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Learn the four practices Maria Montessori believed adults should avoid to nurture children’s independence, confidence, and self-discipline.

When children struggle, Montessori asks: what's in the way? Explore how the prepared environment helps children find their way back to themselves.

When most people think about what children need to thrive, they first think of the basics: food, sleep, safety, and love. Abraham Maslow described how fundamental needs (such as food, shelter, and sleep) must be met to satisfy higher spiritual needs, such as belonging, self-esteem, and self-actualization. What is perhaps less well known is that Montessori education builds on a very similar understanding of human nature and that we carefully design the prepared environment to meet not just children’s academic needs, but their deepest human ones. Dr. Maria Montessori wrote generally about human tendencies, and her son, Mario Montessori, reviewed her work to identify specific innate drives and needs shared by all of us, regardless of culture or era. These tendencies don’t change. They are part of what it means to be human. And when we give children an environment that honors and nourishes them, something remarkable happens: they begin to construct themselves from the inside out. As Christians, we also believe that children are created intentionally by God, with purpose, dignity, and unique gifts. Psalm 139 reminds us that each person is “fearfully and wonderfully made.” Children are not empty vessels waiting to be filled. They are whole human beings created in the image of God, already carrying within them the potential for growth, discovery, creativity, relationship, and wonder. The Need to Explore Every child is born with a drive to move, to discover, and to make sense of the world. This drive is a fundamental human instinct. As Dr. Montessori observed, the urge to explore isn’t simply about getting somewhere better. It is a primitive, vital impulse to engage with life. But exploration requires a foundation of security. When children’s environment is chaotic or unpredictable, they must constantly spend their energy simply reorienting themselves. Constant reorientation means they are expending energy on figuring out what’s where and what comes next, rather than on curious, joyful discovery. This is why we design Montessori classrooms with such deep intentionality. Materials are always in their place. The order is consistent and reliable. Within this predictable structure, children feel safe enough to truly explore, and through that exploration, they begin to develop an internal order that mirrors the order around them. Scripture reminds us that “God is not a God of disorder but of peace” (1 Corinthians 14:33). Children flourish in environments marked by peace, consistency, beauty, and purpose. In many ways, the prepared Montessori environment reflects these truths. It provides children with the freedom to explore within clear and thoughtful boundaries, helping them grow in confidence, independence, and responsibility. We also believe that creation itself invites exploration. Whether children are observing insects outdoors, arranging flowers, tracing land and water forms, or caring for plants and animals, they are engaging with a world created by God with beauty and intentionality. The Need to Work Humans learn by doing. Think of the words of Confucius: I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand. Throughout history, purposeful human work has created civilizations, driven innovation, and provided individuals with a profound sense of meaning and self-worth. Children have this need for meaningful activity within them. They want to work in real ways! Woven into this human tendency for work is a cluster of connected needs: the need for activity, for manipulation, for repetition, for exactness, and for self-perfection. Montessori materials are designed to honor all of these. They are hands-on, precise, and designed to be worked with again and again. Each time a child repeats an activity, such as pouring water carefully, sorting objects, tracing the shapes of letters, they are integrating mind and body, learning from their mistakes, and moving toward a more perfected version of themselves. They absorb complex concepts through experience, repeated freely and with deep engagement. In a Montessori classroom, children are given opportunities to contribute meaningfully to their environment. They wash tables, prepare snack, sweep floors, care for classroom materials, help younger children, and take responsibility for their community. These activities are not busy work. They help children develop concentration, coordination, confidence, and independence. The Bible also speaks to the goodness and dignity of purposeful work. Colossians 3:23 tells us, “Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord.” Even young children long to know that what they do matters. When children are trusted with meaningful responsibilities, they begin to see themselves as capable contributors rather than passive participants. The Mathematical Mind Humans have an innate drive to measure, classify, organize, and make sense of the world in precise ways. Dr. Montessori was inspired by the philosopher Pascal, who wrote that the human mind is mathematical by nature. Knowledge and progress come from accurate observation. Dr. Montessori called this the mathematical mind. And she saw it not as an academic aptitude but as a fundamental human characteristic. The Montessori sensorial materials are designed with this tendency in mind. Think of the