The child’s parents are not his makers but his guardians.
Interpretation
Parents guide and protect their children rather than creating them.
This quote by Maria Montessori emphasizes that while parents play a crucial role in a child's life, they do not create their child's intrinsic nature or identity. Instead, they serve as guardians, responsible for nurturing and providing a safe environment where children can grow and develop their unique selves.
In practice
This quote can be used in a speech at a parenting workshop.
... 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.
Banning books gives us silence when we need speech. It closes our ears when we need to listen. It makes us blind when we need sight.
No instance exists of a person's writing two language perfectly. That will always appear to be his native language which was most familiar to him in his youth.
Education promotes equality and lifts people out of poverty. It teaches children how to become good citizens. Education is not just for a privileged few, it is for everyone. It is a fundamental human right.
Schools connect children to their communities. Jobs connect adults to their societies. Persons with autism deserve to walk the same path.
Children, by nature, are keen, passionate and curious. What was referred to as laziness is often merely an awakening of sensitivity, a psychological inability to submit to certain absurd duties, and a natural result of the distorted, unbalanced education given to them. This laziness, which leads to an insuperable reluctance to learn, is, contrary to appearances, sometimes proof of intellectual superiority and a condemnation of the teacher.
Children feel the whiteness of the lily with a graphic and passionate clearness which we cannot give them at all. The only thing we can give them is information-the information that if you break the lily in two it won't grow again.
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