I'm still thinking about a cosmic education for the Montessori preschool environment. I pulled this together. Maybe it will start a discussion on the yahoo group. There is far too much work that needs to be done there.
Dr. Montessori was first and foremost a scientist prior to an educator. Her system of education was built systematically based on observation and experiment. In the Montessori Handbook there is a very clear distinction that the nomenclature comes only after the child has had the opportunity for use. The child develops a very specific vocabulary which allows him to make observations, classifications, to discriminate, categorize and order his thoughts and impressions.
I've been also reading The World in the Palm of Her Hand by Tim Seldin. It's a book about introducing History and Geography to the young child. One section talks specifically about the different levels of abstraction of knowledge. There are three spheres - the outermost which consists of things that we have never seen and never heard, the next sphere is the sphere of knowledge - we know something but we have no real understanding or experience, the innermost sphere is that which we truly understand and know. Knowledge is usually gained through hands on experience.
A young child will find wavelengths of light to be in the outer level of knowledge, but they will have personal knowledge of a rainbow.
In order for knowledge to be useful for the very young child we must provide a way for knowledge to be both personal, and connected to other knowledge. The child must be able to make some sense of the knowledge.
No comments:
Post a Comment