pink tower, color tablets, or geometric solids. When children work with these materials, they are training their powers of observation and building the precise mental framework from which abstract thinking and imagination will eventually grow. As Dr. Montessori wrote, if the true basis of imagination is reality, then helping children perceive the world with accuracy is one of the greatest gifts we can give them. Christians have long viewed the order and beauty of the universe as evidence of a thoughtful Creator. From patterns in nature to mathematical relationships, the world reflects consistency, design, and structure. As children engage with Montessori materials, they are not only developing academic understanding. They are learning to observe carefully, think logically, and appreciate the beauty and order woven throughout creation. The Need to Belong As children engage deeply with meaningful work in the Montessori environment, something shifts. They become more focused. More settled. More themselves. And from this state of inner calm, children begin to experience a natural orientation toward others. This is deeply human. The drive to communicate, to belong, to understand ourselves in relation to a community, has shaped human civilization from its earliest days. Montessori classrooms are like small, practice societies: mixed-age communities where children learn to work alongside one another, contribute, notice others’ needs, and think not only about their own success but also about the well-being of the group. As Dr. Montessori stated, “social integration has occurred when the individual identifies himself with the group to which he belongs.” Individual interests and communal ones begin to align. We don’t teach this awareness of community through rules or enforce it through compliance. It develops organically when we give children ideal conditions to grow into it. Scripture teaches us that we were created for relationship — both with God and with one another. In Galatians 6:2, we are reminded to “carry each other’s burdens,” and in Philippians 2:4 we are encouraged to look not only to our own interests but also to the interests of others. In the Montessori classroom, children practice these principles daily in tangible ways: waiting patiently, helping a younger friend, speaking kindly, resolving conflict peacefully, and learning to function as part of a caring community. The Spiritual Dimension And then there is something deeper still. Something that is harder to name, but unmistakable when you see it. Humans have always sought meaning beyond themselves. Through art, music, ritual, and community, we reach toward something greater, toward beauty, transcendence, and a sense of connection with life itself. This spiritual dimension of human experience is not reserved for adults. Children feel it too. Dr. Montessori used music to describe this tendency. Music is exact and beautiful, and when it truly reaches a person, it moves them, literally and figuratively. Something is set in motion, deep inside. Dr. Montessori then drew a direct parallel to what happens when children encounter an activity that genuinely engages them. When children feel and understand something that arouses their interest, they begin to move. Their movements connect to the work. Gradually, a unity develops in their personality. They repeat the activity with deep concentration. And when they finish, they seem different: happier, more satisfied, calmer, more at rest. Something elevates within them. This transformation is at the heart of what Montessori education is reaching toward. The classroom is not simply a place where children learn to read and count. It is a place where children are recognized as spiritual beings, where their souls, not just their minds, flourish through movement, engagement, beauty, and understanding. As a Christian Montessori school, we believe children are created not only with intellectual and physical needs, but spiritual ones as well. Jesus welcomed children with tenderness and value, saying, “Let the little children come to me” (Matthew 19:14). We believe children possess a natural sense of wonder, awe, and connection to God’s creation. Quiet moments of concentration, gratitude, beauty, nature, music, prayer, and peaceful community all help nurture that spiritual life. What This Means for Families Mario Montessori wrote that every child is born with human tendencies as potentialities, and that children make use of them to build themselves into a person suited to their time. What the Montessori environment does is provide the conditions in which those tendencies can be met, honored, and developed to their fullest expression. When we nourish children’s needs for exploration, work, mathematical thinking, belonging, and spiritual engagement, they become capable learners and, perhaps even more importantly, whole people who are curious, grounded, socially aware, and at peace with themselves and the world. At Peaceful Pathways Montessori, we believe education is about more than academics alone. It is about helping children grow into thoughtful, capable, compassionate individuals who understand both their responsibility to others and their value as children of God. And that, as Dr. Montessori always believed, is the foundation for individual flourishing and of a more peaceful society for all of us.

Discover how Montessori nurtures intrinsic motivation by replacing rewards and punishment with curiosity, confidence, and self-discipline.

Montessori geography materials help children explore the world through hands-on learning, imagination, and real-world discovery.

