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| Freedom or Discipline? |
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| Author : Collette- Teacher, Long Bay Primary
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Freedom is a core, but often misunderstood, Montessori principle. Shannon Helfrich, an AMI trainer of trainers, defined freedom as the capacity to pause in the face of certain stimuli and make a choice, to the exclusion of all other choices.
How do our children go about making that choice? They can�t make it without prior knowledge and experience. They gain that knowledge and experience from being exposed to the environment and through their own practice with stimuli. They gradually build up a repertoire of skills, abilities and attitudes that they can apply to new situations. Of course, to make a choice, children have to be physically free to act, too. They need opportunities to move freely in dynamic learning environments.
Unfortunately, our culture seems unable to support the child�s progress towards independence. As adults, we often place obstacles across this process because we �manage� our children to suit adult lifestyles and timetables. Think about how we restrict children�s movement with cribs, bouncinettes and playpens. Remember all the times we do a task in the home ourselves, rather than slowing down to help our children do it for themselves. When we do that, we send a message that the children�s own efforts are not quite good enough � that the adult is quicker, better. When we constantly tell them to be careful (e.g. riding a new bike) could we, unintentionally, be sending the message I don�t think you are competent to try this?
Another obstacle is that many of us see children as physically weak and fragile, and needing lots of help. Helping them makes us feel good and this reinforce our desire to help more. However, by helping too much, we not only deprive children of the opportunity to practise something themselves, but we may also demean them by doing it. The risks are high. By 3, our over-help can have undermined a child�s desire to engage happily in independent activity. We need to be active participants in the child�s development towards independence and informed choice� by doing less! We also need to love and accept them so they develop a sense of trust. With trust comes the confidence and security to explore their environment and gain essential physical skills and conceptual knowledge of the world.
As children grow older, they become more aware of their new abilities and knowledge and can call them forth as needed. Their choices become more conscious, and they are increasingly aware of the responsibilities and consequences of the choices made. As parents, how can we help this awareness? One way is to impose external discipline with lots of rules but surely we don�t want to raise children to respond to orders. We want children to exert self-discipline, to make good choices and to avoid wrong ones.
What we need to do is set children a supporting structure of limits. The limits aren�t there to trample children�s freedom, they are there to direct their life force effectively. Think of a hose with a nozzle squirting a jet of water. The nozzle is a kind of limit that steadies and directs the flow. With no nozzle, the water would just splash on the ground. With a nozzle screwed tight the water would be bottled up. Limits guide children�s energy into constructive and productive paths. As they progress to more conscious levels of choice making, they find themselves prepared to accept the responsibilities of the consequences of their action. They accept the consequences because they have been free to discover them spontaneously and acknowledge them as part of the choice.
Where does this leave us? Experience is the key to independence. Independent people make their own choices and take responsibility for the consequences. With more experience, the quality of decisions and level of self-discipline improves. Self-discipline is what is important to the individual and society. The disciplined person is master of himself, not just acting according to the demands of others. And the only way that self-discipline can be gained is through the freedom to develop one's self control.
�Children always have the freedom to do what is right. They never have the freedom to do what is wrong.�
Montessori (The Montessori Method, 1912)
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