Montessori Education for Peace and the Roots of Sustainability
Breakout Presentation, World Congress 2013
Montessori Education for Peace and The Roots of Sustainability
INTRODUCTION:
What has to be defended is the construction of human normality.
(Maria Montessori, The Absorbent Mind, Pg. 16)
“Sustain” comes from the Latin sustinere, meaning “to keep or to hold up”.
The Oxford English Dictionary dates the first usage of the word
“sustainable” with the meaning “capable of being maintained at a
certain level”, to 1965. The concept of sustainability has taken root in
modern consciousness with the growing awareness of the impact of
human actions on, and its short and long-term consequences for human
societies and the natural environment. At the core of sustainability thinking
today is the idea that human beings must function within the context of
the interdependent whole that is our natural environment. Dr. Montessori
anticipates such thinking by decades. Education for Peace that is the
core of her work, presents a vision of peace as an active state where
human beings are an integral part of a harmonious, cosmic whole, where
every organism is fulfilling its role according to its true nature, within the
framework of universal laws. Sustainability concepts of equity, justice and
stewardship are integral to this vision.
Education for Peace takes sustainability thinking to a whole new level with
two fundamental ideas:

Dr. Montessori reframes the perspective of human activity by
placing it in the evolutionary context. In this view, human activity is
not seen as separate from the natural processes of the evolution of
the earth and the species, but as an integral part of it. Without an
Uma Ramani
1
Montessori Education for Peace and the Roots of Sustainability
Breakout Presentation, World Congress 2013
awareness of this context, she says, human beings are jeopardizing
their own future and that of the whole planet.

On a more fundamental level, Dr. Montessori says, the imbalance in
nature and society is rooted in the nature of Man the Adult – a
nature that has not fully realized the human potential, a nature that
is the outcome of the obstacles to natural development during the
formative years. Dr. Montessori brings to our consciousness the
immense powers of the child and the vital importance of his task of
creating the adult. Every child completes this creative-constructive
task through interactions in the adult-made environment into which
he is born. Only when we consciously create conditions that will
ensure the child freedom to develop according to natural laws can
we realize the true nature of Man. At the root of education for
peace is the normal development of every individual.
These two ideas are fundamental to understanding Montessori education
and the roots of sustainability. It is for the child to construct human
normality and for the adult to defend this construction. It is only then that
Man the Adult can take his natural place in the evolutionary saga with
equity, justice and stewardship as the hallmark of his work. Collaboration
between the adult and the child is the foundation of sustainability, which
is the foundation of peace.
OUR WORLD:
Supranature and Nature
“This world is something more than nature, for to build it man
uses everything that exists in nature. Man creates a
(supra)nature. And man’s (supra)nature is different from
ordinary nature.” (Maria Montessori, Education and Peace,
Pg. 97)
Uma Ramani
2
Montessori Education for Peace and the Roots of Sustainability
Breakout Presentation, World Congress 2013
We live in a man-made world. The world that the 7 billion people on earth
today call home is the built environment created by human beings. One
cannot but be in awe of the human ingenuity that has created this world.
One cannot but marvel at the imagination and the work of generations of
human kind that has made it possible for us to overcome challenges, live
in comfort, communicate with ease, and meet our human needs in ever
more efficient ways. Dr. Montessori uses the term “supranature” to refer to
this man-made world.
We tend to think of this supranature as separate from nature, but Dr.
Montessori sees human built environments as being as much a part of
nature as the environments created by other living beings. What we call
Nature today is the creation of Life. Life came on earth and transformed
the barren ball of rock, water and gases into the beautiful “Blue Marble”
that we know today. It is life that created the conditions in land and water
so that other forms of life could evolve and thrive. Through eons, life has
created the composition of the earth as we know it and it is life that
maintains this beautiful planet in perfect equilibrium to sustain life. Dr.
Montessori gives us the metaphor of the “Telluric Economy” (from the
Latin, tellus, the earth), where all of life is working for the common goal of
the creation of the earth. Every living creature has taken from the
environment and through its work, changed that environment: in living its
own life according to its nature, every creature has been a part of this
greater work. In Dr. Montessori’s words, every creature has a cosmic task
to fulfill.
Human beings too are part of this evolving story of the creation of the
earth. Man too, takes from the environment, nature as it is, and builds on
Uma Ramani
3
Montessori Education for Peace and the Roots of Sustainability
Breakout Presentation, World Congress 2013
it. Thus, civilization too is a part of nature and so Montessori calls it
“supranature”.