In Part One of this series, we explored Dr. Montessori's profound belief that imagination is nourished not by fantasy alone, but by reality. The richer children's concrete experiences of the world, the more powerfully their imagination can soar. In Part Two, we look at how this actually unfolds: how the carefully designed materials of the early childhood classroom lay the groundwork for the extraordinary imaginative life of the elementary-aged child. What the Youngest Children Are Really Doing Watch young children in a Montessori classroom, and you might see them tracing the edges of a triangle with their fingertips, testing objects to compare dimensions, fitting puzzle pieces of the continents together, or carefully moving golden beads that represent units, tens, hundreds, and thousands. These activities look deceptively simple. But something of tremendous importance is happening beneath the surface. These children are building the architecture of their minds. Dr. Montessori was clear about where all thinking begins: "There is nothing in the intellect which was not first in the senses." Before a child can think abstractly, before they can imagine what they cannot see, they must first have a rich, precise, embodied experience of the world around them. The sensorial materials of the Children's House are designed to provide exactly this. They train children's powers of observation, sharpen children’s ability to notice distinctions, and lay down a concrete mental structure that will serve children for the rest of their lives. Precision as the Foundation for Possibility This emphasis on precision might seem at odds with imagination, but in Montessori, it is the very source of it. As Dr. Montessori wrote in The Advanced Montessori Method, "If the true basis of the imagination is reality, and its perception is related to exactness of observation, it is necessary to prepare children to perceive the things in their environment exactly, to secure for them the material required by the imagination." In other words, the more accurately a child can see and understand the real world, the richer they can imagine beyond it. Consider geometry. When a young child explores geometric shapes and solids with their hands, by touching edges, rotating forms, and fitting pieces into matching frames, they are not simply learning shapes. They are building a sensory foundation from which, years later, they might begin to conceptualize the support structure of a bridge, understand the geometry of navigation, or envision architectural forms that don't yet exist. The hands-on work of early childhood quietly becomes the creative capacity of the older child and the adult.  The Bridge Into the Elementary Years Something significant shifts around age six. Children who spent years absorbing concrete impressions of the world now begin to hunger for something more. They want to understand not just the things in front of them, but the larger story: how those things came to be, how they connect, what lies beyond the visible horizon of their direct experience. The emergence of the reasoning mind and the explosive growth of the imagination are the hallmarks of the second plane of development. And these superpowers emerge because of everything that came before. The child who handled the golden bead material in early childhood by counting and carrying hundreds and thousands, now has the concrete foundation to comprehend something almost unfathomable: the immense passage of geological time, from the formation of the universe to the emergence of human civilization, as depicted on the Montessori timelines and clock of eras. The quantities they once held in their hands now help them grasp epochs they can never directly touch. The concrete has become a gateway to the infinite. As Dr. Montessori described it in To Educate the Human Potential: "Imaginative vision is quite different from mere perception of an object, for it has no limits. Not only can imagination travel through infinite space, but also through infinite time; we can go backwards through the epochs, and have the vision of the earth as it was, with the creatures that inhabited it." When Imagination Starts from Reality, It Can Change the World There is powerful idea running through all of this, one that reaches well beyond education into the nature of human creativity itself. When imagination is untethered from reality, it tends to stay small or drift into what Dr. Montessori called mere speculation. But when imagination is rooted in genuine understanding, something transformative becomes possible. As she wrote: "When imagination starts from contact with reality, thought begins to construct works by means of which the external world becomes transformed; almost as if the thought of man had assumed a marvelous power: the power to create." This is the arc that Montessori traces across the first 12 years of a child's life. In early childhood, we give children the real world: carefully, beautifully, precisely. In the elementary years, children take that grounded understanding and begin to reach toward the cosmic, the historical, the abstract, and the creative. One stage makes the next one possible. And the imagination that emerges is not a flight from reality, but its highest expression. What We Can Take From This The Montessori environment makes so much sense when we think about this developmental progression! The sensorial materials are not busy work. The real objects are not a rejection of play. The carefully prepared lessons are not limitations on creativity. Each of these things builds minds that are grounded, precise, and curious enough to one day imagine things the world has never seen before. Dr. Montessori always believed that the child holds the future within them. The work of the classroom (and of the family) is simply to give that future the richest possible foundation from which to grow.

