The Link between Montessoris Educational System and the Cosmic Plan - Essay Example

Montessori and the Cosmic Plan Introduction Based on different quotations and reference materials, the link between Montessori’s educational system and the Cosmic Plan is made clear. In the 25th International Montessori Congress, discussions and materials are presented in order to promote and show this link. A quote from Camillo explains the unity of energy, of the sky, the water, life, and humans, the cosmic elements in Montessori’s thinking are present. Camillo further indicates that the cosmic sense affects a significant part of Montessori’s system, in her thought processes and her educational approach, within different stages of human development, from birth to adolescent years. It is clear under these conditions that the cosmic perspective is a huge part of the Montessori system as it is the key which can provide “shared direction and a common goal in our work” (Camillo). Other quotes also present support for this topic. Body The foundations of development in the above Camillo quote refer to Montessori and his discovery of natural development from 0 to 24 years. These planes of development are a unique element of educational work (Hayes, 2005). These are very basic and constant and must therefore be maintained and supported. They are basic, especially as they provide an approach to the educational system, therefore mostly in relation to Cosmic Education. These fundamental planes of development are the initial elements of Montessori education. Another element of the Montessori Cosmic Plan relates to Camillo’s statement on the “vision of an indivisible unity.” Such element maps out the Montessori perspective of the cosmic universe. Montessori discussed in one of her books about the cosmic plan. She pointed out that as it has been considered important to extend so much to the child, it is important to also provide him with a vision of the entire universe. The universe can be a stark reality, one which can provide answers to various questions. “We shall walk together on this path of life, for all things are part of the universe, and are connected with each other to form one whole unity”. Such idea would help the child to focus and to anchor himself within his comfortable setting (Clio, 1989). Within the Montessori Plan of Work for the Child of the Second Plane of Development, the child, aged 6-12 years is guided towards Cosmic Education with the contribution of different approaches. There are cosmic tales and these tales are often attractive to the child’s imagination. The ideas they cover can be understood through the imagination. In another book by Montessori (1958), ‘Communications Christmas,’ children are given two tools to the universe and the world in general. The children are not told that the mountains and rivers were created. But scientific details are given to present how matter exists in different states and that there is a single impact which allows for these states of matter to exist or to change. This relates to the impact of temperature. Acceptance of the laws of nature is very much important in understanding the cosmic ideas for children. Through such understanding, the work of different agents promoted order from the disorder. In observing the different laws seen through observations, the flows of water would be accepted, air rising to the skies would also be an accepted phenomenon, and rocks being chipped away and worn out would become soil. From the soil, seeds can be sown and can grow into plants and trees. These are the accepted natural laws. Plants and animals are ruled by the laws of biology with oxygen produced by plants to support humans and animals, and humans and animals producing carbon dioxide to be used by plants for their photosynthesis. Some plants become food for humans and animals; and some animals become food for humans. There is order in the universe, when a balance in the cosmic elements is maintained. Primary elements to knowledge are important in the work with children in two planes of development. These elements help provide options and developments for the child’s work, and allowing for changes to unfold for the child. Montessori discusses that children in the first plane have accepted the immediate setting, and the restrictions which are seen in society. “You must try to give the child what he now longs for: the understanding of the world, how it functions and how it affects the life and behaviour of humanity”. In the story of the world’s creation, the inanimate setting has been ready for the manifestation of life. Life answers need and such need is also known as part of the purifications. Within Montessori’s Cosmic Education the creation story is an element of cosmic education, and there is a need to support or maintain such creation. Most people are familiar with this scenario, however, this is known more as pollution. The Cosmic Educations perceives it as a “fact for service to be rendered. Service rendered to the environment, service rendered to life, service rendered to humanity”. The purification of water and air is seen. In the Fable ‘Story of the Coming of Life,’ water has filled with calcium carbonates and has manifested with the impact of the rocks of the earth. This has been seen in the changes seen in the earth’s surface, and this was seen persistent rains. These ideas are presented to the child with imagination being a significant quality of the child’s mind within the second plane of development. This second plane of development is considered very much important when humanity is considered (Montessori). In other words, “human consciousness comes into the world as a flaming ball of imagination. Everything invented by man, physical and or mental, is the fruit of someone’s imagination”. The tools used in providing cosmic ideas for children manifest in two types. One type includes Impressionistic Charts. These charts provide impressions of a phenomenon which cannot be seen through the eyes but can actually be understood