Instead of the vague term civilization, we call it Supra Nature,
the creation which is above Nature. Thus, man put a new
rung in the ladder of creation… Supra Nature grows by
feeding on Nature, making use of everything, all the things on
the land, even all the energies in the atmosphere. Thus a
civilized environment is another form of nature.” (Maria
Montessori, Creative Development in the Child, Volume 2, Pg.
290-1)
Dr. Montessori thus brings a cosmic context to human activity. She sees
human activity not as Man living off Nature, but as Man working to
enhance Nature. Through his work Man has consciously, deliberately,
created new forms of life in flowers and fruits, grains and vegetables,
animals and plants. Through his activity, Man has not only been an agent
for the evolution of new forms of life, he has created this whole new
environment within which he functions, an environment that is not natural
but is of nature. Through his work, Man has brought a whole new
dimension to the telluric economy: but without an awareness of the
cosmic context of this work, Man has created great disharmony in the
interdependent ecosystem of nature. This imbalance threatens not only
the natural environment that has evolved through the eons, but the very
survival of human beings as a species.
The Forgotten Citizen
Human history is the chronicle of the work of Man the Adult; the issues of
sustainability that we face today are the consequence of the actions of
Man the Adult. Sustainability action today focuses on changing the
paradigm within which Man the Adult functions. But Man the Adult is the
creation of the work of Man the Child. In all of our equations, we do not
take into account the child’s contribution to society, to the telluric
Uma Ramani
4
Montessori Education for Peace and the Roots of Sustainability
Breakout Presentation, World Congress 2013
economy, to the cosmic task. The child is truly, “the forgotten citizen”. In
creating the supranature within which he lives, Man the Adult does not
take into account the needs of Man the Child – in our supranature, there
is little or no place for the child. This is our world today.
THE ROOTS OF SUSTAINABILITY:
Education for Peace addresses issues of sustainability on two levels:
I) It gives a cosmic context to human activity and
II) It focuses on raising the level of human development.
In this work, Dr. Montessori taps the immense potential of the child to bring
about fundamental change in human society.
I) The Cosmic Context
If life is considered in itself, as separate from the cosmic task, it
appears different from when it is considered as part of the
universe, as part of the whole. (Maria Montessori, Creative
Development in the Child, Volume 2, Pg. 195)
The idea that humans function within an interdependent ecosystem and
that human actions impact the balance and resilience of that ecosystem
was integral to most native cultures. But this idea is only now finding a
place in Western thinking. Sustainability thinking has evolved over the last
six decades:
-
From an Anthropocentric perspective that was focused on the
need for sustaining human activity;
-
And an Ethnocentric world view focused on preserving the life styles
of particular groups of people
-
To an Eco-centric perspective where human beings are seen as
part of a larger interdependent ecosystem of living organisms and
non-living entities.
Uma Ramani
5
Montessori Education for Peace and the Roots of Sustainability
Breakout Presentation, World Congress 2013
With this changing perspective, sustainability time frames have grown
from intra-generational to inter-generational; action for sustainability has
grown from pollution control and conservation to stewardship of the
ecosystem; and sustainability concepts have grown to include ideas of
equity and justice in human communities as well as in the larger context of
the ecosystem.
Education for Peace gives us a cosmos-centric perspective and moves
our thinking into geological time frames. To understand sustainability from
this perspective, we have to begin with the telluric economy – the
harmony of the work of all of life on earth for the purposes of the upkeep
and maintenance and further evolution of the environment. As we look
at this telluric economy through the ages, we see that every creature has
altered the earth through their activity – it is the balance between these
activities that maintains the telluric equilibrium. Every time this equilibrium
is disturbed by the activity of one organism, it is restored by the activity of
another. Telluric equilibrium is not static – through this activity, the earth
itself continues to evolve. Sustainability in this view is not about the
sustainability of one form of life or the activities of one species, but the
sustainability of the earth.
“… the survival of a species corresponds … to the
continuation of their utility for the upkeep of the Telluric
equilibrium. (Maria Montessori, Creative Development in the
Child, Volume 2, Pg. 183)
This view is affirmed by what we understand about ecosystems today and
the maintenance of the telluric balance is what the eco-centric model of
sustainability is all about. Bringing about equilibrium between human
action and the environment is the focus of sustainability work and
sustainability practices today. With the addition of the idea of the cosmic
task, Education for Peace takes sustainability thinking and practice to a
Uma Ramani
6
Montessori Education for Peace and the Roots of Sustainability
Breakout Presentation, World Congress 2013
whole new level. This awareness of the cosmic task gives purpose and
meaning to Man’s endeavors and adds a spiritual dimension to the
systems thinking that is fundamental to sustainable practices.
