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Dr. Montessori's Own Handbook

<h2>WRITING</h2> The child who has completed all the exercises above described, and is thus prepared for an advance towards unexpected conquests, is about four years old. <div>81</div> He is not an unknown quantity, as are children who have been left to gain varied and casual experiences by themselves, and who therefore differ in type and intellectual standard, not only according to their “natures,” but especially according to the chances and opportunities they have found for their spontaneous inner formation. Education has determined an environment for the children. Individual differences to be found in them can, therefore, be put down almost exclusively to each one’s individual “nature.” Owing to their environment which offers means adapted and measured to meet the needs of their psychical development, our children have acquired a fundamental type which is common to all. They have coordinated their movements in various kinds of manual work about the house, and so have acquired a characteristic independence of action, and initiative in the adaptation of their actions to their environment. Out of all this emerges a personality, for the children have become little men, who are self-reliant. The special attention necessary to handle small fragile objects without breaking them, and to move heavy articles without making a noise, has 82 endowed the movements of the whole body with a lightness and grace which are characteristic of our children. It is a deep feeling of responsibility which has brought them to such a pitch of perfection. For instance, when they carry three or four tumblers at a time, or a tureen of hot soup, they know that they are responsible not only for the objects, but also for the success of the meal which at that moment they are directing. In the same way each child feels the responsibility of the “silence,” of the prevention of harsh sounds, and he knows how to cooperate for the general good in keeping the environment, not only orderly, but quiet and calm. Indeed, our children have taken the road which leads them to mastery of themselves. But their formation is due to a deeper psychological work still, arising from the education of the senses. In addition to ordering their environment and ordering themselves in their outward personalities, they have also ordered the inner world of their minds. The didactic material, in fact, does not offer to the child the “content” of the mind, but the 83 order for that “content.” It causes him to distinguish identities from differences, extreme differences from fine gradations, and to classify, under conceptions of quality and of quantity, the most varying sensations appertaining to surfaces, colors, dimensions, forms and sounds. The mind has formed itself by a special exercise of attention, observing, comparing, and classifying. The mental attitude acquired by such an exercise leads the child to make ordered observations in his environment, observations which prove as interesting to him as discoveries, and so stimulate him to multiply them indefinitely and to form in his mind a rich “content” of clear ideas. Language now comes to fix by means of exact words the ideas which the mind has acquired. These words are few in number and have reference, not to separate objects, but rather to the order of the ideas which have been formed in the mind. In this way the children are able to “find themselves,” alike in the world of natural things and in the world of objects and of words which surround them, for they have an inner guide which 84 leads them to become active and intelligent explorers instead of wandering wayfarers in an unknown land. These are the children who, in a short space of time, sometimes in a few days, learn to write and to perform the first operations of arithmetic. It is not a fact that children in general can do it, as many have believed. It is not a case of giving my material for writing to unprepared children and of awaiting the “miracle.” The fact is that the minds and hands of our children are already prepared for writing, and ideas of quantity, of identity, of differences, and of gradation, which form the bases of all calculation, have been maturing for a long time in them. One might say that all their previous education is a preparation for the first stages of essential culture––writing, reading, and number, and that knowledge comes as an easy, spontaneous, and logical consequence of the preparation––that it is in fact its natural conclusion. We have already seen that the purpose of the word is to fix ideas and to facilitate the elementary comprehension of things. In the same way writing and arithmetic now fix the complex inner acquisitions 85 of the mind, which proceeds henceforward continually to enrich itself by fresh observations. <hr class='tb' /> Our children have long been preparing the hand for writing. Throughout all the sensory exercises the hand, whilst cooperating with the mind in its attainments and in its work of formation, was preparing its own future. When the hand learned to hold itself lightly suspended over a horizontal surface in order to touch rough and smooth, when it took the cylinders of the solid insets and placed them in their apertures, when with two fingers it touched the outlines of the geometrical forms, it was coordinating movements, and the child is now ready––almost impatient to use them in the fascinating “synthesis” of writing. The direct preparation for writing also consists in exercises of the movements of the hand. There are two series of exercises, very different from one another. I have analyzed the movements which are connected with writing, and I prepare them separately one from the other. When we write, we perform a movement for the management of the instrument of writing, a movement 86 which generally acquires an individual character, so that a person’s handwriting can be recognized, and, in certain medical cases, changes in the nervous system can be traced by the corresponding alterations in the handwriting. In fact, it is from the handwriting that specialists in that subject would interpret the moral character of individuals. Writing has, besides this, a general character, which has reference to the form of the alphabetical signs. When a man writes he combines these two parts, but they actually exist as the component parts of a single product and can be prepared apart. <h3> Exercises for the Management of the Instrument of Writing </h3> (The Individual Part) In the didactic material there are two sloping wooden boards, on each of which stand five square metal frames, colored pink. In each of these is inserted a blue geometrical figure similar to the geometrical insets and provided with a small button for a handle. With this material we use a box of ten colored pencils and a little book of 87 designs which I have prepared after five years’ experience of observing the children. I have chosen and graduated the designs according to the use which the children made of them. The two sloping boards are set side by side, and on them are placed ten complete “insets,” that is to say, the frames with the geometrical figures. (Fig. 28.) The child is given a sheet of white paper and the box of ten colored pencils. He will then choose one of the ten metal insets, which are arranged in an attractive line at a certain distance from him. The child is taught the following process: <div class='figtag'> </div> <div class='figright' style='width:500px'> <ANTIMG src='images/illus-090a.jpg' alt='' title='' width-obs='500' height-obs='198' /> Fig. 28.