Of all the aspects of Montessori philosophy that raise eyebrows, the topic of fantasy and imagination might be the most misunderstood. Parents sometimes hear that Montessori discourages imaginative play, or that it takes a dim view of fairy tales and make-believe. The reality is both more nuanced and more fascinating than that. Dr. Maria Montessori didn't distrust imagination. Actually, she revered it! She was deeply interested in understanding how imagination develops and what kinds of experiences feed it most richly. Imagination Is a Force for Truth Dr. Montessori believed that imagination is one of humanity's greatest powers. It allows us to reach beyond what is directly in front of us, to envision what we cannot see, to understand what we cannot touch, and to create what does not yet exist. It is imagination, Dr. Montessori argued, that drives scientific discovery, artistic expression, and human progress. But here is the key insight: imagination doesn't grow in a vacuum. It grows from reality. The richer and more precise children's experience of the real world, the more powerful and genuine their imaginative capacity becomes. As Dr. Montessori wrote in The Absorbent Mind, "imagination is a force for the discovery of truth," not an escape from it. For this very reason, we fill Montessori classrooms with real objects, real experiences, and real information about the world. Wonder, to be truly nourishing, needs real and wonderful things from which to emerge. The Difference Between Child-Led and Adult-Imposed Fantasy One of the most important distinctions Dr. Montessori made is the difference between fantasy that children create themselves and fantasy that adults impose on them. When young children pick up a stick and pretend it is a horse or transform a cardboard box into a spaceship, they are using their accumulated knowledge of the real world to construct a creative, imaginary one. This kind of pretend play is entirely natural and valuable. The children are in control of the fantasy, and they know, on some level, that it is fantasy. What is more complicated is when adults introduce elaborate fictions as though they were real. When we encourage children to believe things that aren’t true, we are essentially presenting misinformation to minds that are actively trying to make sense of reality. Young children in the first years of life are working hard to understand what is real and what is not. And when they are uncertain, they look to trusted adults for guidance. When those adults confirm a fantasy as reality, children's natural process of distinguishing truth from fiction is interrupted. Dr. Montessori called this state credulity: a characteristic of the immature mind that hasn't yet developed the tools to distinguish the true from the false, or the possible from the impossible. The adult's role, she believed, is not to extend credulity but to gently support children in building accurate, grounded knowledge of the world. What This Looks Like in Practice It's worth pausing here, because this aspect of Montessori philosophy can feel startling at first, especially in a culture that places enormous value on the magic of childhood and the traditions that come with it. Families navigate this in different ways, and Montessori doesn't prescribe a single approach to handling holidays or family traditions at home. What Montessori does suggest is that children are far more capable of genuine wonder than we sometimes give them credit for, and that the real world, offered to them with beauty and depth, provides more than enough magic to satisfy even the most imaginative child. Dr. Montessori gave striking examples of this. She noticed how a simple chart showing the relative sizes of the sun and the earth left young children full of astonishment, and more astonished, she observed, than any fairy tale had managed to make them. The actual scale of the universe, presented clearly and beautifully, opened something in their minds that no invented story could have reached. As she wrote in To Educate the Human Potential, by offering the story of the universe, "we give him something a thousand times more infinite and mysterious to reconstruct with his imagination, a drama no fable can reveal." Similarly, Dr. Montessori noted that children are often far more satisfied when they can engage with the real version of something rather than a pretend substitute. Washing real dishes rather than toy ones. Riding a real horse rather than a stick. Using a globe to find America rather than hearing it mentioned vaguely in conversation. The real thing, it turns out, is often more engaging, not less, than the pretend version. Reality as the Launchpad This is perhaps the most beautiful way to understand the Montessori approach to imagination. Reality is not the opposite of imagination. It is its launchpad. When children have rich, precise, hands-on experience of the world — through sensorial materials, through nature, through meaningful work, through real information about science, history, and the cosmos — their imagination has something extraordinary to work with. They can envision what they cannot see because they understand what they can. They can reach toward the abstract because they are grounded in the concrete. As Montessorian Sarah Werner Andrews described it, the development of imagination begins with children's understanding of how the real world works. And far from being an immature stage that children grow out of, this grounded imagination is "the entry into the uniquely human, lifelong capacity to imagine alternatives to reality." In other words, Montessori isn't asking children to imagine less. It is giving them everything they need to imagine more — more vividly, more truthfully, and more powerfully — for the rest of their lives. In Part Two of this series, we'll explore exactly how the early childhood materials build that foundation, and what happens to imagination when children carry it into the elementary years. 

