Assignment Two

The aim of this essay is to explain how the role of the teacher changes in process of the child’s growing ‘normalisation’. In establishment of the aim, one will first define the term normalisation in linkage with the concept of deviation, followed by an outline of environmental aspects, which support normalisation. Thirdly one will describe the initial approach to new children and how the teacher’s role changes as the child starts to concentrate and focus on activities. At last, one will explain the impact of this change in the teacher’s role on the child’s growing normalisation and why the child might regress.

The term ‘normalisation’ is first mentioned by Montessori in ‘The Absorbent Mind’. She describes ‘normalisation’ as a transition process from one stage to another (Montessori, 1949). The process of normalisation is closely linked to Montessori’s concept of deviation, whereby deviations disappear and normalisation occurs. She believed that a child is born ‘good’ and over the first three years- the period when the child is in the adult environment, where the child is not given enough independence and toys of the wrong type - the child develops ‘defects’ in character called deviations. Montessori states in The Secrete of Childhood, Chapter 21:’…Thus at the origin of life, in the small baby, errors are constantly being made, deforming the natural psychological type of man, and leading to an infinity of deviations…’. These deviations cause the child to turn away from normal and positive behaviour towards defects in character to compensate for the lack of fulfilment in their ‘sensitive period’ in a certain area (Montessori, 1936). Montessori identified two classifications of deviations linked to the character of the child (Montessori, 1949). When a child has a strong character, the deviations are described by adults as ‘difficult children’;