Infants thrive in the Montessori environment.
Sensitive Period for Movement
Even before birth, babies are testing out their limbs, their reflexes and gross motor skills. from birth to 12 months. Control of the hands and feet, self-support of the head, hand-eye coordination and crawling all come into play in the first year of life.
Montessori responsibility in all this activity is to make sure that babies are not being restrained either by their clothing or by being left in a crib.
Sensitive Period for Sensory Perception
An infant’s perception of sound, sight, touch, taste and smell is acute. Keeping things calm and quiet, with opportunity to explore is key.
Sensitive Period for Language
Even before birth, babies react to sounds. Speaking, talking, reading to infants is very important. Infants watch the mouths of the people around them and begin moving their own lips in imitation. Soon, they begin to explore their own ability to create different kinds of sounds.
Sensitive Period for Order
Infants gain a feeling of security by making sense of all of the things they perceive in their surroundings.. Their own place in the scheme of things feels safe when they wake up from a nap and discover that everything is in the right place.
Dr. Montessori believed that these special sensitive periods were at their keenest from birth to five years of age and an extraordinary amount of development takes place in the first year of life.
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