Our attitudes and opinions toward other people begin to be formed in the first years of life. As your child absorbs the feelings in the home or their child care/classroom community they build their knowledge of our world's people. Well, who we choose to expose them to anyway.
I believe we have a responsibility to foster a healthy and loving introduction to the cultures of our world (especially if you are a Montessori teacher) whenever possible.
Provide your children with a variety of music, foods, songs, clothing, celebrations, dances, houses, languages, means of transportation, tools ~ in the home, in the classroom and in your community.
Offer a cloth globe ball as a first toy for an older infant or young toddler. As the children near the end of their third year provide a real globe and wall map of our world. References can then be made in a tangible, physical way for your children.
The goal is not to teach an understanding of the scope of space and distance, no not yet. Now is an age of celebrating the wonder of it all, the colors and shapes and in attaching names to them. Creating a familiarity. Later your children will build on these early impressions to make sense of the history and cultures of the world.
*Source: Michael Olaf's Birth to Three 2007-2008
There is a wonderful collection of books that I feel should be in every Montessori classroom (if possible) they are the International Family Life Books by Gwenyth Swain. You can find them in the Michael Olaf's catalog.
Another great collection of books for the very young areHelen Oxenbury's First Cultural Board Books.
Enjoy ~ Celebrate Common threads and Create an Awareness
In PEACE
Montessori Mama
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