My vision of the future is no longer of people taking exams and proceeding from secondary school to University but of passing from one stage of independence to a higher, by means of their own activity and effort of will.
Maria MontessoriThe world of education is like an island where people cut off from the world are prepared for life by exclusion from it.
Maria MontessoriIf I am going up a ladder, and a dog begins to bite at my ankles, I can do one of two things - either turn round and kick out at the it, or simply go on up the ladder. I prefer to go up the ladder!
Maria MontessoriThe prize and punishments are incentives toward unnatural or forced effort, and, therefore we certainly cannot speak of the natural development of the child in connection with them.
Maria MontessoriBy the age of three, the child has already laid down the foundations of his personality as a human being, and only then does he need the help of special scholastic influences. So great are the conquests he has made that one may well say: the child who goes to school at three is already a little man.
Maria Montessori