Good Teacher, The

Montessori Life, 2007 by Carey, Kathy

On first reading the Montessori Method, I discovered a view of the child, and thus of humanity, that made the most perfect sense. Montessori's view, elegant and straightforward, is that tlie child is inherently good and desires to develop Ws natural potential to its fullest, but he is continually frustrated in his efforts by obstacles placed in his path by a world made for adults and by arbitrary structural impediments in society. In the Secret of Childhood, Montessori says that

. . . childhood constitutes the most important element in an adult's life, for it is in his early years that a man is made. . . . Wliatever affects a child affects humanity, for it is in the delicate and secret recesses of his soul that a man's education is accomplished. (1966, p. 5)

Montessori's developmental psychology, found in the Four Planes of Development, describes distinct periods of development from birth through age 24, each plane covering a period of 6 years. She characterizes these 6-year periods as the "constructive rhythm of life" (Grazzini, 1996, p. 211). Development is cyclical, not linear. The planes infancy, childhood, adolescence, and maturity are distinct from one another, but connected. The child follows a path from the spiritual embryo to tlie unconscious creator to the conscious worker, through the calm phase of unique growth marked by the child's hunger for culture and an understanding of tlie wider world, (Grazzini, 1996, p. 216) to adolescence and then transitioning to adulthood.

All Montessorians, even those working with infants and toddlers, must embrace this flow of development, since the child cannot be effectively assisted without understanding where he has been and where he is going. Montessori says the work of the adult is that "of building up a transcendent environment" while the work of the child is that of "producing a man" (1966, p. 233, 236).

For Montessori, the teacher is a guide, an expert in her field, who must also understand the means of the child's development. It is tlie role of the teacher to put tlie student in contact with the material. As he develops a basic understanding, the next step is "intervention to enlighten" (Montessori, 1967, p. 167), a complicated way of saying that the teacher assists the student in Connecting knowledge to life. This facilitates the student's self-development as well as her retention of knowledge. "This office of being the 'guardian angel' of minds concentrated on work that will improve them is one of the most solemn duties of the teacher" (Montessori, 1967, p. 167).

Effective teachers, beyond mastering tlie knowledge itself, must become keen observers of students, a difficult task requiring patience, humility, and great restraint.

. . . to become a Montessori teacher is to shed omnipotaice and to become a joyous observer. If tlte teacher can really enter into the joy of seeing things being born and growing under his own eyes and can clothe himself in the garment of humility, many delights are reserved for him that are denied to those who assume infallibility and authority in front of a class. (Montessori, 1989, p. 83-84)

Montessori recognized that there is no uniform method, no set of guidelines for teaching because learners are individuals, who bring to the classroom different experiences, attitudes, and values, and whose path to self-development is singular. Education as the development of the body and mind is useless unless the soul is awakened.

Recently I have begun to look at the "habits of mind" of Arthur Costa, defined as tlie "characteristics of what intelligent people do when they are confronted with problems, tlie resolutions to which are not immediately apparent" (Costa, 2000, p. 2). These sixteen habits-persistence; managing impulsivity; listening with understandhig and empathy; thinking flexibly; thinking about thinking; striving for accuracy; questioning and posing problems; applying past knowledge to new situations; thinking and communicating with clarity and predsion; gathering data through all tlie senses; creating; imagining, and innovating; responding with wonderment and awe; taking responsible risks; finding humor; flunking interdependently; and remaining open to continuous learning-form a coherent, constructive blend of thought and action, or what Costa calls intelligait behavior. The habits encapsulate the fundamentals of teaclung, tlie "briefcase" of effective teadiers.

Good teaching requires knowing what you are talking about, recognizing that knowledge, like learning, evolves, that the teacher is the spark, not the fire, and that tlie most important question may not be "What does tills child know or not know?" but rather "Wliat can this child learn about learning (and, thus, himself), and what is the most intelligent response in hiteraction on tlie part of the teacher?" Simply put, Montessori directs teachers to visualize the "child who is not yet there," and Costa, if I may interpret for him, urges us to visualize the teacher who is "not yet there."