We must let our little ones blaze their own trails, provided, of course, that they are trails which lead in the right direction. We must, also, let them make their own decisions, and if occasionally they prove to have been wrong, the experience will have helped them to decide wisely the next time. We will, also, put into their hands the self-corrective didactic apparatus of Montessori, which has a distinct ethical value in the training of the human will.
Education to be vivid and permanent in the child’s life should be worked out along lines of experience. To say to a child, “Don’t do that; it isn’t right,” is to make a very inadequate appeal to one, only, of his senses, that of hearing. To put into the child’s hands the blocks of the Montessori tower so carefully graded in dimension that it takes exquisite differentiation to pile them is to give him a chance to learn through experience the difference between right and wrong by means of three senses. He hears a possible direction as to their use, he touches them, he sees the perfectly completed tower. In like manner the broad and long stair, the solid and geometric insets, all contribute their quota to the sum of the child’s perfectly directed will control.
The average home is full of mediums for helping a little child to develop along lines of willed control. To concentrate upon a bit of constructive play until it is finished, to learn orderliness in putting away playthings, or to do some simple home duty that will be carried over from day to day, all are important willed activities. To do whatever is in hand, building or drawing or picking up toys, or bathing or caring for a doll or a pet, or helping mother as well as possible, is, also, very vital will-training.
Dr. Montessori helps us to a hopeful outlook on the subject of child will. Our Otellos are not, after all, terrible. The child who is most difficult to manage is, with Montessori training, the child who turns out to be best able to manage himself.
THE CHRIST IN BRUNO
About the New Spiritual Sense
When Bruno was a little fellow, his mother and father were killed in the Messina earthquake.
Because he was one of so many left-behind babies, he was quite neglected, and he grew up to four years as a weed grows. Sometimes one madre of the tenement mothered him, sometimes not. At times he was fed, at other times he starved. Because of the great fear that came to him with the blinding smoke and the twisting red river of molten lava and the death cry of his girl mother that day of the earthquake, Bruno’s mind seemed a bit dulled. He was often confused by the commands of people who tried to take care of him and so could not obey. Then they would strike him. And he heard very vile language spoken and he saw very evil things done during his babyhood in the tenement.
When Bruno wandered across the threshold of the Via Giusti Children’s House in Rome, he seemed like a little alien among the other happy little ones who were so carefully watched over, so gently led. For days he sat in silence, his great, frightened blue eyes watching to help him dodge the blow that he expected but never felt; his lips ready to imitate the vile speech that he had known before, but which he never heard here. His timid fingers fumbled with the big pink and blue letters that the other children used in making long sentences on the floor; they tried to button, to lace, to match colors, but not very effectually. It was as if the great fear of his babyhood had shadowed his whole mental life and left him powerless.