All living systems construct themselves through processes of learning. A child too, grows, develops and matures into an adult through similar processes of learning, marked by the profound elation and joy of the learning experience.

 

The role of education, therefore, is to facilitate the flow of these natural learning tendencies in children. This was Dr. Maria Montessori’s (1870 -1952) seminal contribution to a fundamentally alternative, holistic pedagogy, developed through years of scientific observation of children coupled with the experience from classrooms she set up in various parts of the world, including Chennai that she conceived of education as an ‘aid to life’ that must follow as closely as possible the needs of the growing child.

 

The Montessori perspective on the developmental stages that all human beings go through from infancy  to adulthood, describes a series of formative planes or phases rather than a steady, linear ascent, with each phase having its distinct physical and psychological characteristics and needs. In her words, ‘such dramatic changes mark the stages of development that we are led to believe that we are dealing with a quite different person every time.’