What advice can we give to new mothers? Their children need to work at an interesting occupation: they should not be helped unnecessarily, nor interrupted, once they have begun to do something intelligent.
Interpretation
New mothers should allow their children to explore and learn independently without unnecessary interference.
Maria Montessori emphasizes the importance of fostering independence in children by allowing them to engage in tasks and learn from their experiences. By refraining from unnecessary help or interruptions, mothers can support their children's development and encourage them to pursue interesting and meaningful activities on their own.
In practice
During a parenting workshop, a speaker might quote this to encourage parents to promote independence in their children.
... the first thing his education demands is the provision of an environment in which he can develop the powers given him by nature. This does not mean just to amuse him and let him do what he likes. But it does mean that we have to adjust our minds to doing a work of collaboration with nature, to being obedient to one of her laws, the law which decrees that development comes from environmental experience.
When we want to infuse new ideas, _x000D_ to modify or better the habits and customs of a people, _x000D_ to breathe new vigor into its national traits, _x000D_ we must use the children as our vehicle; for little can be accomplished with adults.
Noble ideas, great sentiments have always existed and have always been transmitted, but wars have never ceased.
What we need is a world full of miracles, like the miracle of seeing the young child seeking work and independence, and manifesting a wealth of enthusiasm and love.
To aid life, leaving it free, however, that is the basic task of the educator.
It is fortunate, I think, that nature is not bounded by human reason and by laboratory work and experimentation, for by the laws of pure reason and by microscopic investigation, it might easily have been proved, long before this, that children could not be born.
One of the great things about books is you can afford to do anything.
Literature was the passport to enter a larger life; that is, the zone of freedom. Literature was freedom. Especially in a time in which the values of reading and inwardness are so strenuously challenged, literature is freedom.
When I talk to students - and I still think of myself more than anything as a kind of professor on leave - they say, 'Well, how do I get to do what you do?'... And I say, 'Well, you have to start out by being a failed piano major.' And my point to them is don't try to have a 10-year plan. Find the next thing that interests you and follow that.
Students deserve great teachers. And teachers deserve the support they need to become great.
I do think that a minister who can preach a sermon without addressing sinners does not know how to preach.
One of the first things I think young people, especially nowadays, should learn is how to see for yourself and listen for yourself and think for yourself.
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