The Discovery of the Child by Maria Montessori

Maria Montessori went beyond the conventions of the day to seek a new way of knowing and loving a child.

In THE DISCOVERY OF THE CHILD, she describes the nature of the child and her method of working more fully with the child's urge to learn.

Maria Montessori believes that "once the general principles have been grasped, the parts dealing with the material application are extremely simple. Gone are teachers who wear out their lungs maintaining discipline, and verbal instruction is replaced by 'material for development', which affords children the opportunity of teaching themselves by their own efforts. The teacher thus becomes a director of the children's own spontaneous work."

"A child in his earliest years, when he is only two or a little more, is capable of tremendous achievements simply through his unconscious power of absorption, though he is himself still immobile. After the age of three he is able to acquire a great number of concepts through his own efforts in exploring his surroundings. In this period he lays hold of things through his own activity and assimilates them into his mind".  With 16 pages of photographs.