User:Delia2013/sandbox

I am going to edit the page on Maria Montessori. These are just some ideas that I have that I would like to elaborate on the page.

Under the ideas subheading im going to add information about the Montessori schools because today public schools are still using her methods. Maria Montessori had many accomplishments with one being the Montessori Method which is a method of educating young children that stresses development of a child's own initiative and natural abilities, especially through practical play. This method allowed children to develop at their own place and provided educators with a better understanding of child development. In Maria's book, the Montessori Method, she goes into further detail about the method. Educators in the field set up special environments to meet the needs of the students in three age groups: two and a half years, two and a half to six years, and six and a half to twelve years. The students learn through activities that involve exploration, manipulations, order, repetition, abstraction, and communication. The teacher is to encourage children in the first two age groups to use their senses to explore and manipulate materials in their immediate environment. Children in the last age group deal with abstract concepts based on their newly developed powers of reasoning, imagination, and creativity (Hainstock, 1997).

Maria created over 4,000 Montessori classrooms across the world and her books were translated in many different languages for the training of new educators. Her methods are installed in hundreds of public and private schools across the United States. In Montessori education at every level, it is always through interaction with the environment that the child learns; the teacher is only part of the environment. To meet such a challenge, it follows that the elementary environment cannot be haphazardly designed by an individual teacher’s whim. Its structure must be scientifically planned and methodically formed (Lillard, 1996).

I want to add to work with mentally disabled children subheading because it talks about who influenced her but it doesn't tell why or how they influenced her Jean Itard and Edouard Seguin influenced her career path. Itard is well known in the twenty-first century for his work with the "Wild Boy of Aveyron," a youth who had been found wandering naked in the forest alone who was most likely abandoned as a child. Seguin studied with Itard and continued his research but he was recognized as the founder of the modern approach to special education. He developed a methodical approach to breaking skills down into small steps, and was highly successful with a carefully developed collection of hands-on educational materials. Maria was intrigued with Itard's ideas and created a far more specific and organized system for applying it to the everyday education of children with disabilities. When she discovered the works of Jean Itard and Edouard Seguin they gave her a new direction in thinking and influenced her to focus on children who are troubled learning.

I would also like to hyper link some of the words because I know when I was reading the page there were some things I thought should have been elaborated on such as Orthophrenic school, asylums.