Standing outside a London classroom in the 1920's, Dr. Maria Montessori, Italy's first female medical doctor, overheard the child's plea. Struck by this so-wise saying of the small child, she adopted it as the slogan for the method she had been using since 1907 to teach children. It was, she believed, not just a child asking for help, but asking for something much deeper and more profound.
Concentration is required for learning to take place.
And the best way for children to concentrate, and thus learn, is by doing tasks with their hands. So all Montessori classroom equipment is selected and used by the teacher and children with this goal in mind. In the Montessori classroom, this goal is approached by allowing each child to experience the excitement of learning by his own choice rather than being forced, and second, by helping him to perfect all his natural tools for learning. Researchers now agree that 80 percent of a child's intelligence is developed by age 8.