Montessori Nuggets: history

Showing posts with label history. Show all posts

Great Lessons - Materials

Within AMI (American Montessori Internationale), the following is a description of the materials for the 5 core Great Lessons to establish Cosmic Education in the elementary Montessori environment.

God with No Hands

4 impressionistic charts
materials for 6 demonstrations
NOTE: There used to be a 5th chart (solar system) which has been pulled to use at another time (a follow-up telling of the story)
NOTE: There used to be far more demonstrations (experiments is a misnomer in this case) which were pulled out to use as follow-ups, thus allowing the story to focus on the core keys, with plenty left for re-tellings and review - going deeper and encouraging a return to the Great Lesson.

Coming of Life

2 impressionistic charts
Timeline of Life (a mute version of the Timeline of Life is a follow-up work)

Coming of Human Beings

No materials
The focus is on the human connection itself - particularly on love; the children can look at their own arms and legs to see that they do not have specialized protection as animals do.
Note: The two timelines called "First Timeline of Human Beings" and "Second Timeline of Human Beings" are follow-up work in the history album. They are not part of this Third Great Lesson.

Communication in Signs

8 impressionistic charts showing the changes of writing styles through time and civilizations

Numbers

8 impressionistic charts showing the changes of numbers through time and civilizations

For further Montessori Nuggets on the Great Lessons:

Timeline of Civilizations

There is a Timeline of Civilizations that is so simple yet so striking for the elementary children - usually upper elementary, although many 8 year olds begin to work with it as well.

This Timeline of Civilizations is not available for sale at any of the Montessori companies (please do post a comment if you know somewhere that does sell it!). Perhaps there is a non-Montessori version that is simplistic and essential and to the point!

It takes all of recorded human history and marks down all of the civilizations onto one long piece of paper, spanning 6000 BC to the year 2000 AD. It can easily be extended to the current day.

How striking to have all of human history, all those great and small civilizations - all of us, right through to today and present-day civilizations - all of us on one piece of paper.

Perhaps even a bit more humbling and gratifying than the red line we have used in the early presentations and continue to use in the Black Strip and the Hand Timeline. Now we see the details - we see that all fits within that red strip.

This material is not meant to stir up a whole slew of new work, but like the Black Strip to be something of a consolidation for the older children, bring together previous details, before delving into new ones. These upper elementary are less apt to request repetition, but still need it - and this material fills that need.

Additional Images of the Full Timeline:

Montessori Scope and Sequence: Elementary

The following links take you to a general scope and sequence for AMI elementary albums.

These Montessori scope and sequences -

follow ages 6-12
do not include remedial (bridge) work
are not set in stone - follow the children before you!
are general (they do not include every single exercise with an album page that might start in year 1 and extend to year 4 or 5) - so when you see a range of 1-3, figure that the album page probably starts in year 1 (or 2 at the latest) and should generally be done by year 3. It could be earlier, but it shouldn't be much later, because the age ranges are pretty generous already. If you want the detailed version that contains every exercise and follow-up, in both Word and Excel formats (easily adapted for personal use), you will find them at Garden of Francis (for elementary) and Garden of Francis (for primary)

The years you see noted in "start" and "end" refer to the year in Montessori elementary - year 1 is the equivalent of age 6, through year 6 which is the equivalent of age 11-12.

The last math work may or may not be completed in elementary and may extend into early adolescence. The other albums are typically easily completed in a 6 year elementary cycle.

Looking for detailed scope and sequence that includes every single exercise of the album page and more specific guidelines and ages? Check with your album provider. Or join us at Keys of the Universe.

Or looking for primary Montessori album scope and sequences? Those are trickier. Presentations that are introduced at age 3, might have extensions that go through age 4, 5, and 6 - so you'll want a very detailed one that includes all exercises for each album page. Ask your album provider for a scope and sequence to correspond with that album set.

Or some general ages are included here in various Montessori Nuggets.

Social Studies in Montessori

Where is "social studies" in Montessori?

Montessori sure does shake things up! History is obvious, but let's discuss the other albums first.

Our geography at primary is what we expect (maps, countries, capitals, flags), along with a great deal of cultural experiences.

Our geography at elementary is what most schools consider "earth science" - physics, geology, chemistry and the like - including climactic zones (and which people and animals live where). AND it then adds in Economic Geography - how people connect with one another, most particularly in regards to the earth itself: source of our food, economic interactions and taxes. Within economic geography is where we get into community helpers that many schools make their entire 1st grade curriculum.

