If you’re a stay-at-home mom or about to become one, you might be wondering what environment is the best for your child. Well, a prepared environment in Montessori is surely the best.
“The first aim of the prepared environment is, as far as it is possible, to render the growing child independent of the adult.”
—Maria Montessori The Secret of Childhood, 1966.
If you’ve come across the Montessori approach you might want to know how to implement it at home.
Here is a simple guide about setting up a prepared environment for Montessori.
We’ll go through the basics and everything you need to get started right now. You’ll discover how a prepared environment in Montessori is a perfect start for you to allow your child to freely grow and develop his natural potential.
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What Is A Prepared Environment In Montessori?
First things first. What is a prepared environment for Montessori?
Well, the main purpose of a prepared environment in Montessori is to develop children’s independence without interfering with their learning.
It’s designed to ease the children’s motion and exploration while learning. It allows movement and offers a variety of activities for the children to develop skills and explore their freedom.
The Importance Of A Prepared Environment In Montessori
Because everything the child comes into contact with affects its development and fosters its interest, a prepared environment is a key component in the Montessori philosophy.
A good Montessori-prepared environment at home follows three guidelines:
The Care For Child Development
What matters the most to the Montessori approach is the child’s development and learning. So a prepared environment must follow your child’s needs and sensitive periods so he can learn what he’s ready for.
Allowing For Movement
The best way to grow confidence and independence within our children is to create a Montessori-prepared environment that fosters their interests and allows them to move safely.
The Environment Becomes The Teacher
Since we want our children to learn by themselves and become independent without interfering too much, we must create a prepared environment that becomes the teacher.
Meaning that you display activities that correspond to their age and that they can reach themselves.
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The Six Principles of the Montessori Prepared Environment
People often wonder what are the 6 principles of the Montessori prepared environment when setting up at home:
Freedom
In Montessori, a child is free to explore and follow his desire to learn and discover. The prepared environment offers the child to be free of movement, actions, choices, and social interactions.
Structure and order
If you know a bit about Montessori you might have heard already that order is one of the sensitive periods.
Though it might sound senseless to you, order and structure are fundamentals in the Montessori philosophy. As part of their prepared environment at home, they help the child assimilate the order and structure of the world around him.
Beauty
This means wherever your Montessori-prepared environment is set up it should follow an esthetic and harmony. For the child to use his best potential, set up a simple, uncluttered, realistic, and peaceful environment.
Nature and reality
This principle follows the previous one. Nature is a big part of the Montessori philosophy. So natural materials are preferred for the prepared environment such as wood, pastel colors, and natural light.
It’s also important to have child-size furniture to preserve realism and allow the child to be independent within his learning environment.
Social environment
While it’s very easy to implement a social environment with a multi-age classroom, it can be more challenging to do it when doing Montessori at home.
To encourage children to develop compassion and empathy, you can either have playdates at home, enjoy nature with friends, or join social activities for kids.
Intellectual environment
With the principles above you will be able to guide your child through the Montessori curriculum. This prepared environment is designed so it can foster your child’s independence, learning potential, unique personality, and creativity.
So once all the principles are met, the prepared environment is set so your child can naturally develop their intellect.
How To Set Up A Montessori Prepared Environment?
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Now that you got the theory you must be wondering: what does a Montessori classroom environment look like? How can I implement it at home? No worries, I got you.
Wherever you’re going to set up the prepared environment and whatever age your child is there are a few basics that you can check first:
- The lighting: as we said above, natural light is the best.
- Safety: it is primordial to consider safety when setting up a Montessori-prepared environment.
- Screw shelves and furniture to walls, kids are climbers!
- Check objects and toys because your child will mostly put everything in his mouth.
- Household products! Be extremely careful with those and store them far away from your children.
- Make sure balconies, windows, and doors are all safe or locked.
- Be careful with indoor (and outdoor) plants, some can be toxic.
- Plus, it’s nice and almost imperative to have washable toys.
The Montessori Prepared Environment At Home By Age
So now, how can we prepare a Montessori environment at home?
0-1-year-old
At this age babies mostly invest one space. It can be in their bedroom. in the living room, or both. What suits you the best.
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During the first years, children are mostly sensorial, so you want the Montessori-prepared environment to promote the movement and sensorial needs of the child.
A Montessori baby bedroom is often set with :
- a mat or mattress on the floor, that allows movement
- a mirror, for the child to explore and observe himself
- and a baby mobile, to develop the child’s sight, motricity, tonus, and grip strength.
This specific setup is called a Nido in the Montessori vocabulary.
As your baby grows old, you can arrange the environment. You can place objects on the mat around him to promote movement such as turning over, crawling, etc… Around 10-13 months old, you can add a shelf with objects for your child to serve himself. Later you can also think about adding a small bookshelf as well.
When it’s time for your baby to leave his cradle, it’s recommended in the Montessori philosophy to choose a low bed that will give the child complete freedom of movement. Be aware that the bedroom needs to be safe!
1-3 years old
As your child grows up he will start investing in other rooms of your home.
Bedroom: you can place little baskets with objects and toys that will promote your child’s motricity.
Entrance: you can place small shelves for shoes, scarves, etc.., a child-size stool or chair to put their shoes on, and a low hook to hang their coat.
Livingroom: it’s important to keep this room safe and accessible. It will promote your child’s independence and confidence. Once your child can walk he will mostly practice his balance and movement there.
You can arrange:
- shelves to propose activities,
- a table so your child can do creative and sensorial play,
- a small bookshelf,
- and a carpet.
You can also provide a music radio or anything to listen to music and dance.
Kitchen:
Practical Life, which is involving your child in the daily tasks, is a core educational aspect of Montessori. It can be meal prep, washing hands, washing dishes, cleaning the tables, you name it!
While you don’t have to fully rearrange your kitchen for your child, it can be good to adjust a few things so it promotes independence and allows movement while being safe.
On low shelves and drawers, you can put kitchenware for your child to freely use during meals.
One great Montessori tool is a learning tower (also called Montessori tower or observation tower}. It’s a safe stool that your child can stand on and use to help you in the kitchen, wash their hands, or even brush their teeth in the bathroom.
Make sure dangerous objects and household products are safely stored away from reach.
3-6 years old
The arrangement will be pretty much the same as previously, but as your child grow you’ll have to propose different activities that could require a different setting, such as a “classroom”.
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The five key learning areas in Montessori that must be part of your prepared environment are:
- Practical life
- Sensorial
- Language
- Mathematics
- Culture
A classroom in a Montessori environment is a child-centered classroom:
- Child-sized furniture such as desks, chairs, and shelves
- Open shelves for the child to freely choose his learning material
- Separate learning areas for each subject
Voilà!
You got everything you need to get started and set up the right Montessori-prepared environment at home. Keep in mind that it must be fun for you and your child so there’s no need to overthink it.
I would love to see how you do Montessori at home and how you set up your prepared environment.
FAQ
What Is The Relationship Between Freedom And Discipline In The Montessori Prepared Environment?
In the Montessori philosophy freedom and discipline refer to the internal ability of children (and adults) to make their own choices and control their behavior. It requires the children to learn how to self-discipline and develop their emotions.
What Are The Things Needed In A Montessori Prepared Environment?
So in the end, to set up a prepared environment Montessori at home you don’t need much. The most important are child-sized furniture and easy-reach activities. And a space that allows freedom of movement. Here is a super exhaustive prepared environment checklist that can help you set up a perfect Montessori environment at home.