Our senses are the gateway to the brain and intellect.  From an early age, children interact with their environment through their senses.  Starting in infancy, they touch, look, listen, taste, manipulate and smell anything that attracts their attention.  Dr. Montessori said in her book The Discovery of the Child, “The development of the senses actually precedes that of the higher intellectual faculties, and in a child between the ages of 3-6 it constitutes his formative period.”

As the senses develop, each child gradually begins to explore size, weight, temperature, texture, smell and sounds. In a Montessori classroom, at first the child may be asked to organize items that vary in one aspect such as length or height.  Each academic concept is represented in material form, such as the red rods that show length.  Sensorial materials have a built in control of error so that children can check and correct their own work, for example the Pink Tower will topple over if not built in sequence.  Or, a knobbed cylinder will not fit into the proper hole if it is not the correct size. The child can see that the cylinder is too tall or too short or just right.

Sensorial materials in the classroom are:

• Knobbed and knobless cylinders
• Pink cubes: 10 pink cubes with graduated dimensions from 1 cm to 10 cm
• Broad stair: 10 brown rectangular prisms of equal length with graduated dimensions
• Rough/Smooth boards
• Fabric box
• Baric tablets (distinguishing weight), Color and thermic tablets (distinguishing temperature)
• Red Rods: 10 red rectangular prisms with graduated length from 10 cm to 100 cm
• Sound cylinders
• Bells
• Geometric solids: triangular & rectangular prisms, cube, cylinder, cone, triangular & square pyramids, sphere, ellipsoid and ovoid
• Geometric cabinet
• Constructive triangles
• Binomial cube
• Trinomial cube (indirect preparation for algebra)
• Smelling jars
• Tasting Bottles: salty, sweet, bitter, sour

The materials in the Sensorial Area include lessons in vocabulary; the students learn small, smaller, smallest, etc.  Initially, the colors and variety of the sensorial materials appeal to the children. They soon learn that the materials involve movement, exploration and the joy of discovery.  They continue to be introduced to more challenging work as they gain a heightened awareness and sensitivity to their world through their senses.

In the math area of the classroom, children develop a  “mathematical mind,” meaning the human nature to place things in order and understand their world.  Through third grade, students learn math by manipulating materials, moving from concrete materials to abstract operations.  When students learn math by memorization or rote, they often do not understand how to apply the mathematical process to every day situations.  Dr. Montessori explained, “I present the idea in a material or concrete form; and always combined with an activity.  As the child works for a long time with this material, gradually there comes from the material, the very essence of the operation. This sinks quietly into his mind and becomes a part of him.” (From Maria Montessori: Her Life and Work by E.M. Standing) 

When students manipulate the materials and can see the mathematical operations, their understanding and comprehension of math is completely different than rote memorization.  Even for the youngest children, Montessori math includes the fundamentals of algebra, plane and solid geometry, fractions and statistics; these operations are never separated from arithmetic, but woven into the problems and exercises. All of the materials are hands-on meaning the child actually sees the process of how to solve an equation and can also feel the weight difference between a unit and a ten for example.

Initial materials in the math area:

• Number rods
• Sandpaper numbers
• Quantity & symbol combined in Number Rods & Number Cards
• Spindle Box
• Number cards & counters
• Memory game
• Hundred board

As students master the concept of numbers and counting, teachers will introduce the decimal system:

• Golden beads & colored bead bars
• Presentation with cards
• Formation of numbers with beads & cards
• Collective exercises & stamp game for addition, multiplication, subtraction & division
• Bank game with complex numbers (all operations)
• Teens & tens boards & beads
• Linear counting using bead chains to count beads, squares & cubes
• Skip counting with beads

Teachers then introduce materials for memorization of math facts and processes:

• Snake game
• Strip board
• Addition practice charts
• Geometric multiplication with bead bars
• Multiplication board
• Division board
• Bead frame

Through the Montessori method of problem solving, activity and engaging materials, students absorb math concepts in a joyful and relaxed environment.  Dr. Montessori said in her book, The Absorbent Mind, “The results we obtain with our little ones contrast oddly with the fact that mathematics is so often held to be a scourge rather than a pleasure in school programs.”

Language and pre-reading experiences are prominent throughout a Montessori classroom. The children are exposed to a rich and varied vocabulary as they are given names and qualities of objects in all areas of their environment. Classification and patterning work allow children to develop skills  in observing and making comparisons, a necessary task used in finding patterns in written language. Lessons are given in sequenced steps which encourages comprehension. Rhyming is used in songs at gatherings and listening games like, ” I spy,” to enhance auditory skills needed for analyzing sounds in written language. Many materials involve using a three finger grip which is indirect preparation for writing. Interpersonal communication is also highly evident as the children are constantly engaged in active conversation.

Using a phonetic and multi-sensory approach, the phonetic sounds of letters are introduced through a material consisting of 26 Sandpaper Letters. As children trace a letter, they see the shape, feel it, and hear its sound. Sandpaper Letters combine muscular memory with auditory and visual senses. When a child learns an assortment of sounds, he begins building words using The Moveable Alphabet. In time, the “synthesis of sounds” or blending that leads to actual reading, occurs. Children are introduced to writing through Metal Inset Work which helps control the lightness of touch and allows a child to gain control of the pencil through an enjoyable and progressive work.

The language area includes material and activity rich in vocabulary, word analysis, writing and reading. The child follows a sequence of work material learning phonetic sounds, word building with phonetic sounds, communicating through written language and eventually reading. Each child demonstrates individual readiness skills in the language area.

Dr. Montessori defined the curriculum as the universe, and it is the role of the teacher to present from the large to the small.  Students may begin their studies in the cultural area with learning about our solar system, night and day, months of the year, days of the week and clocks.  They then use the two Montessori Globes to see that our planet Earth is made of land and water, and the land is divided into continents.  They apply many of the skills used in the Practical Life area to punch or cut out the shapes of the continents to glue them to their hemisphere maps.

As they learn to identify the continents, the students also learn about the cultures prevalent in that area.  They learn about traditions, foods, flags, weather and coins. The students then learn that the land and water forms have names such as isthmus and bay.  From there they learn the plants and animals that live on the land and in the water.  The students conclude the year with the study of volcanoes, core and mantle, in other words, large to the small.

The Children’s House curriculum is designed to be a three year cycle with the classroom actually prepared for students 29 months to age 7.  Each year the student is in the classroom, the information presented is in greater detail.  The Cultural Area includes topics in geography, botany, zoology, history and international culture.  Some sections include science experiments such as magnetic and non-magnetic hands-on activities. They accomplish this curriculum through the use of:

Puzzle map of continents

Foreign language instruction

Time Line of Life on the Earth

The Teaching Clock

Imaginary Island Puzzle

Clock of Eras

Land and water forms

Land formation definition cards

International songs and dances

Pin Maps with capitals and flags

International and Holiday festivals

Money and exchange

Puzzles of plants and animals

The children are taught that their classroom is a community and they are responsible for caring for each other.  As they learn about the countries and cultures, they also learn that their classroom is one small group within a much larger community.  Dr. Montessori believed she did not develop just a method of education, but a philosophy of life.  Information is presented to children in a global perspective, with history and cultures as the foundation for greater understanding, community and peace.