Spontaneous Activity in Education

by Maria Montessori

The child who is "free to move about," and who perfects himself by so doing, is he who has an "intelligent object" in his movements; the child who is free to develop his inner personality, who perseveres in a task for a considerable time, and organizes himself upon such a fundamental phenomenon, is sustained and guided by an intelligent purpose. Without this his persistence in work, his inner formation, and his progress would not be possible. When we refrain from guiding the subjugated child step by step, when, liberating the child from our personal influence, we place him in an environment suited to him and in contact with the means of development, we leave him confidently to "his own intelligence." His motor activity will then direct itself to definite actions: he will wash his hands and face, sweep the room, dust the furniture, change his clothes, spread the rugs, lay the table, cultivate plants, and take care of animals. He will choose the tasks conducive to his development and persist in them, attracted and guided by his interest towards a sensory material which leads him to distinguish one thing from another, to select, to reason, to correct himself; and the acquirements thus made are not only "a cause of internal growth" but a strong propulsive force to further progress. Thus, passing from simple objects to objects of ever increasing complexity, he becomes possessed of a culture; moreover, he organizes his character by means of the internal order which forms itself within him, and by the skill which he acquires.

Therefore, when we leave the child to himself, we leave him to his intelligence, not, as is commonly supposed, "to his instincts," meaning by the word "instincts" those designated as animal instincts. We are so accustomed to; treat children like dogs and other domestic animals, that a "free child" makes us think of a dog, barking, jumping, and stealing dainties. And so accustomed are we to regard as manifestations of evil instincts the rebellions of the child treated as a beast, his obscure protests and desperations, or the protective devices he has to invent to save himself from such a humiliating situation, that, by way of elevating him, we first compare him to plants and flowers, and then actually try to keep him as far as possible in the state of physical immobility of vegetables, subjecting him to the same sensations, reducing him to slavery. But he never becomes the "plant with angelic perfume" we would fain believe him to be; rather do signs of corruption gradually manifest themselves as his "human substance" mortifies and dies.

But when we leave the child "free as a man" in the palestra of his own intelligence, his type changes entirely. It is of this type we must form new conceptions in discussing the question of "liberty."

That of intelligence should also, I believe, be the key to the problem of the social liberty of man. We have heard much talk of late years, of a very superficial kind, concerning "liberty of thought." The issue being obscured by prejudices akin to those prevalent concerning children, it has been supposed that man would be "liberated" were he "abandoned" to his own thoughts. But was he capable of "thinking"? Was not the epoch of such "freedom" also that of cerebral neurasthenia? Was it not also that epoch when laws for extending social rights to illiterates were under discussion?

Now let us take an example: if we told a sick person to choose between disease and health, would this make him free to do so? If we offer an uneducated peasant good and bad paper money, leaving him "free to choose" which he will take, and he chooses the bad notes, he is not free, he is cheated; if he chooses the good, he is not free, he is lucky. He will be free when he has sufficient knowledge not only to distinguish the good from the bad, but to understand the social utility of each. It is the giving of this "internal formation" which makes a man free, irrespective of a "social sanction" which is merely an external conquest of liberty. If the liberty of man were such a simple problem, we should only need to pass a law, enabling the blind to see and the deaf to hear, in order to restore "poor humanity" to health.

Our honesty ought to make us recognize one day that the fundamental rights of man are those of his own "formation," free from obstacles, free from slavery, and free to draw from his environment the means required for his development. In short, it is in education that we shall find the fundamental solution of the social problems connected with "personality."

Deeply instructive is the revelation made to us by the children, that "the intelligence" is the key which reveals the secrets of their formation, and is the actual means of their internal construction.

The hygiene of the intelligence thus assumes cardinal importance. When intelligence is recognized as the means of formation, the pivot of life itself, it can no longer be exhausted for dubious ends, or oppressed and suffocated without discernment.

At a not-far-distant day, the intelligence of children must become the object of treatment much wiser and more elaborate than that which we now bestow on their bodies, to adjuncts of which, such as teeth, nails, and hair, we devote costly and laborious processes. When we reflect that a mother who is perfectly conscious of the dangers and remedies connected with the hair of her child, can oppress and enslave his intelligence quite unknowingly, we are at once obliged to admit that the new road leading to civilization must needs be a long one, if such contrasts in our attitude to the superfluities and the essentials of life are still possible at the present day.