The fire drill was in full operation. The sound of the alarm hammered throughout the school building.
My job was to inspect each classroom, closet, bathroom, and nook to make sure there were no children left behind.
As I entered the last classroom, there in the corner, hidden by shelves, was Jennifer, quietly building an intricate design with the Knobless Cylinders, using all four boxes of yellow, green, blue, and red cylinders.
“Jennifer,” I called.
Her focus remained on the cylinders in front of her.
I walked over and knelt beside her, placing my hand on her shoulder. “Jennifer,” I repeated.
Now she looked up and saw me.
“There is a fire alarm. We need to get out of the building.”
A look of awareness came across her face as she asked, “May I take the cylinders with me?”
That was the first time I caught a glimpse of a child’s deep, spontaneous concentration—a concept I had only read about in Dr. Montessori’s books.
Jennifer had been so absorbed in her activity with the Knobless Cylinders that she had not heard the fire alarm, seen her classmates and teachers leave the classroom, or even noticed that I had entered the room.
Dr. Montessori wrote that deep concentration was one of many signs—and perhaps the most important—of a child being on the path of healthy and natural development, or normalization.
Deep concentration requires certain conditions.
In our Montessori classrooms, we offer an environment filled with activities that children may select for themselves. Each child is allowed to work with a self-selected activity without being interrupted by a daily schedule, other children, or the adults in the classroom.
Concentration develops in two basic ways:
One way is to repeat an activity multiple times in one setting, gradually increasing the length of time spent on it.
For example, at first a child may work for only a few minutes on a puzzle. But given uninterrupted time over many days and weeks, the child may increase their concentration by returning to the same activity repeatedly until they can focus on it for an hour or more.
For adults, this might look like gradually increasing our walking time each day, going from five minutes to an hour or more.
The second way is to do multiple activities, gradually developing a longer, uninterrupted sequence of concentration.
For example, a child might select a puzzle and work on it for three minutes. Then the child returns the puzzle to the shelf and chooses another activity, perhaps spooning beans from one container to another. The child spoons the beans for five minutes, returns the activity to the shelf, and selects another activity.
Over a period of weeks, the child may go from being able to concentrate for three minutes on one activity to concentrating for an hour or more by incrementally engaging in a series of short, focused activities.
For an adult, this might look like gradually expanding a five-minute exercise routine by adding another activity: walk for five minutes, jump rope for five minutes, lift weights for five minutes, and so on, until we have developed a full-hour workout.
The key aspects of developing deep concentration include:
- Uninterrupted time protected by adults
- The child’s self-selection of an activity that requires the mind and hand to work together
- A prepared environment filled with interesting and appropriate activities
When I see children on the ubiquitous screens that fill modern life, I realize that, for many children, the conditions for developing deep concentration simply do not exist.
Dr. Montessori wrote:
“The first essential for the child’s development is concentration. It lays the whole basis for his character and social behavior. He must find out how to concentrate, and for this he needs things to concentrate upon. This shows the importance of his surroundings, for no one acting on the outside can cause him to concentrate. Only he can organize his psychic life. None of us can do it for him. Indeed, it is just here that the importance of our schools really lies. They are places in which the child can find the kind of work that permits him to do this.”
Dr. Maria Montessori, The Absorbent Mind
What can you do today to help create the time, place, and activities a child needs to develop deep, spontaneous concentration?
Join me for a Kids Talk Workshop….
