Maria Montessori

“The study of expression ought to form a part of the study of psychology, but it also comes within the province of anthropology because the habitual, life-long expressions of the face determine the wrinkles of old age, which are distinctly an anthropological characteristic.”

“There can be no 'graduated exercises in drawing' leading up to an artistic creation. That goal can be attained only through the development of mechanical technique and through the freedom of the spirit.”

“When the child begins to think and to make use of the written language to express his rudimentary thinking, he is ready for elementary work; and this fitness is a question not of age or other incidental circumstance but of mental maturity.”

“It is surprising to notice that even from the earliest age, man finds the greatest satisfaction in feeling independent. The exalting feeling of being sufficient to oneself comes as a revelation.”

“When you have solved the problem of controlling the attention of the child, you have solved the entire problem of its education.”

“Education is a work of self-organization by which man adapts himself to the conditions of life.”

“Every one in the world ought to do the things for which he is specially adapted. It is the part of wisdom to recognize what each one of us is best fitted for, and it is the part of education to perfect and utilize such predispositions. Because education can direct and aid nature but can never transform her.”

“If education is protection to life, you will realize that it is necessary that education accompany life during its whole course.”

“We recommend for the training of teachers not only a considerable artistic education in general but special attention to the art of reading.”

“We discovered that education is not something which the teacher does, but that it is a natural process which develops spontaneously in the human being.”

“If 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?”

“We cannot create observers by saying 'observe', but by giving them the power and the means for this observation and these means are procured through education of the senses.”

“In the first three years of life, the foundations of physical and also of psychic health are laid. In these years, the child not only increases in size but passes through great transformations. This is the age in which language and movement develop. The child must be safeguarded in order that these activities may develop freely.”

“Establishing lasting peace is the work of education; all politics can do is keep us out of war.”

“One test of the correctness of educational procedure is the happiness of the child.”

“If intelligence is the triumph of life, the spoken word is the marvellous means by which this intelligence is manifested.”

“It is by developing the individual that he is prepared for that wonderful manifestation of the human intelligence, which drawing constitutes. The ability to see reality in form, in color, in proportion, to be master of the movements of one's own hand - that is what is necessary.”

“At three years of age, the child has already laid the foundations of the human personality and needs the special help of education in the school. The acquisitions he has made are such that we can say the child who enters school at three is an old man.”

“There are two 'faiths' which can uphold humans: faith in God and faith in oneself. And these two faiths should exist side by side: the first belongs to one's inner life, the second to one's life in society.”

“Early childhood education is the key to the betterment of society.”

“The child's mind is not the type of mind we adults possess. If we call our type of mind the conscious type, that of the child is an unconscious mind. Now an unconscious mind does not mean an inferior mind. An unconscious mind can be full of intelligence. One will find this type of intelligence in every being, and every insect has it.”