Maria Montessori And Fredrich Foebel Analysis

The following essay seeks to discuss the educational theorists Maria Montessori and Friedrich Froebel. In this essay, the ideas by which these authors will be evaluated and compared with regards to their philosophies and contributions. However, as teaching styles vary greatly among teachers, this essay has been approached with the teaching style of the author as the primary recipient of the ideas put forward by the theorists in question. The essay is preceded by this introduction. Following this, the work of Montessori will be evaluated. The subsequent chapter will then evaluate Froebel. These will then be compared. A summary of that discussed in this paper will be provided in the conclusion. Born near Aricona, Italy on August 31st 1870,

Froebel like to have “gifts” for the children when they entered the classroom, these gifts were various objects such as a wooden box, knitted balls, wooden cylinders, and various geometric shapes. He liked to give the children these gifts to allow them to use their imagination. (Douglas, F.2008). Often he would give the children clay and paper, so that they could create new beings by moulding the clay or repeatedly fold the paper to see what shapes that they could create out of them. He liked to use these objects as he felt that they helped to increase the children’s fine motor skills and attention spans. (Laurie Carpenter ,2017) However, Montessori was more interested in teaching the children more about self-care and responsibility as she would give the children didactic apparatus materials each with their own specific purpose, such as a broom, dish sets and cleaning materials like brushes, sponges and cloths. She liked to teach children by using their senses, for example, when teaching children about the different letters and numbers, she would use a cut out of sandpaper in the shape of numbers and letters. She liked to teach her children more about self-mastery and through that, become more confident. Although Montessori and Froebel agreed that teachers should let children become creative thinkers and learn on their

I think the Montessori approach was more preferable because of the way in which she tries to encourage the children in her classroom to become independent individuals, cleaning up their own spills and messes as they are prepared for the real world. I admire with her efforts into a hands on approach to teaching, how she encourages children to learn through play, how she brings nature to them, into their classroom with the use of her “nature shelf” help them learn about metamorphosis by letting the children personally experience it for themselves, as I feel as though if you experience something for yourself it is easier to learn about it as some children may be more active learners and may find it more difficult to learn by reading about it from a book. The Montessori Method has a lot more free play than the Froebel Method as some see Froebel’s method as rigid and have decided to add more toys for the children to play with as another way to express themselves e.g. a doll house and musical instruments. I also feel that instead of focusing on fine motor skills Froebel could have instead put more effort into teaching children more academic types of activities, such as reading and