Dr. Montessori gives us the tool of Cosmic Education, to bring to the
consciousness of the developing child the awareness that human beings
are part of an interdependent whole and have a contribution to make to
the telluric economy. For Dr. Montessori, however, this is not the
foundation of Education for Peace.
II) Human Development
As (supranature) is being constructed, the evolution of
humanity is also taking place, representing not only further
evolution of nature, but also a development of human
personality. (Maria Montessori, Education and Peace, Pg. 97)
Dr. Montessori looks at human development from three different
perspectives:
1) The work of the child in creating a unified human personality;
2) The development of the human personality in the context of the
cosmic whole; and
3) The evolution of mankind to a higher level.
1) The Work of the Child: It is the task of every child at birth to realize his
human potential through his own efforts in the environment. Human
beings are born with the potential for “a Mind that thinks, a Hand that
works and a Heart that loves”. It is the work of every child at birth to
actualize this potential, to realize human nature as a functional unity.
Montessori speaks of the valorization of mankind – when Man becomes a
functional unity, when his intellectual, physical and spiritual dimensions are
in harmony. In creating the supranature in which we live and function, we
Uma Ramani
7
Montessori Education for Peace and the Roots of Sustainability
Breakout Presentation, World Congress 2013
have evolved the potential of the mind and the hand to whole new levels
and we have neglected the education of the heart that animates this
work. It is in supporting the child in his work of creating the adult as a
functional unity that we can correct the fundamental abnormality in our
nature. So the reconstruction of human society must begin with
supporting the work of the young child. There are natural laws and innate
powers that guide the child in this work, but it is essential that every child
find the right conditions to complete this task in freedom. Just as
supranature is founded in nature, the development of the human
personality too can only be rooted in nature. To enable this we must
construct a supranature for the child that is based on the understanding
of this process. In this work of creating an environment for his young, Man,
unlike other animals is not guided by instincts. For Man, this must be a
conscious process, undertaken with love. Man the adult then becomes
the collaborator of this natural process and enables the construction of
human normality.
2) The Development of the Human Personality in the context of the
Cosmic whole: Dr. Montessori gives us a deeper understanding of human
development in the context of the cosmic task. Unlike other forms of life,
she says, Man is not born to a particular task in this telluric economy - his
task is not limited, nor is it specifically defined. Every human being must
determine their own individual contribution, their cosmic task. Individual
activity in the context of an evolving whole that grows from the family to
society to the cosmic whole, is essential to human development and is a
preparation for the cosmic task of the individual as an adult.
3) The Evolution of Mankind: Education for Peace takes sustainability
concepts to a whole new level when Dr. Montessori brings the
Uma Ramani
8
Montessori Education for Peace and the Roots of Sustainability
Breakout Presentation, World Congress 2013
evolutionary perspective to the evolution of Man himself. The long-range
vision of the telluric economy shows us that just as life is instrumental in the
evolution of the earth, this changing environment in turn supports the
evolution of life. Till the appearance of Man, these changes happened
slowly, unconsciously. With the coming of Man however, a new element
entered the story – Consciousness. As human beings build supranature,
this supranature is in turn influencing the development of man, his
evolution as an individual and as a species. This understanding of the
relationship between life and the environment gives us a new
understanding of the work of human beings. With his gift of
consciousness, Man can determine the direction of his own evolution, in
partnership with the child who has the creative-constructive powers to
realize the human potential.
What we can and must do is undertake the construction of
an environment that will provide the proper conditions for
(the child’s) normal development…. The child’s psychic
energy, once awakened, will develop according to its own
laws and have an effect on us as well. The mere contact with
a human being developing in this way can renew our own
energies. The child developing harmoniously and the adult
improving himself at his side make a very exciting and
attractive picture. (Maria Montessori, Education and Peace,
Pg. 58-59)
Man, who lives in supranature and must realize his true nature through his
interaction with this man-made environment is in the unique position of
determining his own evolution. This evolution can only happen within the
framework of the universal laws. With an understanding of his true nature
and the cosmic context of his actions, he can create a supranature,
where every child can develop the human potential ever more fully. The
environment, Dr. Montessori says, can then become the tool for Man’s
conscious evolution. This is the true root of sustainability.
Uma Ramani
9
Montessori Education for Peace and the Roots of Sustainability
Breakout Presentation, World Congress 2013
REMOVING UNFREEDOMS:
(The child) has shown us the basis of the entire development
of the personality of man, that superior individual whose
potential seems almost unlimited and whose personality
decidedly does not have a fixed limit set to its development.
… Individual freedom is the basis of all the rest. Without such
freedom it is impossible for personality to develop fully.
