Montessori-Pierson Publishing Company, p/o Koninginneweg 161, Amsterdam (2025)

05/12/2025

THE HUNGER OF DEVELOPING MINDS
The school, conceived as an institution for the cultivation of humanity, assumes an aspect totally different from that of the modern schools where teachers dedicate all their efforts to making the children study. The school, in my view, should be considered as a help to development. The hunger of developing minds is akin to the hunger of a starved body. Children want to know everything and ask an infinite variety of questions….
The child must be given complete answers that will arouse his enthusiasm and demand further research and intense activity on the part of the child himself and of his teachers. The teachers in our schools also broaden their psychic life; research takes them into fields formerly unexplored, widens their horizons and allows them to become conversant with arts and sciences, formerly unknown and unsuspected. They become enthusiastic about the work and collaborate excitedly with the children, frequently joining them in their research and participating in their manual and scientific work.. Page 100 from the book “Citizen of the world” https://montessori-pierson.com/products/citizen-of-the-world-vol-14 ; https://montessori-pierson.com/products/ciudadano-del-mundo-vol-11

27/11/2025

IMAGINATION CAN TRAVEL THROUGH INFINITE SPACE AND TIME
From the smaller children who have learnt the effectiveness of an indirect approach, as by addressing older children in their presence, for in our schools the ages are, to a limited extent, mixed. When we try to show something to the older children, the younger ones crowd around showing eager interest. This interest was especially shown by a child of six towards a chart illustrating the relative sizes of the sun and the earth by globe and point. The younger children were thrilled by the realization that this invoked in them, and were unable to tear themselves away though the older child for whom the instruction was planned found it rather commonplace, and needed some other thing to arouse in him similar interest. There is a difference between such enthusiasm and mere understanding. The point and the sphere touched the imagination of the younger child, leaving him full of enthusiasm for something beyond his former limits, belonging not to the physical environment, which cannot be grasped by hand. If moreover this particular illustration left the older child unmoved, it was not that nothing had the power similarly to touch his imagination, bearing him beyond his little world into wider realms, by great strides into the unknown universe; but he could not reach such marvels and mysteries without help...Imaginative vision is quite different from mere perception of an object, for it has no limits. Not only can imagination travel through infinite space, but also through infinite time; we can go backwards through the epochs, and have the vision of the earth as it was, with the creatures that inhabited it. To make it clear whether or not a child has understood, we should see whether he can form a vision of it within the mind, whether he has gone beyond the level of mere understanding. P. 7/8 from the book: To educate the human potential: https://montessori-pierson.com/products/to-educate-the-human-potential-vol-6; https://montessori-pierson.com/products/la-educacion-de-las-potencialidades-humanas-vol-6; https://montessori-pierson.com/products/opvoeden-voor-een-nieuwe-wereld-en-onderwijs-en-het-menselijk-potentieel

14/11/2025

ELEMENTARY ARITHMETIC, DECIMAL SYSTEM
The decimal system is the foundation on which we rely to sort numerical quantities. Its introduction into our world, which dates back to the Arabs in the Middle Ages, is an aid to calculation so ingenious that it enables us, including children, to count large quantities. Calculation is nothing more than abbreviated counting. As in all work of simplification, the key lies in the greater degree of clarity achieved. Simplicity and clarity are the very qualities needed to bring facts within the reach of the child. Therefore, the first step should be to provide children with the construction of the decimal system itself rather than to count or calculate, because these two things are achieved with easy procedures offered by the decimal system….
…Making the decimal system accessible to children by means of a material is something that is feasible in practice and of such evident simplicity that the decimal system can be converted into a little game suitable for a child. Naturally what the child is offered is certainly not a toy but an exact material for study, capable of helping him to overcome all the difficulties that are encountered by children in the regular school, where they are taught to count and calculate based on the decimal system without being proffered any explanation of the principles on which that system is founded. Page 11-14 from the book psychoarithmetic https://montessori-pierson.com/products/psychoarithmetic-vol-20; https://montessori-pierson.com/products/psicoaritmetica-vol-18

05/11/2025

INTELLIGENT WORK WITH INTEREST IS NOT FATIGUING
…No such possibility was yet conceived as a happy education of children, so many still had to be sacrificed to civilization, and the best they could do was to compromise, reducing hours in instruction to the minimum, cutting out from the curriculum grammar, geometry and algebra, making outside play obligatory and postponing the age for entry into school. But however much free periods have been increased and children urged to play rather than study, strangely the children have remained mentally fatigued not- withstanding all these reforms. Montessori schools have proved that the child needs a cycle of work for which he has been mentally prepared; such intelligent work with interest is not fatiguing, and he should not be arbitrarily cut off from it by a call to play. Interest is not immediately born, and if when it has been created the work is withdrawn, it is like depriving a whetted appetite of the food that will satisfy it. Through long experimentation we have now arrived at much elimination of error, and the possession of a key, which can unlock for children the gates of a healthy and happy education. On our courage and perseverance in its use depends the future of humanity. Page 74 from the book: To educate the human potential: https://montessori-pierson.com/products/to-educate-the-human-potential-vol-6; https://montessori-pierson.com/products/la-educacion-de-las-potencialidades-humanas-vol-6; https://montessori-pierson.com/products/opvoeden-voor-een-nieuwe-wereld-en-onderwijs-en-het-menselijk-potentieel