––Sloping Boards to Display Set of Metal Insets. </div> He lays the frame of the iron inset on the sheet of paper, and, holding it down firmly with one hand, he follows with a colored pencil the interior outline which describes a geometrical figure. Then he lifts the square frame, and finds drawn upon the paper an enclosed geometrical form, a triangle, a circle, a hexagon, etc. The child has not actually performed a new exercise, because he had already performed all these movements when he touched the wooden plane insets. The only new feature of the exercise is that he follows the outlines no longer directly with his finger, but 88 through the medium of a pencil. That is, he draws, he leaves a trace of his movement. The child finds this exercise easy and most interesting, and, as soon as he has succeeded in making the first outline, he places above it the piece of blue metal corresponding to it. This is an exercise exactly similar to that which he performed when he placed the wooden geometrical figures upon the cards of the third series, where the figures are only contained by a simple line. This time, however, when the action of placing the form upon the outline is performed, the child takes another colored pencil and draws the outline of the blue metal figure. When he raises it, if the drawing is well done, he finds upon the paper a geometrical figure contained by two outlines in colors, and, if the colors have been well chosen, the result is very attractive, and the child, who has already had a considerable education of the chromatic sense is keenly interested in it. These may seem unnecessary details, but, as a matter of fact, they are all-important. For instance, if, instead of arranging the ten metal 89 insets in a row, the teacher distributes them among the children without thus exhibiting them, the child’s exercises are much limited. When, on the other hand, the insets are exhibited before his eyes, he feels the desire to draw them all one after the other, and the number of exercises is increased. The two colored outlines rouse the desire of the child to see another combination of colors and then to repeat the experience. The variety of the objects and the colors are therefore an inducement to work and hence to final success. Here the actual preparatory movement for writing begins. When the child has drawn the figure in double outline, he takes hold of a pencil “like a pen for writing,” and draws marks up and down until he has completely filled the figure. In this way a definite filled-in figure remains on the paper, similar to the figures on the cards of the first series. This figure can be in any of the ten colors. At first the children fill in the figures very clumsily without regard for the outlines, making very heavy lines and not keeping them parallel. Little by little, however, the drawings 90 improve, in that they keep within the outlines, and the lines increase in number, grow finer, and are parallel to one another. When the child has begun these exercises, he is seized with a desire to continue them, and he never tires of drawing the outlines of the figures and then filling them in. Each child suddenly becomes the possessor of a considerable number of drawings, and he treasures them up in his own little drawer. In this way he organizes the movement of writing, which brings him to the management of the pen. This movement in ordinary methods is represented by the wearisome pothook connected with the first laborious and tedious attempts at writing. The organization of this movement, which began from the guidance of a piece of metal, is as yet rough and imperfect, and the child now passes on to the filling in of the prepared designs in the little album. The leaves are taken from the book one by one in the order of progression in which they are arranged, and the child fills in the prepared designs with colored pencils in the same way as before. Here the choice of the colors is another intelligent occupation which encourages 91 the child to multiply the tasks. He chooses the colors by himself and with much taste. The delicacy of the shades which he chooses and the harmony with which he arranges them in these designs show us that the common belief, that children love bright and glaring colors, has been the result of observation of children without education, who have been abandoned to the rough and harsh experiences of an environment unfitted for them. The education of the chromatic sense becomes at this point of a child’s development the lever which enables him to become possessed of a firm, bold and beautiful handwriting. The drawings lend themselves to limiting, in very many ways, the length of the strokes with which they are filled in. The child will have to fill in geometrical figures, both large and small, of a pavement design, or flowers and leaves, or the various details of an animal or of a landscape. In this way the hand accustoms itself, not only to perform the general action, but also to confine the movement within all kinds of limits. Hence the child is preparing himself to write in a handwriting either large or small. Indeed, 92 later on he will write as well between the wide lines on a blackboard as between the narrow, closely ruled lines of an exercise book, generally used by much older children. The number of exercises which the child performs with the drawings is practically unlimited. He will often take another colored pencil and draw over again the outlines of the figure already filled in with color. A help to the continuation of the exercise is to be found in the further education of the chromatic sense, which the child acquires by painting the same designs in water-colors. Later he mixes colors for himself until he can imitate the colors of nature, or create the delicate tints which his own imagination desires. It is not possible, however, to speak of all this in detail within the limits of this small work. <h3> Exercises for the Writing of Alphabetical Signs </h3> <div style="float:right; width:240px; margin-right:0px; margin-left:0.5em;"> <div class='figtag'> </div> <div class='figcenter'> <ANTIMG src='images/illus-090b.jpg' alt='' title='' width-obs='237' height-obs='226' /> Fig. 29.