Montessori, utilizing the precepts of cosmic education, emphasizes the link between the land (geography) and the people - who lives where, how they live and interact with one another and their environmental surroundings and the changes that take place... starting to sound like ecosystems in Biology, huh? ;)

Within the language album, we look at the history and development of languages, literature, and modes of communication. We look at the biographies of authors, their times and lives, to provide us deeper insight into their choice topics, their writing styles, their beliefs - their inner souls.

Within Mathematics and Geometry, we'll have the usual mathematical skills, but also have the Story of Numbers and various Geometry stories. These stories place mathematics and geometry in the context of history and within daily life - why are these subjects necessary and useful? How can we utilize these skills to be service to *people.*

Art and music are relatively obvious - these areas are not just about skills, but appreciation for the work of others. We study the history of artists and musicians in the same way we study authors - in the same way we study all of history: as a gift.

History is the most obvious as far as social studies. Montessori provides a framework within which to study history, not from any one resource (i.e. a textbook), but from a variety of sources utilizing one's own developing reasoning skills to sort bias from fact and create one's own view of history, within the framework of gratitude for the gifts given us by those who came before us and responsibility to those who are with us now and those who will come after us - how shall we hold dear and develop the gifts we have been given? How shall we then pass on these gifts that are a living heritage from ancient times to the present.

So you can see that social studies - the study of society, its people, its functionings and even the study of ourselves, truly is cosmic education, utilizing every aspect of a child's life, even outside these academic albums.

History Timelines

When it comes to extra timelines needed to fulfill interests OR other educational requirements:

Equal weight has to be given to allow the children to explore freely whatever they wish to explore and to develop the sense of responsibility to society. Cosmic education was first fully developed in 1944 by Dr. Montessori and her son Mario while they were living in India. When they arrived back in Europe in 1945, they began to present this idea in training courses. In one lecture, Mario said, “Regarding the memorization of historical elements, a sort of game has been devised. The teacher has to first give the lesson, then by way of testing the memory, cards and charts are prepared.”

Living History

From AMI History album:

There is a story that comes from Leicester in England, the name of which is derived from the Latin castra, meaning “camp”. There is a museum in this area with lots of things that have been dug up from the Roman times onward. There was a little account in the newspaper told by the curator of the museum:

Every day before he goes to work, he goes down to the basement and picks up a brick and holds it. That brick takes him back to the time of the Romans being in the city of Leicester because in the brick is the little print of a child’s foot and lines that must have been drawn with a stick, a child of about two years old. He was probably amongst workmen making bricks and came upon the brick before it was dried. He probably took a stick, as tiny children do, and began to draw lines on it. Some adult must have come along and shooed him off, and he went running, leaving his foot imprint on the brick.

It is stories like this that make history come alive; this little boy playing at the time of the Romans. Now that brick is there in the museum, a display-piece of the lives and times of these people.

History needs to be made visible.

It is not a record to be memorized.

It is a life to be lived and to be studied.

Art Presentations in Elementary (and all ages)

Provide art experiences in the basic skills at primary and early elementary. Nothing fancy, but use *real* materials: real watercolors with good brushes to make small designs on small watercolor paper; rubbings; outlining, etc. (in primary, some albums have art in the Exercises of Practical Life and some have it in "Culture").

"The best for the youngest." Give the children the best materials possible and show them how to utilize and care for the materials during this time of formation.

By providing basic skills and assuring they are well learned, with good materials, they can then apply those skills to their later studies, interests and passions.

When studying an ancient civilization or another modern culture, or finding patterns in geometry or mathematics, or just illustrating a work in language, they will have the skills they need to reproduce anything they see.

There is no need to present every art form, if you have provided the very basics.

So we might not have a presentation on mosaics, or on pottery, but they can re-create these things because of the experiences they have had utilizing non-drying clay, cutting and gluing. They can learn from a crafter or a book or a video the additional skills they desire to reproduce an art form for which they might not yet have the skills.

If they have basic folding skills (folding napkins in primary, leading to folding paper - very, very basic), we won't have to present origami to them before they read Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes and teach themselves how to make cranes.

And they can create pyramids from paper folding when studying Egypt.

Basic plant skills or other basic art skills: they can re-create their version of the Hanging Gardens when learning about the 7 Wonders of the Ancient World.

They can study artists and art periods under the guise of history, creating timelines, and creating in the style of various artists.

They will extend their art skills in day to day life and studies, without art skills being a separate study.

And they will be able to express themselves when words are not enough - now or in the future, as they prepare for adolescence.

How many pyramid paper patterns can be designed?