based on one’s imagination. The Geography Charts on the other hand can have a significant impact when seen by children through the Story of Creation. Angels match the movement of the air which rises when heated, and later it may become colder and descend to the earth. This is an impressionist perspective on how the earth’s surface is cooled and its crust was formed, and its waters filling in the hollows. Angels were a fascinating idea for Montessori because they represented life and art. The impressionistic charts were used for children with experiments showing how rocks are worn away when chipped away using other rocks. Chemicals introduced can then show how the pieces chipped away can dissolve into soil. From the soil, life can emanate. From need small Tiny little creatures so minute we would not be able to see them came and they ‘gobbled’ up, as it were, this polluting substance. You see they needed it, they used it to make the harder parts of their bodies. And thus began the pageant of life, first the single-celled creatures appeared followed by those made up of many cells, then those creatures whose cells joined to form organs, thus becoming organisms, followed by the animals with the backbones, the fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds and mammals. Life experimented with forms and fashions The first service that life rendered to the inanimate/inorganic environment was to create conditions in which the many and varied life forms could exist and satisfy their needs. First all life was in the water. Then soil/earth had to be created and the composition of the gases of the air had to be attended to and this was and is the work of plants. The appearance of the plants was also a pageant of life, there were the tiny microscopic ones, followed by the mosses, ferns, giants trees of the Carboniferous times, including the beautiful lepidodendron tree, meaning ‘butterfly tree’, (now extinct but contributing to the creation of coal deposits) and eventually came the flowering plants, which Maria Montessori called the ‘love plants’ because of the special relationship between the insects and the flowers of these plants, the pollination ‘experience’. Once again life comes in answer to a need, life is a cosmic agent, the need of the plants is for carbon dioxide to make food in the process of satisfying this need they purify the air and produce oxygen, as a service to all life. Chart (Biology) Food Factory, another chart presenting the food making process in the plants in an imaginative way. We cannot see this process taking place in the leaf and therefore we show it in an imaginative way to the children. Of course we have included some scientific representations of the hydrogen and carbon dioxide in terms of the atoms of these elements. The chart is not explained to children, it is simply displayed while the teacher tells the story. Our approach is subtle. Montessori’s Cosmic Education, then is a vision of the unity of the cosmos. It includes both Cosmic Agents and Cosmic Tasks. In an article in Communications 1973 2/3 ‘The Unconscious in History’, Maria Montessori on p 10 speaks at length about the cosmic tasks and gives many examples of specific ones, then she says, ‘Long and fascinating is the tale of the various cosmic tasks of living beings: ever busy each of them, ever hungry, ever eager to carry out their particular job, no matter how horrible it may appear to others whose instincts lead them to fulfil tasks opposite to theirs’ Cosmic Agents, perform functions, which render service to the whole of the cosmos. There is the unconscious and conscious service. As we understand it, we think that the plants and animals are not conscious of the service they render to the environment and to life. A dictionary may define conscious as aware of or sensitive to a fact, or aware of or sensitive to our own mental state. Mr Mario Montessori in his short article ‘Cosmic Education’ poses an interesting question for us. Having addressed the cosmic tasks of plants, insects, corals and others he writes, ‘Supposing plants possessed consciousness, most certainly they would still not be aware that their task is to eliminate a poison and produce oxygen, which is the breath of life. These are the primal forces, one might object; but man, endowed with his allembracing intelligence, is he included in the same category? Is he also an agent of creation? And if so, is he also unconscious of his cosmic task? If one investigates, one comes to realise that had he been conscious of it from his first appearance on earth, human history would not have been the long path of work and suffering it has become’ (p 2.) Now, this is a most interesting concept which has not been to date explored in any real detailed way in Montessori circles, I think. The concept I refer to is the place of humanity in the cosmos. Humanity, is for Maria Montessori, at the centre of history, because we say history is the story of the human beings on the earth. Recall that when we looked at the Chart of Interdependency, there was a single solid/darkened circle connected by arrows to all the human groups. This circle represents what we call the ‘supranatura/supranature’ not as in the meaning of the word super, better than something else, but meaning a world superimposed on nature. But not dominating nature but a world which has been created by the work of humanity, the created world of humans. This contains all the creations of our species, both the material and the spiritual. The computer, the plough, the motorcar and the alphabet, our mathematical systems, our philosophies of life and so on and so forth. The third Great Cosmic Fable which we offer to the child of the second plane is the Story of the Coming of the Human Beings, and in that very short story, it is short as it is just a beginning, we tell them about the gifts which the human beings were given – the mind that could think, the hands that could work and the heart that could love. These gifts, would enable the human being to make a life