This week we delved into a consideration of physical geography.

As is the way with Montessori lessons the concrete is presented before the abstract. This is a far more meaningful method of learning as it makes concepts more easily understood and accessible. ‘How exactly does this work?’ I vaguely hear that question spring to mind. In a nutshell this means that you start with a tangible reality, and, therefore, concrete model of learning. For example, if we were teaching about a musical instrument, the ideal way to introduce the instrument would be to bring it into the classroom.
 
Now with the world that can be a bit more problematic! However, the children will readily accept a representation if the real physical example presents a challenge. Hence in the case of the world we start with the Land and Water globe. It is aptly named as its only features are land and water. For our purposes in the Montessori classroom this is ideal, as the world is made up of land and water… but also air! In introducing the land and water globe we also discuss air and when we talk about it we ensure that we really take in some deep breaths and fill our lungs.
 
The children love this whole activity as it gets them thinking and working out why land, water and air are so important. And they are so smart and beautifully imaginative. They worked out that if we had to give up one of those it would be land as one child said, ‘ We can live on a boat’ and another added, ‘and swim.’ It made me think of Noah’s ark!

First of all Happy New Year to everyone out there! As we make new years resolutions and think of ways in which we can enrich our lives I have one to ponder on, namely utopian thinking.

I make no bones about the fact that this is a curious  one. However, the other day I was, driven by my daughter, to read about utopian thinking, and not only was it insightful but it did get me thinking that utopian thinking is healthy.

The idea of utopia stems from Thomas More’s book ‘Utopia’ in which there is a society which live in harmony, and utopian thinking is the mindset in which we reflect on society and look to change it to an ideal version where everyone and everything benefits. This means that we are continuously evolving in our thoughts and are prepared to ditch certain ideas in the process.

As I read about utopian society where everyone is equal, where everyone works towards the common good, where jobs and responsibilities are managed by the whole community fairly and there is equal status and recognition amongst them, it got me thinking about the nursery class and our micro community.

Thomas More would be pleased with an eye-view into the nursery as the virtues of utopia are lived and practiced by the children.
 
Their world view is not clouded by the lived experience of the big wide world. It is fresh, open, honest, kind, good fun and abundantly wholesome. Problems have solutions and can be worked out amongst themselves, and if not they may seek the help of adults in the nursery. There is a willingness to embrace and adapt and keep it fresh and move on with creativity and imaginative thinking which embodies utopian thinking.

I was reading a lovely book about dinosaurs with the children, and it was a wonderful experience into the mindset of utopian thinking which is not to be constrained by conventional thinking. As we flicked through the pages of the book the children  began to speculate the reasons for the different features of the different dinosaurs. There was one who had a red plate on its head – the book said that it was likely that the red plate was a decorative piece to attract a mate. When I told the children that it was to make that dinosaur attractive, one of the children laughed and told me that the red plate was a store of energy like walking around with a volcano on your head. And then we looked at a prehistoric squid called a cephalopod and observed its tentacles.  I said that they squirted ink when they felt they were in danger, and one child suggested that actually they also squirted their ink as they liked to swim through it as smelled so nice, 'a bit like a bath bomb.’ Brilliant!  

It all made me think that,  in the presence of children, utopian thinking is always abundant.