Christian Montessori Fellowship

Freedom has to be earned – respect doesn’t!

At a recent conference we asked the question, “What did you wish you knew before you started teaching?” Interestingly, the answers are a reflection, not only of experience, but of maturity. It is not only knowing what to do – but why – and significantly when.

Freedom has to be earned – respect doesn’t.
What attracts many of us to Montessori is the freedom the child experiences in his learning. It is a wonder to behold as a child actively searches and discovers. As beginning teachers we are sure there must be a magic formula (or magic dust) to make the learning happen. It surely must be the “magic” of the freedom in the classroom – the lack of restraints and compulsion. But when I, as a new teacher, tried to spread that “freedom dust” around all I got was chaos and confusion. I was sure that it was the freedom of the classroom that gave rise to the great learning (and contentment and happiness) that was happening there.

Experience taught me (like many other beginners) that freedom isn’t magical. It has to be earned and trained and practiced. Freedom is a long term process and you cannot rush it until the child is ready to handle it. Earning freedom is like preparing for a marathon. It starts with a step, a walk, a run and longer runs until you have trained yourself for the race.

Freedom’s real value is when you know how to use it wisely. Our society confuses freedom with independence. To many freedom means no constraints. However, independence means the ability to be self-governing. Real freedom has to be built on a base of independence. And that is what you are doing in Montessori, creating an environment where the child is learning to govern and guide himself. Traditional education provides few opportunities for gaining independence and exercising freedom.

The challenge of freedom (and exercising it) is that it is messy. It is not the “ordered” existence of everyone doing the same thing at the same time and coming out with similar results. It is the messy process of making mistakes, correcting those mistakes, hopefully, not making the same mistakes again but invariably doing so and failing our way to success. Our challenge is not to disrespect the process or the learner in the process. We have to be careful in life (in and out of the classroom) that we don’t look down on people who are struggling to overcome, to master and to achieve. Obviously, we can do everything better and quicker than our students but unless we give them the time they need they will never come to independence and real freedom.

We live in a world that hasn’t changed much since Jesus’ day. The disciples didn’t think that Jesus should be bothered by “mere” children. Children are weak, noisy, distractible etc and they should just do what they are told. Jesus saw them differently because He looked with eyes that saw where they came from and with eyes that saw where they were going. He gave great respect to the child and “unless you become like the child” you can’t even enter the Kingdom of heaven.

Respect does not have to be earned. It is the hallmark of our relationship with the child (and each other.) And even the childish abuse of freedom is not a reason to stop the progress of learning how to use the freedom wisely. Just as God forgives us of our sins and starts our slate over so He requires us to “re-present” to our children, with patience and respect, the opportunities of learning freedom.