adapted to any part of the globe, from sunny Australia to the ice and snow of North America. The Key for the children to the story of how the humans built societies, cultures, civilisations and nations is called ‘Fundamental Needs of Human Beings’. Fundamental Needs are twofold – Material and Spiritual. The circles representing the satisfaction of the material needs show usually the kinds of materials used to build our houses, to make our clothes and so forth. The circles related to the satisfaction of the spiritual, on the other hand, show the expressions of these need, that fact that the child can see, every day of his life and in his own environment, evidence that human beings satisfied these needs, not just in our clothes, our adornments , our means of transport but also in our art galleries, our concerts and in our churches, mosques, synagogues and so forth. This is not just a key to history for the children it offers to them what we call the ‘concept’ of history. Human beings have certain basic needs that must be satisfied, they also have been given inherent tendencies, these work together to facilitate us in satisfying our needs. On the first appearance of humanity on the earth the needs were satisfied from what they found around them in the immediate environment, berries, roots, plants, fish and other small animals. Through the reasoning mind, the power of imagination and the hands that could work human beings, over time, built an identifiable way of life which was composed of the two territories, material and spiritual. It might have been called Stone Age Culture, Aboriginal Culture, Roman or Greek Civilisations, or it might the nation states of today. These realities are both past and present. In building our cultures and way of life, humanity has, in fact, developed the mind and therefore become more conscious. I think that Montessorians would consider history as the story of the growth of consciousness. I do not mean that the people who made history were conscious of what they were engaged in at the time but that we, looking back at history can become conscious of its implications. In the article on ‘The Unconscious in History’ Maria Montessori discusses the idea of the cosmic task of humanity, of man as being a ‘transforming agent’ and of his work as being a ‘transforming task’, he is, she says ‘the builder of a supra-nature’ (p 14). I cannot give you the exact reference for this single sentence from the writings of Teilhard de Chardin, French priest, paleontologist, biologist and philosopher, he says ‘man is not a figure in the landscape he is a shaper of the landscape’ and this idea coincides with the Montessori thought ‘builder of the supra-nature’. The environment of modern people is this supra-nature and through it we have become much more closely connected with each other and with all of humanity. The fact that humanity is actually ‘one organism, is perhaps the one fact of which humanity has been conscious’, so Maria Montessori would concede this point. In the article ‘Supernature and Single Nation’ which appears in Maria Montessori’s book ‘Education and Peace’ (Clio p 98/99), she says, All mankind forms a single organism, but man continues to live in an emotional world that is outdated. Humanity today forms a single, indivisible unit - a single nation. This single nation has opened the whole world and brought all men together. The earth’s riches now belong to all. The fear of poverty must disappear, but once free of this fear man must realise that riches must no longer be sought within or on the surface of the earth. The single treasure of man, the raw material that promises to yield man everything, is human intelligence, that inexhaustible treasure’. Using her own prefix ‘surpa’ she maintains that ours is the ‘supra-natural’ humanity living in the ‘supra-natural ‘world, which is the cause of all our problems, as we have lost the freedoms of the ‘natural man’. That is a thought to consider. Montessori’s Cosmic Education is to help us in making a new step forward in our evolution. Life has evolved, it tends towards a finality. Finality, as understood, in a Montessori way, is the fact that everything tends towards a predetermined end, therefore cannot be produced by external circumstances, or caused to come into being by outside forces. So spontaneity is of the essence here. Put very simply and practically in relation to the development of the children, it is not the adult, or school which causes the child to develop but the inner drives and sensitive periods which create the human personality. We must finish by speaking of the child, the adult may modify the environment but the child builds the adult and therefore is our hope for the future, each new child coming into the world brings a new possibility of positive constructive powers. The child of the First Plane absorbs the environment unconsciously, he/she constructs builds himself/herself from what the environment contains. This environment must contain human values these will be absorbed into the very life of the child with the emotional sensitivity of that first plane. The single most important human value is respect for human dignity. In the Second Plane the child will reason about what has become a part of his life. These children cannot rid themselves of this, they can learn to understand it with the power of imagination and intelligence. They need the great and the good, they need moral values. The mind of the elementary child concerns itself with human behaviour, this is because the individual is building one of the single most important human characteristics, we call this the conscience, an inner sensibility which vibrates, a sense we have of what is right and what is wrong. Montessori’s Cosmic Education will help the child to become this kind of ‘new adult’ and I would like to finish as I started with a quotation from the Paris Congress 2001 from Camillo Grazzini ‘Cosmic Education results in creative attempts to lead a new and different kind of human life, with responsible