Practical Life!

by Regan Becker

The Montessori Primary classroom contains four curricular areas: Practical Life, Sensorial, Language, and Math. In this article, we focus on Practical Life, which is foundational for the three other curricular areas. It is necessary for a child to feel physically capable, confident, and connected to the environment before devoting concentration to learning through the intellect. 

Practical Life — Preliminary Activities: Folding

In Dr. Montessori’s Own Handbook, Maria Montessori describes the characteristics of the Primary (ages 3-6 years) child as:

“In fact, he ‘never keeps still’ and ‘touches everything’... in these movements the little one is seeking the very exercise which will organize and coordinate the movements useful to man. We must, therefore, desist from the useless attempt to reduce the child to a state of immobility. We should rather give ‘order’ to his movements, leading them to those actions towards which his efforts are actually tending. This is the aim of muscular education at this age.”

Practical Life — Preliminary Activities: Pouring Water

Dr. Montessori found that children want very much to be independent and do what adults do. Practical Life lessons and materials encourage the child’s control and coordination of movement, care of the environment, care of the self, and social skills through practicing Grace & Courtesy. 

Maria Montessori spoke of the positive aspects of educating children toward their independence – rather than adults coddling or sheltering them from the educative effects of accidents and errors:

“Our education is not negative nor does it deprive a child of anything, but rather changes, intensifies, and refines. Everything must be taught, and everything must be connected with life… How he is to use what he has learned is a task for his own conscience, an exercise of his own responsibility. He is thus freed from the greatest of dangers, that of making an adult responsible for his actions, of condemning his own conscience to a kind of idle slumber.”

Practical Life — Care of the Environment: Washing an Underlay

In Montessori Primary classrooms, Practical Life lessons begin with Preliminary Movements — such as:

• Carrying (a pitcher of water, a potted plant, a tray with something on it, a chair)

• Rolling and Unrolling a Rug

• Folding 

• Spooning

• Tonging

• Pouring Wet and Dry Materials

• Opening and Closing Containers

Practical Life — Care of the Environment: Washing Dishes

In Montessori education, skill-building occurs with isolation of difficulty – one skill developed at a time with a direct aim of “an education in movement”, as Maria Montessori describes in her book The Discovery of the Child:

“There is a special secret which enables the children to carry out their practical activities with success. It is the precision, the exactness with which the acts must be performed. They are much less interested in filling a glass with water than in pouring it out of the bottle without touching the edge of the glass and without spilling any of it upon the tablecloth. Washing one’s hands becomes more attractive if one has to remember the exact place for the soap, and where the towel must be hung.”

Practical Life — Care of the Environment: Mopping with Water

After these fine and gross motor strengthening and balancing exercises have been introduced, the Montessori Primary child has lessons on Care of the Environment — such as:

• Dusting (a table or shelf)

• Polishing (wood, metal, a mirror)

• Washing (a table, chair, window, or dishes)

• Sweeping 

• Scrubbing

• Mopping

• Plant Care (watering, washing a leaf, arranging flowers in a vase, misting)

• Setting a Table

Practical Life — Care of the Environment: Scrubbing Boots

Maria Montessori described the First Plane of Development, from birth to age six, as a Sensitive Period for Movement: “Physiologically, we may say that their muscles and nerves are passing through a period when they are learning how to work harmoniously together.” Practical Life activities increase a child’s self-confidence and compassion. Children have a desire to show others their capabilities! What they can do for themselves, they can also do for others!

Practical Life — Care of the Environment: Arranging Flowers

Concurrently with Care of the Environment, the Montessori Primary child has lessons on Care of the Self — such as:

• Grooming (washing hands and face)

• Dressing Frames (snap, button, buckle, zipper, bow)

• Lacing a Template

• Sewing a Button

• Brushing Teeth

• Cutting Food and Serving Others

• Scrubbing Shoes or Boots

Practical Life — Care of the Self: Cutting and Serving Food

The Montessori Practical Life curriculum follows a scope and sequence from simple to complex, from foundational skills to actions combining many steps:

“Every complex action comprises a series of distinct movements; one act follows the other… Dressing and undressing oneself, for example, are highly complex acts which we adults, except on special occasions, carry out rather imperfectly. The imperfection consists in carrying out at the same time and confusing various movements that should follow each other.”

Practical Life — Care of the Self: Grating Ginger

Additionally, Montessori Primary students receive lessons on the Silence Game, Walking on a Line, art of all kinds (easel painting, puzzles, play dough), and Grace & Courtesy activities – such as:

• Greeting a Person

• Introducing Someone

• Watching Someone Work

• Offering an Item

• Inviting Someone

• Blowing One’s Own Nose (also Care of the Self!)

• Saying Goodbye

Practical Life — Art: Watercolor Painting

In Montessori education, discipline – which derives from the Latin word discipulus, meaning “following” or “learning” – emerges through a child’s physical control and coordination of movement. The foundational Practical Life activities instill in children concentration and self-belief to work peacefully solo or with others:

“When children experience pleasure not only from an activity leading towards a special goal but also in carrying it out exactly in all its details, they open up a whole new area of education for themselves… and urge the child on to organize his movements.”

Practical Life — Art: Easel Painting

In the mixed-age Montessori classroom, Practical Life activities assist with building social skills. Children learn by doing for themselves what they see older children and adults do independently:

“A child’s inner toil has a kind of modest sensibility, and it finds expression only when an adult has not intervened with his advice, exhortations, orders, and questions. We should leave a child free to activate his potential. He will show us that he is aware of the fact that he can always do better than he is doing at present.”

Practical Life — Care of the Self: Bow Tie Dressing Frame

The Practical Life curriculum embodies the child’s plea, “let me do it by myself.”