wonderful way of helping them develop their vocabulary. And it is very observant of you to note that your child is beginning to abstract, as this is an ability that all children have (after all, language is an abstract notion, right?). But it’s precisely BECAUSE he’s beginning to abstract that a strong foundation in reality becomes so important. In this way, his abstractions will be well-founded and useful for developing further accurate abstractions! Montessori websites such as Michael Olaf have wonderful reality-based books to supplement your book collection.
@ Rachel – We must help parents realize that Montessori is not ONE educational approach, but FOUR – one for each plane of development (0-6 years of age; 6-12 years of age; 12-18 years of age; 18-24 years of age). When Dr. Montessori wrote “To Educate the Human Potential” she was referring ONLY to the Elementary child, as you probably already know. The back cover of the book states: “This book is intended to help teachers to envisage the child’s needs after the age of six.” Therefore, the approach she writes about is one TAILORED TO THE ELEMENTARY CHILD.
Most parents are not aware that what the elementary child needs is ENORMOUSLY DIFFERENT from what the Primary (pre-school) child requires. This is why it is crucial to differentiate between the two when talking about fairy tales, fantasy, and Montessori. In Elementary, we touch the child’s imagination and send it soaring, but we must always remember that our mission is to “educate the human potential”, so every story we use in Elementary must have this aim and not the aim of entertaining the children. Any story that helps the child feel gratitude towards “the wonders of the world and sympathy with humanity” is a great and powerful story!!
Je suis passionnée par l’éducation et l’enseignement. Je suis à la retraite depuis juin 2011. Je continue à réfléchir et à échanger avec d’autres praticiens sur les meilleurs moyens et pistes qui aideraient les enfants à apprendre dans le plaisir.
Je voudrais savoir si, pour l’enseignement de la langue arabe ou plutôt en langue arabe un matériel similaire à celui conçu pour la langue française a été élaboré.
Just regarding the question of faith – and my examples can only speak from a Christian perspective — in our family, we utilized the Bible stories that are “real” in the under-6 age. While most religious ed programs will have children learning about creation (and usually in a “cutesy” sort of way, which signifies there is a deeper meaning that children just won’t get, so they have to make it cute to get them to learn about it), a Montessori-based religious experience only gets into creation at ages 6-9, with a more thorough study of it at 9-12 – when a child can grasp those concepts of TIME, and SPACE, and HISTORY.
So a Montessori religious experience of any religion for under 6 will be anything hands-on, accessible to the child.
For example, in churches with altars and chalices and patens, and pastors in particular garments – these things will be given as nomenclature, art work, and manipulatives (think just larger than doll-size, so it’s not “doll-house play” but it’s also not “re-enactment” – it is exploring the form and function).
But “reality” is of course a reduction of the actual thing out there. Our minds must necessarily reduce and represent what is out there, as it is too complex to fully percieve. In math terms, only a tiny fraction of the photons any object reflects/emits can be captured by the eyes. Then, only a tiny amount of the information about position/color/intensity those captured bits of energy in the eye contain can be processed by the nuerons of the human brain.
Just trying to make sure we all do realize that what we agree is “reality” is strictly a social construct. E.g. — in my neighbor’s “reality” the grass may be long enough that it “needs mowing.” In my reality, it may appear the grass “needs” to be removed and the land allowed to go wild so as to encourage native plants, which are sustainable in an arid local climate.
In one analyst’s “reality” Iran may be a growing nuclear threat to Israel. In my own “reality” Iran is only reactive to our own U.S. belligerence. etc.
But even for very plain “reality” this relativism and arbritariness holds.
While Fran may think my car is “red”, I think it is “maroon.” My wife thought my tires were becoming too worn and becoming a hazard to drive on. I thought the tires clearly had another 10,000 miles until they become a hazard. Both of us have engineering backgrounds.
Stories: “Fantasy” is usually taken to mean what we mutually agree does not happen in the real world.
This applies to most stories, most fiction. “Highly realistic fiction” often turns out to have a lot of holes in its logic and details to some discerning eye somewhere. This is going to happen because each individual person necessarily has a different, unique experience. We literally each recived different photons and sound waves, all unique. We’ve also had of course more every-day unique experiences. Our synatic connections in our brains are unique.
So your “realistic” fiction may seem much like “fantasy” to me.
And this can apply even to ordinary journalism in quality newspapers like the New York Times, etc., where the reporters interpretations and emphasis creates a unique take on what happened.
I didn’t really get to what I was trying to say.
I mean that most all statements we make about complex things, like people, oceans, weather, etc., are in a profound sense very similar to fiction.
And the other big implication is that Fairy Tales are very beneficial because they emphasize the fictional element of reality. They are obvious fictions (even to a 3 yr old), and that suggests, correctly, to that 3 yr old, that “reality” itself is very subjective, fictional.
And *that* is a very valuable lesson.