Freedom is the key to the entire process. (Education and
Peace Pg. 101)
Dr. Montessori sees freedom for development as essential from birth: the
freedom that every child needs to complete his task of the formation of
man. Freedom during the stage of the fundamental human development
of man is the basis of all freedom. The deep-rooted prejudices in the
adults, who fail to recognize the true nature and potential of the child are
obstacles that hamper the freedom of the child to create the individual.
We do not recognize the child’s potential, the nature of his creativeconstructive process, his essential contribution to mankind and to the
cosmic whole: Man the Child as the builder and the creator of Man the
Adult. It is only upon the completion of the task of Man the Child that we
as adults can take on our cosmic task. On the quality of the child’s work
depends our capacity to fulfill our task. But we do not acknowledge the
importance of the child’s work, nor do we make it possible for him to
complete this task in freedom. These prejudices then are the obstacles
that hamper the normal development of Man.
In his work, Nobel Prize winning economist Dr. Amartya Sen explores this
relationship between freedom and development. Freedom, he says is
both the principal end and the means of development. While
development is the process of expanding freedoms, such development is
only possible when there is a basic level of social, economic, individual
and political freedom. Focusing on economic development, he stressed
Uma Ramani
10
Montessori Education for Peace and the Roots of Sustainability
Breakout Presentation, World Congress 2013
the importance of removing what he calls “unfreedoms” such as poverty
and lack of civil rights, as key to sustainable development. Such
development is the consequence of the freedom of every individual to
realize individual capabilities and contribute to the development of the
whole and in turn leads to expanding freedom not only for the individual
but also for society. Development, he says, is a momentous engagement
with freedoms possibilities.
The supranature that Man the Adult creates for Man the Child determines
the nature of the future adult. What is the supranature that we must build
to support the task of the fundamental development of Man and to
support the realization of the human potential, to support the evolution of
man? The first step in this process is to become aware of the true nature
of the child, the importance of his work and then only can we create the
conditions necessary for this work. The spiritual preparation of the adult is
the first step in removing unfreedoms for the child.
PREPARED ENVIRONMENTS AS ECOSYSTEMS:
This is the mission of education. Let us therefore unite our
efforts to construct an environment that will allow the child
and the adolescent to live an independent, individual life in
order to fulfill the goal that all of us are pursuing – the
development of personality, the formation of a (supra)natural
order, and the creation of a better society. The human soul
must shape itself within a (supra)natural milieu. (Maria
Montessori, Education and Peace, Pg. 106)
An ecosystem is a complex of living and non-living factors. Within this
ecosystem, each element functions in freedom within the limits of the
environment, according to natural, universal laws. Our Prepared
Environments are also a complex of living and non-living factors; but they
include a third factor that permeates the whole – the spiritual dimension
Uma Ramani
11
Montessori Education for Peace and the Roots of Sustainability
Breakout Presentation, World Congress 2013
that creates the environment of freedom and love, that is essential for the
formation of Man. It is only the spiritual preparation of the adult that can
remove the unfreedoms, the obstacles to development that is created by
the deep-seated prejudices that we carry within ourselves. It is up to the
adult to “defend the construction of human normality”.
In preparing this environment, at the material level, not only must we have
an understanding of our true nature and the potential of the child, we
must also understand humans in the cosmic context. With this
understanding, we can prepare environments where the child will have
motives for activity for the formation of self and the social context for
action that is within the sphere of his abilities. This prepared environment
must evolve with the developing child, giving a context of a whole that is
within the developing capacities of the child. From the family to the
community, to the society and to the global and cosmic whole, the
context for development and action evolves through the planes of
development. Such an individual is then prepared to take on the cosmic
task of the adult as the builder of supranature and an agent of his own
evolution.
In removing the obstacles to the development of the child, we are also
freeing ourselves and moving to a whole new level of development. And
so Dr. Montessori brings us to the idea of raising all of mankind to a higher
level of development. Freedom is the essence of a viable prepared
environment for the formation of man.
THE TASK BEFORE US:
The goal we have therefore set ourselves is to help the adult
world know, love, and serve the child better, thereby helping
Uma Ramani
12
Montessori Education for Peace and the Roots of Sustainability
Breakout Presentation, World Congress 2013
all mankind reach a higher stage of development. (Maria
Montessori, Education and Peace, Pg. 37)
This is the task that we must undertake – to overcome our prejudices with
regard to the child and to prepare an environment where the child can
fulfill his cosmic task in freedom. Every child has the right to such a
prepared environment – but this preparation of the environment must
begin with changing adult perspectives. This is the goal that Dr.
Montessori sets for us. What is needed is not an educational reform but a
social reform.
