Freedom and Discipline

Discipline (positive guidance) and freedom go hand in hand in the Montessori classroom. As children continue their own work, they are also learnt to respect one another’s work. Patience is learned while waiting for a turn at a given lesson or group activity, which helps the child develop an “inner discipline” rather than one imposed externally. 

Lessons of “grace and courtesy” begin on the first day of each child and a sense of community is soon established that all children begin to make class their own.

This is auto education respects individual liberty of children to choose their own activities. This freedom allows children to follow their inner guidance and self-directed learning.

The various forms of freedom provided in a Montessori environment are: Freedom for speech, Freedom for movement, Freedom for spontaneous choice, Freedom for work and not to work, Freedom to repeat, Freedom of presentation, Freedom for social interaction, Freedom for communication and Freedom of expression. Each child is given freedom of choice. From the moment the children enter the class in the morning, they are free to choose their activities for themselves. 

Each child is also given freedom of time. They are free to work with an activity for as long as they choose, free to repeat it as many times as they need, or simply take their own time. For example, in the prepared environment there is only one of each set of materials; one easel for painting, for example. If a child has an impulse to paint and another child is already painting, there is a natural limit to that impulse.

NORMALIZATION

Montessori education has a special term called normalization for the process by which characteristics, including initiative, self-discipline, focus, independence, a love of intentional activity, and compassion become manifest in the child.

Dr. Maria Montessori used this term to indicate that she believes that these characteristics are the normal features of childhood. During the 0-6 age of development, children have the ability to shift their fundamental being from the ordinary condition of disorder like inattention and attachment to fantasy to a state of normal human being showing external behaviour such as spontaneous self-discipline, independence. love of order and complete harmony and peace with others in social situation. This psychological change to the normal being occurs by a deep concentration on the engagement of the activity of their own choice. This “normalisation” is the single most important result of Montessori education.