Growth and psychic development are therefore guided by: the absorbent mind, the nebulae and the sensitive periods, with their respective mechanisms. It is these that are hereditary and characteristic of the human species. But the promise they hold can only be fulfilled through the experience of free activity conducted in the environment.
Maria MontessoriIf education is always to be conceived along the same antiquated lines of a mere transmission of knowledge, there is little to be hoped from it in the bettering of man's future. For what is the use of transmitting knowledge if the individual's total development lags behind?
Maria MontessoriGreat tact and delicacy is necessary for the care of the mind of a child from three to six years, and an adult can have very little of it.
Maria MontessoriIt is true that we cannot make a genius. We can only give to teach child the chance to fulfil his potential possibilities.
Maria MontessoriHe who experiments must, while doing so, divest himself of every preconception. It is clear then that if we wish to make use of a method of experimental psychology, the first thing necessary is to renounce all former creeds and to proceed by means of the method in the search for truth.
Maria Montessori