Some Cycles of Nature - Applications of M. Montessori’s Cosmic
Education in a Nursery School
Paul Herbst
Salzburg University, Dept. of Geography and Geology, Hellbrunnerstr. 34, 5020
Salzburg, [email protected]
M. Gruber-Fuchs
Kindergarten Liefering II, Laufenstraβe 49, 5020 Salzburg, Austria
E. Herbst
Kingergarten Stiftsgasse, 5201 Seekirchen/Wallersee, Austria
ABSTRACT
By means of Montessori education, children aged from 3
to 6 years were introduced to the basics of earth-sciences
in general and of glaciology in particular. For this
purpose, a one-year-program was established under the
principles of Cosmic Education (Sensu Montessori) in
order to provide an insight in some parts of the afore
mentioned sciences via 3 steps. Step 1 brought up
introductory informations about earth sciences,
historical geology, planetology, and climatology. In Step
2, specific information about the Ice Ages and glaciology
was given by introducing a story about a personified
glacier which included information on mass budget
(ablation/accumulation), dynamics, features (crevasses),
and in relation to those, the dangers of a glacier. Step 3
completed the program by giving the children the
opportunity for depicting and acting out their
knowledge via glacier-“modelling”, painting, dancing,
and making music.
After this one-year-program the children were able
to give a simple account of the basic principles of
climatology and glaciology, which may contribute to a
more careful and respectful attitude towards their
environment.
The program turned out as a helpful and appropriate
tool for giving an introduction into the great cycles of
nature to preschool children, not only in nursery schools,
but also at home with their families. In addition, the
interactive and hands-on ways of presentation described
were responded by the children with interest and
sometimes enthusiasm, which is taken as further
evidence for the tool’s efficacy.
INTRODUCTION
instruction for very young students. M. Montessori, the
first woman in Italy who earned a physician’s medical
degree, started and established her method during her
time in a school for mentally disabled children. After the
great success that she achieved within some years, she
expanded her method to children from the slums of San
Lorenzo, Rome, Italy (Stephenson, 2004). A great deal of
attention was paid to M. Montessori internationally
when she established a glass-walled classroom at the San
Francisco Panama-Pacific International Exposition
(Sobe, 2004). Today the methods of M. Montessori are a
recognized educational theory that achieves great
success; in Austria, they are mainly applied in nursery
and primary schools. The main principles of the
Montessori method are the strong attention to the
individuality of the students, leading to work in small
groups, times of free work during school time, and the
individual use of different materials to achieve
knowledge.
Figure 1 shows in a diagram the organization of the
glaciology program within the framework of Montessori
pedagogics. A key idea of Montessori education is
Cosmic Education, first presented in London in 1935 by
Maria Montessori (Haspel, 2004; Kaul, 2005;
Salvenmoser, 2005). Cosmic Education addresses all
themes related to nature - but not just in a strictly
scientific way. Montessori wanted to teach children
something of nature’s mysteries, of the philosophy and
value nature has (or better, should have) for all of us. In
this way, science education topics cover a wide range
and include a spiritual aspect. Another aspect of
Montessori education exemplified in the Cosmic
materials is the use of manual, sensorial work (work with
as many of the five senses as possible), and of repetition
to help children develop their mental abilities. These
aspects were considered when establishing the program
for basic concepts of Earth science and glaciology.
The main facts of Cosmic Education (Salvenmoser, 2005)
such as orderliness (which we can find in many natural
systems), respectfulness not only for other people but
also for natural items and systems, cross-linked
reasoning, and the particular state of mankind in the
whole system of the earth have been respected by trying
to let orderliness become vivid (through use of a
so-called “prepared environment” in the classroom), to
dwell on the specific needs of the students and to treat all
students with respect.
In the Austrian Alps, lots of glaciers still do exist, even if
they are currently melting away (due to heavily
increased ablation) (Patzelt, 1970). The last time that
most of the Alpine glaciers were growing again (with
positive mass-balances over 10 to 15 years) was in the
eighties of the last century (Patzelt, 1985). Even though
the glaciers exist, lots of children in Austria, especially in
urban environments, have no idea of glaciers and of
glaciology, respectively. Because glaciers are a good
example to vividly illustrate the water cycle and the
sensitivity of nature to climate changes to children, we
started a program to teach children aged three to six STEP 1 – INTRODUCTORY INFORMATIONS
about the life of glaciers and glaciology.