participation in all natural and human phenomena’ (p 84) examine how Montessoris understanding of the concept of the Cosmic Plan underpins the organisation and implementation of her cosmic approach to education,designed to meet the needs of the primary age range Im required to be able to show a minimum of 15 quotation regarding this topic and this quotation has to be from the following books:1.to educate the human potential 2.The Secret of Childhood, Montessori method, Children of the universe, From childhood to Adolescence, Spontaneous Activity in Education ‘It is this vision of an indivisible unity made up of energy, of sky, of rocks, of water, of life, of humans as adults and humans as children that lends a sense of the cosmic to Montessori’s thinking. This cosmic sense pervades all of Montessori’s work, both her thinking and her educational approach for all of the different planes and stages of development of the human being: from birth without violence to the Infant Community, to the Casa dei Bambini, to the elementary school, to the Erdkinder community for adolescents. Quite clearly, then, this cosmic vision belongs by right to the whole of the Montessori movement: it is indeed the key which gives us a shared direction and a common goal in our work’. ‘Maria Montessori’s Cosmic Vision, Cosmic Plan and Cosmic Education’ p 81 – 82 Conference Proceedings, Paris 2001 http://www.montessori-ami.org/congress/2005sydney/papermh.htm She created her "Cosmic Plan" to give a set of principles that would guide the teacher in her efforts to nurture the spirit of the child and to encourage his desire to explore and respect the world in which he lived. She felt that this would empower the natural instincts of the child and give him the connections that he needed to gain a balanced impression of the world. The following chart lays out the key principles of her cosmic vision. "...it is through a childhood modified and freed from the ties of unconsciousness, of weakness, of psychic deviations and of ignorance, that it is possible to act by giving a new form of intellectual culture and by cultivating new sentiments for humanity. It is this latter part, culture, that which represents the study to be carried out in the schools, the universal syllabus that can unite the mind and the consciousness of all men in one harmony, that we intend by Cosmic Education." The Child, Society and the World p 111, Chap V http://www.montessori.org.uk/magazine-and-jobs/library_and_study_resources/teacher-training-http://www.forsmallhands.com/ideas-insights/cosmic-educationstudy-resources/topics/cosmic_education Cosmic Education By Dave Kosky, Lower Elementary Director Maria Montessori calls Cosmic Education the path through which children develop a global vision. By developing gratitude for the universe and their own lives within it, the child then takes on an awareness of receiving many gifts from other human beings they will never know. The theme of Cosmic Education is best summed up in the following quotation from Dr. Montessori: “The child will develop a kind of philosophy which teaches this unity of the universe; this is the very thing to motivate his interest and to give him a better insight into his own place and task in the world and at the same time presenting a chance for the development of his creative energy.” http://ruffingmontessori.net/home/about/why-montessori/montessori-articles/cosmic-education/ "If children can see their own lives in the framework of the cosmos, if each one can see the role he or she must play in its unfolding, life will become more meaningful." (Nurturing the spirit (1996) page 97) http://www.amontessorimusingplace.org/2011/06/cosmic-education.html "If the area of the universe is to be presented to the child in the right way, it will do more for him than just arouse his interest for it will create in him admiration and wonder, a feeling loftier than aan interest and more satisfying, the childs mind then will no longer wander, but becomes fixed and can work. The knowledge he then acquires is organized and systematic; his intelligence becomes whole and complete because of the vision of the whole that has been presented to him, and his interest spreads to all,for all are linked and have their place in the universe on which his mind is centered.....No matter what we touch, an atom, or a cell, we cannot explain it without knowledge of the wide universe." (To Educate the Human Potential (1 989) page 6) Quote. Dr. Maria Montessori Posted in Montessori, Quotes, tagged appreciation, characteristics, children, construct,education, gratitude, Imagination, Montessori, preparation, The Four Planes of Development - Overview on January 12, 2012 | Leave a Comment » Dr. Montessori said: “The aim is not to create a cultural mind, but a spiritual soul based on reality. Therefore, history should not be taught as a collection of dates and places. But rather be approched to arouse gratitude and appreciation. This gratitude should be aroused first to the law and order of the universe and the preparation of the environment into which human beings came.’ "The secret of success is found to lie in the right use of imagination in awakening interest, and the stimulation of seeds of interest already sown by attractive literary and pictorial material, but all correlated to a central idea, of greatly ennobling inspiration – the Cosmic Plan in which all, consciously or unconsciously, serve the Great Purpose of Life." (To Educate the Human Potential, p. 3) "…the Cosmic Plan can be presented to the child, as a thrilling tale of the earth we live in…." (To Educate the Human http://montessori.org.au/montessori/quotes.htmn Potential, p. 2) "To have a vision of the cosmic plan, in which every form of life depends on directed movements which have effects beyond their conscious aim, is to understand the childs work and be able to guide it better." (Dr. Maria Montessori, The Absorbent Mind, Clio Press, 135) http://www.montessoriforeveryone.com/The-Five-Great-Lessons_ep_66-1.html Read More