montessori ed

Erik Erikson

Erik Erikson (June 15, 1902 – May 12, 1994) was a prominent psychologist and psychoanalyst.  He trained in psychoanalysis at the Vienna Psychoanalytic Institute and also studied the Montessori method.

He developed a theory of Psychosocial Development with 8 stages that bear a remarkable intellectual debt to the 4 Planes of development.  I encourage you to take a few minutes to read this brief summary of the stages outlined below, and compare to these to the 4 Planes.

Birth to 18 months            Infancy

18 months to 3 years       Early Childhood

3 to 6 years                          Play Age

6 to 12 years                        School Age

12-18 years                          Adolescence

19-35 years                          Young Adulthood

35-65 years                         Middle Adulthood

65+                                         Late Adulthood

Dr. Montessori influenced many of the great psychologists who came after her, most notably Erikson and Piaget.  In the interests of being well informed about the field of psychology and making connections to Montessori’s work, please take a look.

Dr. Maria Montessori developed auto-didactic materials, or materials that teach when manipulated by a learner.  She was born in the 1870’s and passed on the 1950’s.

Think about the technology that was introduced within her lifetime (automobiles, radio, television, airplanes, telephones) and the technology introduced after her death (computers, cell phones, the internet, space travel, satellite communication, GPS).

Dr. Montessori never saw photographs of the earth from space.  She never saw a computer in action or marveled at the information available on the internet.

What kind of auto-didactic materials would she create if she were alive today?

These thoughts were inspired by a TED talk by Will Wright, the developer of the SIMS computer games which he says were inspired by the Montessori materials of his youth.

Do you suppose that Larry Page & Sergei Brin (Google founders) Will Wright (Game designer) Jeff Bezos (founder of Amazon) and others might be interested in endowing an annual prize for the development of new, developmentally appropriate auto-didactic materials?

The Montessori Prize could be like a Nobel Prize for material design, maybe with age categories 0-3, 3-6, 6-12, 12-18, adult.

This would be an interesting way to raise awareness of Montessori education principles within the “toy” and education industry.