28/10/2025

REPETITION OF THE EXERCISE
Here was a first peep into the unexplored depths of the child mind. Here was a very small child, at an age when attention flits from one thing to another and cannot be held down. Yet she had been absorbed in concentration such that her ego had withdrawn itself from reach of any external stimulus. That concentration was accompanied by a rhythmic movement of the hands, evoked by an accurately made, scientifically graduated object. Similar facts occurred on various occasions. And every time the children emerged as if rested, full of life, with the look of those who have experienced some great joy.
Though such instances of a concentration reaching insensibility to the outer world were not usual, I noticed a peculiar behaviour that was common to all, and practically the rule in all they did – the special characteristic of child work, which I later called “repetition of the exercise”…
The same thing happened on many other occasions; the more accurately an exercise was taught in all its details, the more it seemed to become a stimulus to an endless repetition of the same exercise. Page 107 from the book The Secret of Childhood: https://montessori-pierson.com/products/the-secret-of-childhood-vol-22; https://montessori-pierson.com/products/el-nino-el-secreto-de-la-infancia-vol-4

17/10/2025

WORK OFFERING THE GREATEST OPPORTUNITIES
It would be a mistake to attempt to estimate a child’s capacity for work according to his age before testing him, or to exclude any from a task to be done on the grounds that they could not be of any assistance. A teacher should always open up the way, and should never discourage a child through lack of confidence in him. Even the littlest children are anxious to do something and are more anxious to exert themselves than those who are older….
The importance of the work does not bother children, they are satisfied when they have done as much as they can and see that they are not excluded from an opportunity to exert themselves in their surroundings. The most admired work is that which offers the greatest opportunities to each one. Page 85 from the book the discovery of the child https://montessori-pierson.com/products/the-discovery-of-the-child-vol-2 ; https://montessori-pierson.com/products/el-descubrimiento-del-nino-vol-2 ; https://montessori-pierson.com/products/de-methode

06/10/2025

THE SENSE OF GEOMETRY
…The material that has the purpose of giving the child his first sensory representation of geometry figures consists of what are called plane insets…
…This…is not just an item of knowledge penetrating the mind of the very young child. Something unfolds within him, becoming part of his mental life. This sense of geometry becomes one with his psychic organ which is actively being created. The child’s eyes are now attracted by the geometric aspects of his surroundings; his eyes are attracted by the light that pe*****tes them naturally. The flat surface of a rectangular table, hexagonal floor insets, circular dishes, small chequers on napkins, the ellipses of picture frames: all these – doors, windows, decorations – take on a new meaning. It is as if the small child is assailed by these images that pe*****te within him through an intimate attraction. These mental aptitudes – spontaneous observation coupled with inner sensitivity – differ greatly from what we consider as logical learning. To attach some grounding in a discipline to the sensitive periods means preparing aptitudes in the personality that predispose the child to understand. It means sowing the permanent seeds of interest in the mind. Page 9-10 and14-15 from the book Psychogeometry https://montessori-pierson.com/products/psychogeometry-vol-16 ; https://montessori-pierson.com/products/psicogeometria-vol-16

29/09/2025

ORDER AND PRECISION
In our tiny children the evidence of a mathematical bent shows itself in many striking and spontaneous ways. In fact, if we showed them exactly how to do something, this precision itself seemed to hold their interest. To have a real purpose to which the action was directed, this was the first condition, but the exact way of doing it acted like a support which rendered the child stable in his efforts, and therefore brought him to make progress in his development. Order and precision, we found, were the keys to spontaneous work in the school. And if we look now at the sensorial apparatus which is able to evoke such deep concentration (remarkable in very small children between the ages of three and four), there is no doubt that this apparatus may be regarded not only as a help to exploring the environment, but also to the development of the mathematical mind. The results we obtain with our little ones contrast oddly with the fact that mathematics is so often held to be a scourge rather than a pleasure in school programmes. Most people have developed “mental barriers” against it. Yet all is easy if only its roots can be implanted in the absorbent mind. Page 166 from the book The Absorbent Mind: https://montessori-pierson.com/products/the-absorbent-mind-vol-1 ; https://montessori-pierson.com/products/la-mente-absorbente-del-nino ; https://montessori-pierson.com/products/het-brein-van-het-jonge-kind