Let the children discover this! You've given them the tools: how to fold paper, all the sensorial materials; you've given them the structure, now let them explore! :)

Timelines In Elementary

There are so many timelines for elementary Montessori! Which ones should you purchase or make????

KEY: Let the children make them!

Here are the timelines you, the adult, should purchase or make:

Timeline of Life
Black Strip (if you count it as a timeline)
Hand Timeline
1st Timeline of Human Beings
2nd Timeline of Human Beings
Timeline of Civilizations (this is *not* Timeline of Ancient Civilizations - the Timeline of Civilizations covers 5000 BC/BCE through the year 2000 AD/CE)
BC/AD Timeline (or BC/BCE) - easily handmade!

Everything else - is for the children to create as their own work!

If you have a local educational requirement for learning certain aspects of the local history, then you *might* make a timeline with the key information that the children are required to know - or you might provide them some notecards (each one labeled with the title of the required information) and send them off to do interviews, library visits, archaeological studies, photographs of historical locations, and other sort of hands-on learning ;) They then place these notecards in order, and begin building a timeline using any of a plethora of timeline-making ideas.

Unfortunately, the alternative, already-finished, timelines you can purchase (math/geometry and language seeming to be the worst, but even music and other areas), can be just comprehensive enough that true, deep interest on the part of the child is totally lost. Sure, they might have some interest in studying a particular era, but the wonder of discovery is lost. And the sorting, classification, deciding what is the most important and what is of serious interest (perhaps an event that is seemingly unimportant but ties in to another area of school or life the child is studying, so it is included by the child in the timeline at hand).

Leave them hidden golden nuggets, buried in the plain old sand - and give them *just enough* to get them digging on their own.

For example, the Timeline of Life is not *supposed* to be updated every time a new discovery is made. I even tell the children the story about the dinosaur with the second brain, saying that scientists at one time thought that the dinosaur had a brain in his tail - the children will ask which dinosaur they thought it was. My response: "AH! There is a great research idea! How shall we find out!?" (make sure you have resources in your classroom with this information, or a Going-Out to the library or local natural history museum is available to the children).

Keys to the universe, past, present and future - just the keys..... Let them unlock the doors. You can guide them toward it, with "I wonder what we might learn over here" or "Is there a connection between Louis Braille's blindness and medical practices of the time?"

Just the keys.

Pique their interest.

Get them researching and creating on their own.

(HINT: This means YOU have less work and they have more responsibility! Win-win both directions!).

Where to buy the Elementary Montessori History Timelines

Montessori Nuggets on the Timeline of Life with a list of vendors

Check the following sites for the various timelines:

Azoka.com
Albanesi.com
AlisonsMontessori.com
ETCMontessori.com
Gardenoffrancis.com - download available
Keysoftheuniverse-Montessori.com - download available
MissBarbara.net
Monteaco.com (is this website still available?)
MontessoriServices.com
Nienhuis.com

History - Table of Contents

If the other areas within Montessori do not correlate from one set of albums to another, how history is covered at the primary level is the worst in lack of correlation.

Follow the Keys at each level and supplement if the situation demands or allows for it. If a child does not learn to tell time or label the parts of a clock in primary, he will get it in elementary - rest assured!

While history is not labeled as such in the casa, the child received sensorial impressions and experiences such that the child will feel secure at the end of his first plane of development, thus we have children entering the elementary environment ready to go on, ready to reach out to the outer society and to understand more about his culture.

At elementary, we focus on giving a foundation and a structure; then we look to the child's interest, our own requirements, and any outside requirements to determine the rest of the details. Elementary Montessori history is really more a method and a style, rather than a "curriculum" that spoon-feeds all information. In this way, you can really have a lot of freedom and a lot of fun, while also being comfortable that all the bases are covered.

Primary - Keys to the World

Focus on the keys that lay a *foundation*:

cultural folders
life-cycles
practical life activities based on sequences and culturally-past processes
flags
song
dance
poems
books and other cultural items[4]
more loosely in the mathematics and the language materials with the order of presentations correlating with how human beings developed these skills
pictures around the environment[5]
all of the aspects of family life and celebrations which are learned by the first plane child are part of the history for that child, for that group of people, that culture and ultimately, all human life
grace and courtesy[6]
vocabulary enrichment cards should include past cultural items (clothing, tools, homes, etc), tying in with the fundamental needs done at elementary.
As the primary child reaches the end of the first plane, his sense of time is developing. While the children do not yet receive dates, they can receive basic vocabulary and sensorial impressions: “in the beginning” “later” “meanwhile but elsewhere”, etc. These children will want to write stories about these things.