This reform is an enormous task that must begin with each individual adult.
The essence of our work is communication, to initiate what Montessori
calls a peaceful revolution. This revolution can have as its starting point
the schools that we lovingly create – schools that can help us
communicate this message to families and communities. Or we can begin
by reaching out to the adult community, raising their consciousness with
regard to the child. Schools that provide a prepared environment for the
child will then be an outcome of such outreach.
We must work in both these ways to fulfill this mission. This requires great
resilience in our thinking: to retain the core of our legacy, which is to
create prepared environments where the child can be free. What is the
essence of such prepared environments? Are they to be defined by the
Montessori materials or is it the spiritual environment that we create that is
more vital to our work? In 2015, it is estimated that there will be nearly 400
million children below 14 years of age in India alone (2011 Census,
Government of India). Much work has been done to remove the
unfreedoms of poverty, ill health and malnutrition, but there is urgent need
to address the intellectual and more fundamentally, the psychoUma Ramani
13
Montessori Education for Peace and the Roots of Sustainability
Breakout Presentation, World Congress 2013
emotional health of the child. What will Montessori prepared
environments look like in this context? Realistically, the limited resources
preclude the possibility that every community will have access to Pink
Towers and Golden Beads. In these circumstances, can the focus be
creating the spiritual prepared environments? In the United States where
there is a growing movement bringing Montessori to the public sector, we
are reaching more families through these prepared environments. But the
setting up of these schools is only the first step in creating the prepared
environment for the child. Through these schools we must work to prepare
the larger social environment. It is the schools then that become the focus
of this peaceful revolution.
In the Formation of Man, Dr. Montessori gives us a direction for our work:
What is the Montessori Method? “Means offered to deliver the
human personality from the oppression of age-old
prejudices...” The defense of the child, the scientific
recognition of his nature, the social proclamation of his rights
must replace the piecemeal ways of conceiving education.
(Maria Montessori, The Formation of Man, Page 11-12)
This is the essence of our task: scientific study to understand the nature of
the child, and then using this knowledge to build environments that will
support the realization of the human potential. Our work is to facilitate
development in freedom; to create an environment that provides motives
for activity for the development of the individual and a social context for
action. This is not about educational reform – it is about social reform. This
is Montessori education for sustainability.
OUR LEGACY:
This is the hope we have – a hope in a new humanity that will
come from this new education, an education that is a
collaboration of man and the universe, that is a help for
Uma Ramani
14
Montessori Education for Peace and the Roots of Sustainability
Breakout Presentation, World Congress 2013
evolution, for the incarnation of man. (Maria Montessori,
Reconstruction in Education, Pg. 14)
We must look at the issue of sustainability in the context of our work as
Montessorians. Resilience is what defines strong ecosystems that can
accommodate change without losing their equilibrium. The century old
movement that is Montessori education is functioning in a changing
environment. In our work too, change is inevitable: how resilient are we?
Can we accommodate this change without compromising the essence
of the work?
We must each of us find answers to these questions in the context of our
unique situations. What awaits us is this vision of the adult and the child
working side-by-side evolving together to a higher level. It is for us to
define our individual paths, with an understanding of the core of our work:
to carry out Dr. Montessori’s legacy, to continue exploring the nature of
the child, to create environments for them, to become collaborators for
the evolution of man. Here lie the roots of sustainability; this is Montessori
Education for Peace.
Whoever works for this ideal must be actuated by a great
ideal, much greater than those political ideals, which have
promoted social improvements. This ideal is universal in its
scope. It aims at the deliverance of the whole of humanity.
Much patient work, I repeat, is needed along this road
towards the freedom and “valorization” of mankind. (Maria
Montessori, The Formation of Man, Pg. 22)
This is our legacy to have and to hold, to honor or to fritter away – the
choice is for each of us to make. What will our legacy be to future
generations of Montessorians? What will our legacy be to the children of
the world?
Uma Ramani
15
Montessori Education for Peace and the Roots of Sustainability
Breakout Presentation, World Congress 2013
References:
Montessori, Maria
Creative Development in the Child, Volume 2,
Kalakshetra Publications, Chennai, 1994
Montessori, Maria
Education and Peace, Clio Press, Oxford, 1992
Montessori, Maria
Reconstruction in Education, First published in The
Theosophist 1942, reprinted by AMI
Montessori, Maria
The Absorbent Mind, Kalakshetra Publications,
Chennai, 2006
Montessori, Maria
The Formation of Man, Kalakshetra Publications,
Chennai, 2005
Sen, Amartya
Development as Freedom, Anchor Books, New
York, 2000
Uma Ramani
16