Dr Montessori interpreted writing as the ability of converting sounds into letters. But in reading she explains that a person needs not only to pronounce the word but also the word needs to be recognised and understood, which requires an extra step in the intelligence.
“A higher intellectual activity must therefore be brought into play.”
(Maria Montessori, The Discovery of the Child, Chapter 16, pg 230)
Maria Montessori introduced an effective method to help the child in achieving the skill of reading, and to achieve it faster during his childhood. Dr. Montessori also revealed that to achieve the skill of reading, first the child needs to be assisted in acquiring the skill of writing. Because,
“…writing prepares the way for reading so that the difficulties are almost unnoticeable.”
(Maria Montessori, The Discovery of the Child, Chapter 16, pg 229)
Following are the phonetic approach in which the child learns how to read and write step by step:
Children begin to learn their phonetic sounds with the Montessori sandpaper letters. They are lowercase letters cut out of sandpaper and mounted on a wooden background. Usually the consonants are printed on red or pink, and vowels are printed on blue. During a lesson, the teacher models tracing the letter with the first two fingers of the dominant hand in exactly the same fashion the letter is written. At the same time, the teacher makes the letter's phonetic sound. The child then mimics. The focus is on phonetics. When they are mastered, the child learns the letter names.
- In the Montessori classroom we first teach the child reading of symbols, which are letters of the alphabet, combined with the sound it represent. This is the phonics approach for written language, which emphasis on the sound. In this process we also make use of child’s sensitivity for learning through sense of touch, because,
“…muscular memory is the most tenacious in a small child and is also the readiest.”
(Maria Montessori, The Discovery of the Child, Chapter 15, pg 212)
When the child has mastered the sounds of the alphabet, he starts putting them together to spell (encode) words. This lesson is usually given first with the sandpaper letters and then with a smaller wooden movable alphabet. The child practices spelling simple words with three sounds and short vowels (cap, sit, rut, hog, men). Then he often spontaneously starts writing them, as he is familiar with letter formation from his work tracing the sandpaper letters.
Tracing sandpaper letters helps the child absorb the muscular impression of the letter along with the auditory impression which makes a lasting memory in the child’s mind.
If the child is not given proper training in sense of form, it may be difficult for him to discriminate differences between ‘a’ and‘d’. So it is important to train the child by giving him plenty of experience in sensorial materials that represent form such as Stereognostic materials, geometric cabinet, geometric solids.
All the experience child gains in working with materials on the sensorial and practical life areas have lead the child to unconsciously “…perfect themselves in writing without writing.”
- (Maria Montessori, The Discovery of the Child, Chapter 15, pg 210)
- In Dr. Montessori’s mechanism for indirect preparation for written language, she concluded that it is very important to enhance a child’s oral and auditory language skills through conversation, speech work, drama, stories both red and told, songs, and naming activities. Through these activities the child is given the opportunity to express their thoughts and enjoy their work by building confidence, imagination, creativity, concentration, communication and listening skills.
- A simple naming activity games like ‘I spy game’ allows the child to understand the placing of a sound, whether it’s in initial, terminal or medial within a word and helps the child familiarise with the sounds used in speech. In order to succeed this exercise the child should have the skill to discriminate sounds and be familiarized with the names of objects.
- The pink scheme: After familiarising the child with sounds by presenting vowels and consonants in the alphabet, children are exposed to phonetically sounding words. Initially he is given simple phonetic words that have 2 to 3 letters such as cat, hat, and ant. At this stage child has naturally developed a tendency to sound out words according to its phonetic sound. But for the child to be easily understood that these words are pronounced phonetically the Montessori Classroom apply a pattern that is common only to these words. Which is a phonetic word of 2 or 3 letters are printed in larger, black coloured font and on pink coloured paper. All the materials that come under this category are called the Pink Scheme materials.
“Language, we may say, grow with human thought.”
(Maria Montessori, The Absorbent Mind, chapter 5, p109).
- Then the child is introduced to Blue Scheme materials which contain longer phonetic words and words with simple acceptable blends such as ‘ll’, ‘ck’.
As the child becomes more comfortable spelling these simple words, she also practices reading them in simple forms. Next she will start adding consonant blends (such as "bl," "cl," "st" and "pr") and consonant digraphs (such as "ch," "ph," "sh," "th" and "wh"), while still focusing on short vowel sounds. Next, other phonograms and long vowels are introduced. The child initially practices with the movable alphabet, isolating one new sound at a time, and then moves to reading the words on cards and in books.Some of the words that come under blue scheme are black, bell, bond, and pond.
- At the end the child, when the child is much comfortable reading words in the blue scheme he is gradually introduced to the sounds of the typical letter-patterns of English, which is called phonograms, for example ‘ch’, ‘aw’, and ‘tion’. These words come under the Green Scheme, which they are printed on green coloured paper. The phonetically sounding letters of the word are printed in black and phonograms are printed in red which makes it easier for the child to recognize phonograms and pronounce accordingly.
