How to Reinforce Montessori Practical Life Training

Montessori practical life training involves preparing children to care for themselves and take an active, independent role in their own health, hygiene and well being. It also helps them become active participants in their households from a very young age. These skills are taught in Montessori schools, but they must be reinforced at home for the child to truly benefit from the skills and mindset that Montessori practical life lessons encourage. Parents have a responsibility to reinforce this training with their own behavior to help their children grow in a healthy and independent manner.

Difficulty: Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Easily accessible cleaning tools

1. Speak in a positive manner about your own housework. It is important that young children not learn from adults to view their household responsibilities as chores, but rather tasks that are pleasant because they make the entire house run more smoothly. This will help them approach their tasks with a positive attitude rather than as something to be avoided.

2. Keep cleaning supplies in a child-accessible area. For a child to clean up inadvertant messes or perform simple tasks such as dusting or wiping down furniture, he must be able to locate and access cleaning supplies such as dustpans, brooms, mops, rags and, once you have explained their proper use, even safe, organic cleaning fluids.

3. Practice safe cleaning practices. Make sure that when you introduce your child to a new cleaning activity that you are very clear about how it must be performed. For example, you might encourage her to wear gloves to keep cleaning fluids off her hands and dirty items from touching her skin. Also emphasize hand washing before and after cleaning and make sure that there is a safe, convenient location where a child can dispose of trash.

4. Limit responsibilities. Young children should have specific and limited tasks. For example, a child might be responsible for putting away toys in his room. If so, there should be a designated spot for each toy. Similarly, a child can be responsible for sweeping the floor, but you should not make him also responsible for mopping until he has mastered sweeping. If he has too many choices, then he may become too distracted to accomplish any of them.

5. Express delight rather than direct praise. Direct praise can accidentally take the form of an address to an inferior member, or imply that the child has done you a favor rather than performed a task that by rights should be hers. Instead of saying, "Thank you for cleaning the table," you might phrase the positive reinforcement in this way: "Isn't it wonderful that we have such a nice, shiny table? It is wonderful to have someone helping me."

Tips & Warnings

• While children who have had practical life training are more self sufficient, they are not ever like small adults. As a result, you will still need to help them with tasks and you may need to keep an eye on their level of hygiene, since they may wash their hands thoroughly but do so after eating dirt!
• If you have children too young to understand the safe use of cleaning products, assign children tasks that do not involve using cleaning fluids--even organic ones.