“Here was a peep into the unexplored depths of the child’s mind. Here was a very small child, at an age when attention flits from one thing to another and cannot be held down. Yet she had been absorbed in concentration such that her ego had withdrawn itself from external stimulus. That concentration was accompanied by a rhythmic movement of the hands, evoked by an accurately made, scientifically graduated object.” 1.
By giving the children freedom of choice and allowing them their own time to process an exercise this concentration was lengthened and strengthened. It is what Montessori said, “the children showed me”.
The conventional structured learning activities are normally in groups in which the children must sit quietly and “behave”, like Montessori once observed “transfixed butterflies”. “Making muscular movement penetrate into the very life of the children, connecting it with the practical life of every day, formed a main part of the practical side of our method, which has introduced education in movement fully into the indivisible whole of the education of the personality of the child.”
Montessori education incorporates a sequential unfolding of movement activities which bring under the child’s control of his own movements and aid him in coordinating these movements to the purpose of his conscious mind. These activities not only meet the child’s physical need but also a deep- rooted psychic need.
