Observing those children with excellent academic performance, they basically have strong logical thinking ability.
So, how to cultivate children's logical thinking ability from an early age? How is Montessori education done?
Logical thinking ability is the ability to observe, compare, analyze, judge and reason things. Through the judgment and thinking of the human brain, we can express our thoughts accurately and methodically.
Hegel famously said in Logic that "logic is the basis of all thinking".
Logic is the foundation of all thinking and creation, and it is also the key to many scientific experiments and innovations. Now many parents attach great importance to the cultivation of children's logical thinking ability.
It can be said that logical thinking ability directly determines children's observation and analysis ability, reasoning and judgment ability, and understanding and generalization ability.
Logical thinking ability is not innate, talent only accounts for a small factor, and what is more important is the cultivation and learning of the day after tomorrow.
So, how does Montessori education cultivate children's logical thinking ability?
In Montessori teaching, children's logical thinking ability is mainly developed in three aspects.
Senses are the foundation of all education.
We know that children know the surrounding environment through the five senses of sight, hearing, taste, touch and smell, and develop into their own minds by absorbing their minds, fully accepting them and internalizing them into their own cognition.
It can be said that sensory education is the basis of all education and the most important. As Dr. Montessori said, you forget after listening, remember after reading, and understand after doing it.
Children know the world through sensory exploration. Sensory education is the "soul" and the core of Montessori education.
Piaget, a famous psychologist, mentioned in his cognitive development theory that children aged 3-6 are in the stage of thinking in concrete images, and they mainly use intuitive images and representations to understand and solve problems.
Therefore, the cultivation of children's logical thinking ability in preschool stage should start with the senses. Dr Montessori also believes that children are explorers of the senses, and the peak of this exploration activity is 0.6 years old.
In Montessori teaching, cultivating children's logical thinking mainly includes the following aspects:
1, learning classification
The process of children's learning is to enter the brain for analysis through the stimulation and application of sensory organs, and then make a decision after thinking.
As Dr. Montessori said: "The progress of children does not depend on their age, but on being able to observe everything around them freely."
Montessori sensory field has prepared a wealth of hands-on teaching AIDS for children. Children can train their senses through pure sensory stimulation and help them build various abilities through the operation of teaching AIDS.
For example, learning the ability of classification is to classify objects with the same attributes, such as size, color, shape and so on.
For example, binomial and trinomial in the sensory area, children first classify the teaching AIDS by color, and then put them back in the box in a certain order.
For example, trinomial teaching AIDS are teaching AIDS that can be used in Montessori's sensory field and mathematics field. After children learn simple classification, they can also learn mathematical formulas indirectly.
(a+b+c)？ =? This mathematical formula may not be understood by children now, but through the practice of teaching AIDS, it has left a mark on children's minds and laid a certain logical thinking ability. When the teacher teaches this formula, the child will be suddenly enlightened.
2. Learning order
Montessori sensory teaching AIDS contain many attributes, such as shape, weight, size, color, thickness and so on. When designing teaching AIDS, Dr. Montessori did not integrate all the changes in nature, but only changed its single nature according to the purpose of teaching AIDS.
Therefore, every Montessori teaching aid highlights a "feeling point" to attract children's attention, that is, to stimulate children's senses by separating feelings.
Such as socket cylinder, pink tower, brown ladder, red stick, color cylinder, color plate, geometric panel cabinet, triangle and so on. Each group of teaching AIDS has a systematic sequence, and children can develop a good sequence by operating these teaching AIDS.
These orders can be from large to small, from coarse to fine, from heavy to light, from coarse to fine and so on. This is an important basic exercise to train children's logical thinking ability.
The operation exercises of pairing, classification and sequencing are three particularly important purposes of Montessori's sensory teaching. The practice of these Montessori teaching AIDS can exercise children's logical thinking ability.
Seize the child's curiosity
Children are full of curiosity and desire to explore the living environment. They want to know everything and try everything.
At this time, grasping children's curiosity and consciously guiding them can not only satisfy children's curiosity, but also inspire them to explore the essence of things from phenomena.
Children classify things through their perception of things and their own cognitive ability, and cultivate their logical thinking ability to some extent.
In Montessori classroom, scientific experiment is one of children's favorite activities.
Scientific and cultural education involves the teaching of animals, plants, astronomy, geography, history and time. All kinds of novel and interesting scientific experiments can always attract the interest of every child.
For example, the process of seed germination in scientific experiments, how a seed grows into a seedling, and what conditions are needed for growth?
Children are very interested in this. Mr. Montessori will come to know the seeds with the children, understand the whole process of seed germination and witness the birth of new life together!
Children understand the occurrence and evolution of life through observation, experiment and thinking. A series of experiments will dispel their curiosity about "why", and then stimulate them to think and solve problems step by step and systematically.
Children's logical thinking ability has been consolidated and strengthened in small experiments.
Listen patiently and encourage children to express themselves.
Thinking is usually expressed in language, and language expression has a very important influence on the progress of thinking.
Moreover, language should be used when educating children, so we should also pay attention to encouraging children's language expression when cultivating their logical thinking ability.
For preschool children, each child's language development stage is different, and some children's language development may be slightly slower than others.
For example, when children describe something, it may seem very difficult, and some parents think that they "know their children" and help them before they can fully express it in words. In fact, this is not conducive to the development of children's thinking and language skills.
Montessori education emphasizes that adults should be patient listeners of children, and Montessori teachers also emphasize the simplicity, clarity and accuracy of language when giving guidance to children.
In teaching, Montessori often uses affirmative sentences to guide children positively, not telling them what they can't do, but letting them know what they can do.
Gentle and firm, not only suitable for Montessori teachers, but also for parents, so parents should pay more attention to their children's words and deeds on weekdays, enrich their vocabulary, and encourage their children to express their ideas in complete language.