With the slower pace of summer, more time at home and outdoors, and more unstructured hours to fill, it’s a perfect time to pull art supplies out fo the closet, cover tables with paper, and unleash some creative energy! What happens in these creative moments matters more than most of us realize. And how we respond to what children make matters just as much as the making itself. The Process Is the Point A foundational principle behind Montessori's approach to children's artmaking is that the process of making art is far more important than the product. This can be difficult for us to internalize, because the product is what we most often see. It’s not that we don’t care about our children’s experience. But the painting is what comes home. The drawing gets taped to the refrigerator. We get handed the collage at pickup. So it’s natural to focus on what is right in front of us. But it is the moments when children are deeply absorbed in moving paint across paper, pressing clay between their fingers, or scribbling long, looping lines with a crayon that something essential is happening. This is a deep form of creative expression and an outlet for feelings children may not yet have words for. Plus, children are developing visual-spatial skills, fine motor coordination, and the capacity for innovative thinking. During art-making, children are problem-solving in real time, making decisions about color, form, pressure, and space. And they are experiencing the deep satisfaction of following an internal creative impulse all the way through to its end. What Not to Say and What to Say Instead One of the most important things we can do to support young children's creative process is to be thoughtful in our comments. Even well-meaning responses can shift children's focus from their own inner experience to an adult's reaction. Once that shift happens, children begin making art for the audience rather than for themselves. Comments like, "That's beautiful!" or "What is it?" or "Can you make one for Grandma?" are all, in different ways, asking children to produce something for someone else or to explain and justify what they've made. Neither of these supports genuine creative development. Instead, focus on objective, process-focused observations. For example, "I can see you used a lot of green and purple today," or "Your lines extend all the way to the edge of the paper," or "It looks like you really enjoyed making that." These responses acknowledge children's work without judging it, and they communicate that what they made matters, and what they experienced while making it also matters. Young children often cannot (and should not have to) explain their art. The experience of making art is enough. A Summer Opportunity: Freedom to Explore Summer is an ideal time to offer children a real variety of creative materials and the freedom to choose what calls to them. Different children will be drawn to different media, and what each child gets from a new experience will be entirely their own. Variety is important precisely because it sparks different kinds of interest and expression in different children. Here are some starting points for summer art exploration, appropriate for toddlers and young children: Offer crayons and large paper for open-ended scribbling and mark-making. It’s best to begin by offering large spaces before moving to smaller ones. Large paper means that children's bodies have room to move freely. Easel painting or watercolors offer the joy of color mixing and the experience of a brush moving across a surface. Play-dough and clay can satisfy children's deep need to manipulate, press, and build with their hands. Collage materials (paper scraps, leaves, fabric, natural objects) invite children to arrange and compose in ways that feel both free and purposeful. Chalk on pavement (or dark paper, if the weather isn’t cooperating) is especially magical outdoors on a summer morning. From a practical standpoint, it’s helpful to protect clothing and surfaces before beginning, so children can work freely without worry (theirs or ours!). Choose non-toxic materials, particularly for the youngest children who may still explore things with their mouths. And resist the urge to direct the outcome. Children who cover their paper entirely in black paint are not doing it wrong. They are doing exactly what they need to do. What to Do With What They Make Not every piece of art needs to be saved or displayed. Saving a selection of artwork from across the summer (early pieces, middle-of-summer pieces, late-summer pieces) can serve as a timeline or record of your children's creative development and a meaningful way to look back together at the end of the season. If there isn’t room to display selected pieces, a simple folder or large envelope can also work perfectly for this. When you look through the artwork together, let your child lead the conversation or simply look at it together without words. The goal is never gallery-ready products. The goal is children who trust their own creative impulses, who feel free to experiment and make a mess and start over, and who carry the confidence of someone who has been allowed to make things in their own way. Summer is long, and the canvas is wide! Let children fill it however best suits their needs! We'd love to hear how your family is spending the summer months. And we always love to share how we support creative exploration in our prepared environments in our school. Contact us to learn more!