––Single Sandpaper Letter. </div> <div class='figtag'> </div> <div class='figcenter'> <ANTIMG src='images/illus-091.jpg' alt='' title='' width-obs='237' height-obs='350' /> Fig. 30.––Groups of Sandpaper Letters. </div> </div> In the didactic material there are series of boxes which contain the alphabetical signs. At this point we take those cards which are covered with very smooth paper, to which is gummed a letter of the alphabet cut out in sandpaper. (Fig. 29.) There are also large cards on which are gummed 93 several letters, grouped together according to analogy of form. (Fig. 30.) The children “have to touch over the alphabetical signs as though they were writing.” They touch them with the tips of the index and middle fingers in the same way as when they touched the wooden insets, and with the hand raised as when they lightly touched the rough and smooth surfaces. The teacher herself touches the letters to show the child how the movement should be performed, and the child, if he has had much practise in touching the wooden insets, imitates her with ease and pleasure. Without the previous practise, however, the child’s hand does not follow the letter with accuracy, and it is most interesting to make close observations of the children in order to understand the importance of a remote motor preparation for writing, and also to realize the immense strain which we impose upon the children when we set them to write directly without a previous motor education of the hand. The child finds great pleasure in touching the sandpaper letters. It is an exercise by which he applies to a new attainment the power he has already acquired through exercising the sense of 94 touch. Whilst the child touches a letter, the teacher pronounces its sound, and she uses for the lesson the usual three periods. Thus, for example, presenting the two vowels i, o, she will have the child touch them slowly and accurately, and repeat their relative sounds one after the other as the child touches them, “i, i, i! o, o, o!” Then she will say to the child: “Give me i!” “Give me o!” Finally, she will ask the question: “What is this?” To which the child replies, “i, o.” She proceeds in the same way through all the other letters, giving, in the case of the consonants, not the name, but only the sound. The child then touches the letters by himself over and over again, either on the separate cards or on the large cards on which several letters are gummed, and in this way he establishes the movements necessary for tracing the alphabetical signs. At the same time he retains the visual image of the letter. This process forms the first preparation, not only for writing, but also for reading, because it is evident that when the child touches the letters he performs the movement corresponding to the writing of them, and, 95 at the same time, when he recognizes them by sight he is reading the alphabet. The child has thus prepared, in effect, all the necessary movements for writing; therefore he can write. This important conquest is the result of a long period of inner formation of which the child is not clearly aware. But a day will come––very soon––when he will write, and that will be a day of great surprise for him––the wonderful harvest of an unknown sowing. <hr class='tb' /> <div class='figtag'> </div> <div class='figleft' style='width:387px'> <ANTIMG src='images/illus-094.jpg' alt='' title='' width-obs='387' height-obs='500' /> Fig. 31.––Box of Movable Letters. </div> The alphabet of movable letters cut out in pink and blue cardboard, and kept in a special box with compartments, serves “for the composition of words.” (Fig. 31.) In a phonetic language, like Italian, it is enough to pronounce clearly the different component sounds of a word (as, for example, m-a-n-o), so that the child whose ear is already educated may recognize one by one the component sounds. Then he looks in the movable alphabet for the signs corresponding to each separate sound, and lays them one beside the other, thus composing the word (for instance, mano). Gradually he will 96 become able to do the same thing with words of which he thinks himself; he succeeds in breaking them up into their component sounds, and in translating them into a row of signs. When the child has composed the words in this way, he knows how to read them. In this method, therefore, all the processes leading to writing include reading as well. If the language is not phonetic, the teacher can compose separate words with the movable alphabet, and then pronounce them, letting the child repeat by himself the exercise of arranging and rereading them. In the material there are two movable alphabets. One of them consists of larger letters, and is divided into two boxes, each of which contains the vowels. This is used for the first exercises, in which the child needs very large objects in order to recognize the letters. When he is acquainted with one half of the consonants he can begin to compose words, even though he is dealing with one part only of the alphabet. The other movable alphabet has smaller letters and is contained in a single box. It is given to children who have made their first attempts at 97 composition with words, and already know the complete alphabet. It is after these exercises with the movable alphabet that the child is able to write entire words. This phenomenon generally occurs unexpectedly, and then a child who has never yet traced a stroke or a letter on paper writes several words in succession. From that moment he continues to write, always gradually perfecting himself. This spontaneous writing takes on the characteristics of a natural phenomenon, and the child who has begun to write the “first word” will continue to write in the same way as he spoke after pronouncing the first word, and as he walked after having taken the first step. The same course of inner formation through which the phenomenon of writing appeared is the course of his future progress, of his growth to perfection. The child prepared in this way has entered upon a course of development through which he will pass as surely as the growth of the body and the development of the natural functions have passed through their course of development when life has once been established. For the interesting and very complex phenomena 98 relating to the development of writing and then of reading, see my larger works. <hr class='toprule' /> <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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