21/09/2025

THE COSMIC FUNCTION
One side of evolution deals with the satisfaction of vital needs, defence, survival of the species and growth by modifications towards perfection. Another – and stronger – factor in evolutionary processes is concerned with the cosmic function of each living being, and even of inanimate natural objects, working in collaboration for the fulfilment of the Purpose of Life. All creatures work consciously for themselves, but the real purpose of their existence remains unconscious, yet claiming obedience. A coral polyp, if capable of conscious expression, would choose to live in calm and warm seas, undisturbed by river currents, and to have faithful attendants to bring it food without its having to stir in search of it. Corals never become aware that by their mode of living they preserve the purity of the water, so helping innumerable millions to live, and also build new land, to support future races. So the trees and plants might consciously exalt their desire for sunshine and vital need of carbon dioxide for their nourishment, unconscious that nature had given them these instinctual urges for the purpose of preserving the purity of the air, on which depend all higher life on earth. The bee who robs the flower of its nectar is aware only of his own need or the hive’s, not that the flower’s need of his visit is as great for its purpose of reproduction, for perpetuating the life of the species. Man too, like all beings, has the two purposes, conscious and unconscious. He is conscious of his own intellectual and physical needs, and of the claims on him of society and civilization. He believes in fighting for himself, his family and nation, but has yet to become conscious of his far deeper responsibilities to a cosmic task, his collaboration with others in work for his environment, for the whole universe…Page 24-25 from the book: To educate the human potential: https://montessori-pierson.com/products/to-educate-the-human-potential-vol-6; https://montessori-pierson.com/products/la-educacion-de-las-potencialidades-humanas-vol-6; https://montessori-pierson.com/products/opvoeden-voor-een-nieuwe-wereld-en-onderwijs-en-het-menselijk-potentieel

15/09/2025

IT IS TIME TO BRING ABOUT A GREAT REFORM
Let us therefore continue our efforts! Let us construct an environment for children and young people; the thanks we will receive for so doing will be the enlightenment we need to see all the errors inherent in the supernature that we adults have created only for ourselves. We must build something new, not offer older children the same things we offer the young ones. Miniature objects and utensils no longer satisfy seven-year-old children. They need other things. The four walls of a ‘house’ become too confining; older children need to go out and explore the world. They must have broader social horizons. Man feels a great need to make genuine efforts, so as to measure his own worth… It is time now to correct these errors, to bring about a great reform, to offer young people the means necessary for their development and the enhancement of their personalities. This task cannot be entrusted to private efforts alone; it is society as a whole that is called upon to fulfil it. It is of vital interest to the state to organize the life of young people. The child by the age of twelve should already be taking an active part in social life; he should be producing, selling, and working, not in order to learn a trade, but because working means coming into contact with life, participating in the building of supernature. These young people should engage in economic transactions, learn the value of money, and take conscious part in productive activities. Page 64 from the book Education and peace https://montessori-pierson.com/products/education-and-peace-vol-10 ; https://montessori-pierson.com/products/educacion-y-paz

06/09/2025

REFORMS THAT ARE IN RELATION WITH THE SOCIAL LIFE OF TODAY
The essential reform is this: to put the adolescent on the road to achieving economic independence. We might call it a “school of experience in the elements of social life.” This “independence” has more educational than practical value; that is to say, it has a closer connection with the psychology of the adolescent than with an eventual actual utility…Education should...include the two forms of work, manual and intellectual, for the same person, and thus make it understood by practical experience that these two kinds complete each other and are equally essential to a civilized existence. If we consider the plan from the point of view of our own method it can be regarded as a development of that principle that has already had such great success in our schools for smaller children right down to the nursery class, known as the “exercises of practical life.”…This has a truly educational, not utilitarian purpose. The reaction of the children may be described as a “burst of independence”…These children seem to be precocious in their intellectual development and they demonstrate that while working harder than other children they do so without tiring themselves. These very children reveal to us the most vital need of their development, saying: “Help me to do it alone!” Independence, in the case of the adolescents, has to be acquired on a different plane, for theirs is the economic independence in the field of society. Here, too, the principle of “Help me to do it alone!” ought to be applied. Page 61-63 from the book From Childhood to Adolescence https://montessori-pierson.com/products/from-childhood-to-adolescence-vol-12; https://montessori-pierson.com/products/de-la-infancia-a-la-adolescencia-vol-12 ; https://montessori-pierson.com/products/van-de-kinderjaren-naar-de-adolescentie

29/08/2025

EDUCATION OF MOVEMENT
The children look after the classroom. They sweep with their own small brooms and dust and scrub and polish. Then there is their own personal cleanliness. When a child’s hands are dirty, we do not take him to the basin and wash his hands or hold his face while we do the washing. The children learn to do these things for themselves as a matter of course, and even toddlers of two and three years can carry objects and wash themselves and lay a table. The children love to do these things for themselves and they learn to be careful and precise in their movements.This is both education of movement, because there is a refinement of muscular coordination when the work is carefully done, and education through movement, because these activities involve judgement and will, self-discipline, and an appreciation of orderliness. We do not teach the children these things to make little servants of them, but because we have observed that of their own accord children actually take the greatest interest in perfecting all the movements of daily life. P31 from the book: Maria Montessori speaks to parents https://montessori-pierson.com/products/maria-montessori-speaks-to-parents-vol-21 ; https://montessori-pierson.com/products/maria-montessori-le-habla-a-los-padres-vol-15 ; https://montessori-pierson.com/products/maria-montessori-in-gesprek-met-ouders

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