Cosmic Education in Action

Montessori teachers are encouraged to observe students in order for them to act as effective guides. What this means is that, at times, teachers need to let go of their own agendas and simply follow the child. This week I was privileged to see yet another example of this in action in the classroom. Three of our younger students have been drawn to the animal boxes and will often unpack, look at and play with the small models contained therein. On this particular day I suggested a lesson around classes of vertebrates (definitely not what had planned for these children this week!). They eagerly joined the lesson where we learned the scientific names for classes of vertebrates (e.g. Class Pisces, Class Reptilia, Class Aves, etc.). We also learnt about being hot/cold blooded, how the different classes take care of their young and what skin covering each has. Later the children matched pictures to each class. 

I then suggested that the children take the animals from the animal boxes to match them according to class. They eagerly did this and I thought that would be the end of this work. Soon, however, the children involved came to tell me that mammals had the most. They were looking at the animals as though examining a bar graph. The mammal line certainly looked longer however, I started counting and we realised that both mammals and birds in fact had the same number. Then the children got really excited! They ran off to get paper and pencils to record their results. 

One of the boys decided that there were more mammals in the room and went off to collect all the prehistoric mammals as well as the early human models. The mammal line was now the longest! The students came to ask how many 33 and 13 were when added. They were given an impromptu lesson on adding up the tens and then adding the ones. Off they went to write down the number of mammals. Other children came to observe and count with the boys. 

Later the students called me to explain their findings. Mammals were the winners! One of the students told me the rankings - first, second, third, fourth and fifth. 

Here was the perfect example of how a range of concepts can be integrated: learning Latin names, biological facts, graphing, adding, classifying, learning ordinal numbers along with a good dose of collaboration, problem solving and engagement. Cosmic education is about more than integrating subjects. It is also about children finding their place in the world. Who knows what these boys were actually thinking when doing this work? I would like to think that they could identify that humans are mammals too. As individuals they were a part of this picture as well. They learnt about what makes each class unique and that they are unique too. This is one of the things I love about Montessori education!