- The words in all these three schemes mentioned above, the pink, the blue and the green are initially presented to the child in a written format by using the movable alphabet. Within these writing exercises directress assists the child in composing words by uniting sounds. The words given to the child to build consist of letters which keeps its individual sounds, and of phonogram sounds, when pronouncing the syllables. This is the next level in achieving reading skills which allows the child to understand that most common sound-spelling relationships so that they can decode, or sound out, words.
- As the third stage in preparation for skilful reading, the child is progressively directed in to reading words. At the initial phase of this stage the child is introduced to names of familiar objects. The child also begins to learn about nouns, verbs and punctuation. He then starts to diagram sentences, using the Montessori grammar symbols. For example, a noun is represented by a large black triangle and a verb is represented by a large red circle. The child starts with a two-word sentence, such as "Jane sits." He places the triangle over "Jane" (the noun) and the circle above "sits" (the verb). The other symbols are as follows: article, a small light blue triangle; adjective, medium dark blue triangle; adverb, small orange circle; pronoun, pink (or purple) isosceles triangle; conjunction, horizontal pink rectangle; preposition, horizontal green crescent; and interjection, a yellow upside-down keyhole kind of shape.
He’s provided with objects and tags containing the name of the object, which he needs to, read and match to the object. With preparation exercises done involved in writing, now the child is able to read a word as a composite of sounds. And the words that are given to the child to read needs to be selected by the directress based on the phonics approach; firstly the short and simple words that keeps its individual sounds which is pink scheme words, then longer phonetic words and words that contain blends which is blue scheme words, finally when the child is introduced to phonograms, he’s given words with phonograms the green scheme words.
As a technique to present words without them being too hard or too easy, were to group words based on their sounds. For an example, grouping words with the sound ‘o’
group 1 : on, hop, pot, ox
group 2 : pond, bond, cold, told
- Gradually the child is progress to read words without the presence of its concrete version. He is given wordlists, booklets that contains not only nouns but also verbs, adjectives and more. e.g. big, end, blend, own.
- Finally the comprehension of words proceeds to logical reading of sentences. But first the child needs to be introduced to few rules of sentence reading such as a sentence begins with a capital letter and ends with a full-stop and he needs to be introduced to articles that require completing a sentence or a phrase such as ‘the’ and ‘a’. These words are introduced as sight words that are taught to the child from a three period lesson which allows him to carry the words in his memory. The words does not pronounce phonetically are introduced in sight words.
- Then the child is provided with single sentences that are associated with pictures which give him the sense of what the sentence describes. The same technique is applied when the child is introduced to reading story books. The picture associated with the sentence act as a control, and by doing so he is trained for logical reading that communicates ideas to his thinking process, which they gradually discover on their own. The materials; sentence cards and story books are introduced at the pink scheme level which helps them to build their logical reading even with the limited words that they know. As the child’s word reading level improves in blue and green schemes more challenging reading is involved in sentence reading and story book reading.
Furthermore if the child is encouraged to read aloud they have the opportunity to learn proper grammar and pronunciation. Also it enhances their spoken language development and helps them learn to express themselves clearly and concisely.
- The phonics approach not only quicken the reading ability of a child but also helps the responsible figures to observe and approach the developmental disabilities that a child would posses, such as dyslexia or faults in speech like stammering or hearing and more.
Therefore, graded phonics instruction in the Montessori Classroom plays a key role in helping a child comprehend language effectively and preserve throughout his lifetime.
“If writing serves to correct, or rather, direct and perfect the mechanism of speech in the child, reading assists in the development of ideas and language. In brief, writing helps a child physiologically and reading helps him socially.”
(Maria Montessori, The Discovery of the Child, Chapter 16, pg 230)
Language helps the child to unify with his community. When his ability for communication is improved he is capable of expressing his feelings, share his thoughts, ideas and desires. Montessori classroom apply simple methods to develop child’s language skills. Associating names to the objects that they come across in their day to day life is one important method which satisfies child’s tendency for exploration.
But child’s exploration for the environment within the world is greatly satisfied by materials presented in cultural subjects.
The sequence of materials; from concrete to abstract representations, such as from models to photographs and drawings, develops child’s intellect. The child will continue with these activities as learning components and functions, classifying and definitions.
The ultimate goal of the ‘prepared environment’ is to stimulate child’s interest and give him the possibility to explore and experience the environment and help him in his mental classification in order to develop his own personality. We can e witness to the endless inner happiness of the child if he is given the opportunity to explore the world endlessly.
Montessori uses language all across the curriculum. Vocabulary is emphasized in every activity. Children learn new vocabulary through nomenclature and definition activities. Especially at the elementary level, children have journals in which they write for every curriculum area. The language foundation, started in the early years, builds as the child progresses.
Alifiya Abdeali/DMT 106 Page of
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alifiyaabdeali (student)
