The environment must be rich in motives which lend interest to activity and invite the child to conduct his own experiences.
Maria MontessoriScientific observation then has established that education is not what the teacher gives; education is a natural process spontaneously carried out by the human individual, and is acquired not by listening to words but by experiences upon the environment.
Maria MontessoriEducation, as conceived today, is something separated both from biological and social life.
Maria MontessoriAt birth, the child leaves a person - his mother's womb - and this makes him independent of her bodily functions. The baby is next endowed with an urge, or need, to face the out world and to absorb it. We might say that he is born with 'the psychology of world conquest.' By absorbing what he finds about him, he forms his own personality.
Maria Montessori