Summer has a rhythm that the school year rarely allows. Mornings without a clock ticking. Afternoons that stretch and meander. The unhurried pace of days that don't need to be anywhere quite so urgently. And tucked inside all of that spaciousness is one of the most valuable gifts the season can offer young children: time to do things for themselves. In Montessori, we don’t rush through the practical life activities that help children care for their own bodies: washing hands, dressing, brushing hair and teeth, wiping a nose, and putting shoes away. We don’t even think of these as chores because they are among the most important developmental work in our children’s early years. And summer, with its slower tempo, is the perfect season to lean into them. Independence Is the Destination and the Journey Dr. Montessori understood that, from the very first moments of life, children are moving toward independence. The newborn who moves toward the breast has already taken a first step. That milestone transforms the toddler who learns to walk: their hands are suddenly free, they can move toward or away from people and objects in their world, and they can begin actively shaping their own experience rather than merely absorbing it. Every act of self-care that children learn to do for themselves is another step along this path. Not because independence is about doing things alone, but because the child who can care for their own body develops a sense of genuine capability, a trust in themselves, and a growing understanding of who they are as unique human beings. As the Montessori principle goes: Help me to do it myself. Collaboration Before Independence One of the most important things to understand about supporting self-care in young children is that the path to independence moves through a collaborative process. Often, things go awry when we swing between getting caught up in instruction, resorting to doing something for them, or stepping back entirely before they are ready. The progression looks something like this: first, we do the activity with or for the child, using gentleness and narration, so the child is always a participant, even before they can act. "I'm going to put on your shirt. Let's put your arm through the sleeve." Gradually, the adult and child do the activity together. Eventually, the child begins to imitate, then to do it in their own way, imperfectly, slowly, and with deep satisfaction. This progression is not a straight line. There will be days when a child who has been dressing independently for weeks suddenly wants help again. This is entirely normal and simply calls for a gentle return to collaboration: "Let's do this together." Our goal is always to offer just enough support and no more. We want to find the balance between honoring children's need for assistance and protecting their emerging sense of capability. What Summer Makes Possible The school year, for all its richness, is often defined by time pressure. Mornings, especially, can become a sequence of things that need to happen faster than children can manage them independently. Shoes get put on by adults. Jackets get zipped by adults. Hair gets brushed quickly and without much ceremony. During the summer months, there is often more space to let a three-year-old button their own shirt, however long it takes. There is time to stand back and watch a toddler figure out how to pull on their own socks. There is room for the unhurried back-and-forth of teaching a child to wash their hands properly, step by step, at a sink they can actually reach. If we think of these moments as children’s real work, we can avoid getting caught up in the sense that the process isn’t efficient! This is a long-term game. Our children are building their abilities and their internal sense of capability. Practical Suggestions for the Summer Months Here are a few ideas for bringing the Montessori approach to self-care into your home this summer: Set up the environment for success. Small adjustments allow children to manage their own needs without regularly needing adult assistance. Perhaps place a step stool at the bathroom sink. Provide low hooks for towels and clothing. Create a low shelf for children to store their belongings. Choose clothing that supports independence. Elastic waistbands, velcro shoes, and loose-fitting shirts can be respectful of children's current physical abilities. Children who can dress themselves feel capable. Narrate without taking over. When a child is struggling with a button or a zipper, resist the impulse to fix it immediately. Try instead: "You're working hard on that. Would you like to try once more, or would you like some help?" This keeps the child in the driver's seat of their own experience. Begin with larger movements, then refine. Just as with any practical life work, self-care builds from the general to the specific. Children learn to pull a shirt over their head before they learn to fasten buttons. They learn to remove their shoes before they learn to tie them. Follow your child's current capacity and build from there. Move without talking; talk without moving. This Montessori principle helps us demonstrate a self-care activity most effectively. When showing a child how to wash their hands, do it slowly and silently, so the movement is fully visible. Then, separately, use words to name the steps. Children often find it difficult to simultaneously track our narration and demonstration. Self-Care Activities Worth Practicing This Summer Consider the range of self-care activities appropriate for our children. Do they include undressing and dressing, hand washing, brushing hair, brushing teeth, wiping the nose, and caring for shoes? What else would your child benefit from learning how to master? Your child can practice these skills gradually as part of the natural rhythm of daily life. There is no hurry. There is no single right timeline. What matters is the collaborative attitude that underlies each interaction. The adult and child are working together. We honor children's participation. Our goal is always to help children come to know what they are capable of. The Deeper Meaning Dr. Montessori was clear that the destination of this entire developmental arc, across all four planes of development, all the way to young adulthood, is a person who can provide for themselves, take responsibility for their own actions, plan for their own future, and perhaps even support others on their own path toward independence. It begins here with a small person pulling on their own socks or learning to wash their own hands, and in a summer that is long enough and slow enough to let them try. We hope your summer is full of these quiet, meaningful moments. If you would like to learn more about honoring children’s journey toward independence, please schedule a visit to our school!