Step 1 started with an introduction into the seasonal
circle by using the so-called cloth of the seasons (Figure
METHODS
2) in which the children can see the circular appearance
A three-step program was used to introduce young of the seasons within a combination of cultural
children to glaciology and climatology. The methods of (easter-rabbit, christmas tree,...) and natural artifacts (e.g.
Maria Montessori (1913) were applied within this red leaves for autumn), combined with photographs (a
program because of the success of this system of tree in every season) and arranged on a circular cloth
with differing colors for each season. 365 pearls along the
Herbst et al. - Applications of M. Montessori’s Cosmic Education in a Nursery School
220
Figure 1. Digram showing the organization of our one-year-program within the framework of Montessori
education.
Figure 2. Using the cloth of the seasons during Step 1
of the program.
rim of the cloth illustrate the days as the smallest cyclic
units.
The teacher’s talk combined with the kinesthetic
experience of circling about the seasons led to another
lesson on planetology in which the solar system was
built from balls in different sizes to show the relative
dimensions and spacing, as illustrated in Figure 3. The
teacher discussed the different compositions of the
planets and the physical properties of surface
environments of these celestial bodies.
Step 1 culminated in a visit to the Natural Museum
of Salzburg (Haus der Natur), Austria, and to the
Geological Department of Salzburg University. In the
course of this visit, the children heard a short
introduction to historical geology emphasizing fossil life, Figure 3. The “planetary system” built up in the
as well as some highlights of mineralogy. Each child was nursery school.
given a gemstone (Alpine quartzes) to keep. According
to the children, the most interesting fossils for them were
ammonites since most of them knew the relatives of
ammonites - the calamares. The hidden life of these
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Journal of Geoscience Education, v. 56, n. 3, May, 2008, p. 220-224
Figure 4. Frontpage of the book about a personified
glacier entitled “The Year of the Glacier” (translated
from German).
animals far down in the sea and their unique shape and
beauty filled most of the kids with enthusiasm. A
skeleton of a big fossile whale (Rhynchodelfis sp.), which
was found just some years ago within the cenozoic
sediments north of Salzburg also was a highlight.
STEP 2 – SPECIFIC INFORMATION
Step 2 lead to a more intensive confrontation with ice
ages and glaciers. Having had all the experiences with
historical geology and planetology, the children were
able to understand the main reasons for the appearance
of (e.g. Milankovich-cycles, a cosmic reason for cooling
and warming of the earth dealing with the instabilities obliquity, eccentricity, precession - of earth’s orbit
around the sun and subsequent differences in the solar
radiation input on earth) and the main effects caused by
the ice-ages. Especially in Salzburg, which is situated at
the northern margin of the Alps, it is quite awe-inspiring
to talk about a time when the city was buried under
hundreds of meters of ice. The children could also carry
out some experiments with both fresh water ice and salt
water ice to see the differences in melting/freezing point
and also just to watch water freeze. The different
densities of ice and water could also be visualized, and
the children were working with great enthusiasm.
After these experiments, a story was introduced
dealing with a personified glacier and his life over a
whole year. The story is built up like a fairy-tale which
refers to the “mystic” way of teaching put forward by
Montessori - the glacier is personified, suffers from heat,
speaks about the painful ruptures in his skin (crevasses) but tells the children many things about the dynamics,
the seasonal variations, the crevasses, and the interaction
between climate and glaciers. The illustrations were
carried out by a professional artist who painted in a very
impressive, instructive and mystic way (Figure 4). The
personification of an item (a glacier) and – vice versa –
the becoming of an item (personal analogy, Rule, 2005)
strengthens the interest and is therefore thought to gain
better, more individual knowledge about the item.
Figure 5. Glacier snout with an eroded tunnel of
meltwater.
At this point of the program, a geologist/glaciologist
visited the children performing an interactive
two-hours-talk about glaciers, their life, and their
dangers. The children were not just able to see a
powerpoint presentation about glaciers as a conclusion
of all the knowledge gathered so far, but could also see
and test the “instruments” needed for working on a
glacier such as crampons, ice-picks, ropes, or an
ice-drilling-system. This sensorimotor information
which was combined with explanations helped to
achieve an understanding of the environment on a
glacier, its dangers, but also its mystical beauty. The
Highlights of the interactive talk were slides from deep
crevasses, moulins (vertical structures on the glacier,
tens of meters deep, in which water falls into the glacier
and is swallowed by the ice), and other hydroglaciological features (Figure 5) on the one hand, and on
the other hand the glacier-equipment, especially
crampons and the ice-pick which illustrated the special
ways of movement on the glacier. Children asked a lot
about security on the glacier and also about the dynamics
(crevasses) and the water flow since these are the most
spectaculous phenomena on a glacier.