Supplemental pieces at primary:

Reading an analog clock
Parts of a clock
Child's personal life timeline

Elementary - Keys to the Universe

· Introduction to History

· The Coming of Life

o Notes on the Story

· The Black Strip

o Notes on the Black Strip

· The Story of the Coming of Human Beings

· The Hand Timeline

o Notes on the Hand Timeline

· The Clock of Eras

· First Timeline of Human Beings

o Notes on the First Timeline of Human Beings

· Fundamental Needs of Human Beings

· History Question Charts (primary source for independent study)

· Three Phases of History

· Second Timeline of Human Beings

· Migration Charts

· Four River Civilizations

· New World Civilizations

· Timeline of Civilizations

· History Timelines

o Timelines for Memorization

o American History (National History)

· Time

o Clock

o Personal Timeline

o Calendar

o BC-AD Timeline

· Notes on Constructing a Timeline

See our other Montessori Nuggets for links to where to buy.

[1] Can have past pictures in the primary cultural folders.

[2] Washboards, sewing skills, washing hands in a basin, etc. Exercises that fit into a historical context.

[3] Historical reasons for the flags, stories associated with them

[4] Culturally past and present

[5] Periodically change; have to do with different aspects of the world: culture, past, present.

[6] Laying a foundation for the elementary child to research the hows, whys and wheres.

History - Introduction

Short story for Montessori history:

Montessori history provides a framework in which ANY and ALL history can be studied. It is not a curriculum so much as an integration of humanity and human studies of all times and places. It is within history that we find cosmic education, our purpose for being here on this earth, and our place within the grand scheme of life.

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The history program has to be integrated into cosmic education. History can’t be taught in isolation any more than any of the other subjects can be. It will be interwoven with geography, with language, with mathematics, with biology… that’s how the children will be exploring history: inter-connected with all of these other traditionally-thought-of subjects of the curriculum.

If we focus on human beings through stories, language and math will fall into their proper places. Language of words and of numbers are simply and wonderfully achievements of human beings – so they fall into the Story. They are also tools in which we need to develop skills; they are necessary tools for exploring cosmic education, but they are not the two most important subject areas of the integrated curriculum. Separating those subjects out and forcing them on the children, rather than approaching them through interests and as tools, is a developmental hindrance to the children.

While telling the stories about human beings, the adult presents the idea of human beings as both creation and creators. As a species, human beings have created through seeking the fulfillment of their needs.

Sopranatura is the term Dr. Montessori used to describe the abilities of the human to go beyond the immediate environment, yet to use the environment to fulfill needs in unique ways.

As we study human history with the children, we want to help the children find their place in the world; find their place in the cosmos. We must tell them what life in the past was like so they can have an appreciation for life today and so they can start to look forward into the future and think about life down the road.

The Montessori approach maintains a large emphasis on the common person – the ordinary person. One of the reasons for this focus is that most people in the world are common, ordinary people. We want the children to understand that even we common, ordinary people have excellent contributions to make. We also want them to understand that the famous people could only do their work with the support of all the ordinary people. Between all those wars and behind all those famous personages, are nameless individuals who lived a way of life, held their loved ones, sang songs, learned from their elders, and above all, LIVED – so that we might live today – they had a culture, and they had a story to tell. That is the history that we study.

History - overview

Within what we call history is included recorded history and pre-history, including archaeology and paleontology.

Hand Timeline - to show history and pre-history

The important key is there must be a context, an overview, given first. Otherwise, there is just random jumping around with no cohesion or order for the children.

Therefore we present big to small, but within each plane of development:

1st plane (0-6): Keys to the World - In geography, we give them the globes at age 3 - the picture of the whole world - then we give the continents and cultural folders and flags, then the local country, then the state or province or region, finally the local area around age 5 - where they start reading maps and can comprehend them. We've also been giving them the sensorial keys to the world so they can understand what is around them even if it is too far away to directly experience. They do not receive history lessons persay, but will be prepared for studying history in other ways, suitable to their development at this age: story-telling, sequencing, vocabulary of time, story of their lives, perhaps learning to track time.
2nd plane (6-12): Keys to the Universe - BEGIN with the Great Lessons with timelines - followed by the details, then back to the big picture before delving into another detail; interconnections between all subject areas.

Archaeology: study of history and prehistory through excavations and study of artifacts
Paleontology: study of fossil plants and animals

Pages

There are so many timelines for elementary Montessori! Which ones should you purchase or make????

Where to buy the Elementary Montessori History Timelines