STEP 3 – DEPICTING THE KNOWLEGE
In step 3 the children were given different options to
depict their knowledge (Table 1). One variant (for the
Herbst et al. - Applications of M. Montessori’s Cosmic Education in a Nursery School
222
Dance
Music
Experiments
Games
free movement with music; when music stops - the children "freeze"; just before "melting" the music
starts again.
telling of the story of the glacier (see step 2); at the same time and under guidance of a teacher, the
children are creating a model of the glacier using cloth, stones, sand . The noises of the glacier are
simulated by different instruments (see text)
Adapted to the season (e.g. in winter: experiments with ice and snow)
active games (finger plays, body movement circle games) adapted to the topic of the glacier
Table 1. Options for depicting the knowledge.
surfaces using glue on paper to fix various materials
(sand etc.). The five- to six- year-old children especially
enjoyed the experiments with different instruments and
the “recreation” of diverse noises but also the
construction of models of the glacier as described above,
and playing with the finished product.
CONCLUSIONS
Figure 6. Model of a glacier built up by 6-year-old
children with aid of a teacher. Note the glacier-tables
and the forefield!
smaller children) was painting glaciers which led to quite
impressive results. The accuracy in details was
astonishing (e.g. the presence of glacier-tables – a
common feature on glaciers where big boulders save the
ice below them from melting and so being risen above
the surface of the glacier standing on a trunk of ice, as
seen in the slide-show part 2). Older children tried to do
some “modelling” of glacier-dynamics by building up a
morphology with paper-mâché and then let the glacier
(modelled by small pellets of insulating material
[styropor TM]) flow (Figure 6).
The final activity and at the same time the last act of
the whole program was the invitation of an
Orff-musician who was specially trained for working
with children of pre-school age. He tried to simulate the
noises of water and ice in close cooperation with the kids.
The whole story of the glacier was interpreted by several
sounds evoked by instruments such as the triangle
(sunshine - melting), the kalimba (fountain, water), a
rainmaker (rain), drums (movement of the glacier,
creation of cracks and crevasses), a windmaker (wind)
and the glockenspiel with the notes D, E, G, A,
representing snowfall.
During step 3 major differences between the
interests of the children regarding their ages have been
found: three- to four-year-old kids mainly took pleasure
in active games (e.g. construction work using natural
stones); four- to five-year-old kids also liked the active
games, but similarly liked the creation of glaciers with
different materials and also the creation of different
223
The children were able to gain some basic knowledge
about glaciers, climatology, and geology in general. Even
though the whole program was voluntary, all of the
children in the group showed interest according to their
state of development, and at times expressed great
enthusiasm. The reactions of the parents were quite
impressive since some of the children could teach their
parents some facts such as details about ammonites and
their life, or special glacial features (e.g.
accumulation/ablation). Many parents supported our
work by talking about the topic at home and/or
supplying the children with items and books to talk
about in the group. The most impressive result is that
now, after two or three years, the children (and also
parents) are still talking about the knowledge they
gained. When the program finished, both children and
parents were waiting for more.
Given the results, we are convinced that through this
program the children became aware of the fragility of
nature and of the possibly strong human impact on it.
The program has been carried out three times by now
and is updated and completed every time. During the
years the program became more specific and was
adapted in details; for the next run of the program we are
planning a field trip to a glacier in order to let the learned
facts become a real experience for the kids.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The authors would like to thank the scientific editor, Carl
N. Drummond, Fort Wayne IN, the associate editor,
William Slattery, Dayton, OH, three anonymous
reviewers, and Audrey C. Rule, Oswego NY, for
substantial hints on deficits in the manuscript in very
detailed and kind reviews.
M. Geretsegger, Vienna, converted the “Austrian” to
American English. Thanks for that.
Finally, thanks to all the children who helped
making this program successful, the University teachers
at the Geological Dept., Salzburg University, who made
the visit an unforgettable event for the kids, and the great
illustrator of our glacier book, R. Weiss, Wels, Austria.
Journal of Geoscience Education, v. 56, n. 3, May, 2008, p. 220-224
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