The Man Who Inspired Us to Montessori

Its was a bright sunny morning and we were headed for Blue Blocks Self-Learning Pre-School to attend the Positive Parenting Workshop. A day before this, I was wondering why in the world do I need to attend this workshop? Do I not know Enough about a small baby? I mean what if I was going to become a mother for the first time, I know what a small baby needs! obviously, a baby needs feed, good cloths and Diapers and not to forget the cuddling. See I know it all! But then when I started giving a serious thought - Why learn parenting? Do I really know enough? I burst into a cry! Only then I prayed sincerely to Allah - Oh Allah! Give me from your knowledge. I know not and you are all knower. Give me best out of this Workshop. Then with an open heart I decided to attend this workshop.

When we reached our destination, we received a warm welcome from the staff. After filling a short form we were directed to the lecture hall. It was just the right time. There we saw a short man with a gentle smile. This was pavan. His first sight made me a bit disappointed. I was hoping to see an energetic speaker who would blow up our minds with his talk on the subject. But this man was polite and calm. hugh! not so impressive anyway.

Soon the session began with what we are expecting or any question we want him to cover, followed by our introductions. Then began the real part. Mr. Pavan Goyal Started to introduce himself. He has taken the AMI intensive training in the USA for the age group of Birth – 3 years. He has observed and worked with infants and toddlers as part of his training program. He is also trained in the age group of 3 – 6 years, which has been certified by AMI Netherlands. With his training and practice he is committed to educating parents all over the country through Positive Parenting Workshops. He is also the founder of Blue Blocks Self-learning Pre-school.

After this impressive introduction he made us do a visualization technique. We sort of looked into our childhood where we found ourselves being rejected and disappointed. Then he took us through the journey of a child unfolding the developmental stages a child goes though and how can we support him in this development. He spoke about the wrong ways of parenting and bad educational techniques that are followed. His inspiring talk covered both physical and psychological needs of a child. In all we explored a whole new perception towards a child. The Montessori philosophy he spoke about was so natural and obvious that we felt our hearts getting convinced with it. Entire session we were kind of glued to our chairs. We couldn't hear enough on the subject. I wouldn't be summarizing his talk instead here is the link where you can get all the info. In all, his talk blew our minds, not in the way I was expecting but in a way that was as amazing as child psychology was. He was soft and thought provoking. He made us laugh, he made us cry. He definitely was someone who made a change.

By the end of the session I got my answer as to why this man is so polite, gentle and calm....Because he deals with children. Can there be any other way to handle this lovely creatures. When we left we had in our hearts great regard and respect towards this man who gave us hope to parenting efficiently. Even though we do mistakes raising a child but there is a way to rightly do it. We extend our wishes and thank Pavan for his good work.

May Allah guide us all to the straight path. Ameen!

Note:
For all those parents who are interested in Blue blocks Montessori School for their kids, here is the link to the school's website. You will get all necessary information.

The very own cloth book(week 27 & 28)

Our inspiration to Montessori was a Parenting workshop organized by a Montessori School (see my post on it here). One thing which was stressed on by the speaker was that we must start reading books to children once they turn six month old. It was surprising for us. When we questioned him as to what books he said any homemade book would do. Now that was tricky. There are many books available for very young children. The market is floated with all kinds of cardboard books. But the very first book has to be very special - that is what we had in mind. Although we have been reading Quran and other books to her, she dint have her own book. Finally, the idea of her first book was decided after enough browsing had been done on the subject. The idea was to make a cloth book that shows pictures of Allah's signs. Kind of like a nature's book. To make this book more of sensorial stimulation various beads and different textured cloth were used. Alas! the book was made referring to this tutorial. Its an amazing, easy to follow tutorial. Below are the pictures of the pages of the book and their descriptions:
The front cover of the book has written on it - Signs of Allah in Urdu (Fatima's mother tongue).
Allah speaks of all these in Quran.

Front cover of the book

Page1 (Day) has a yellow pompom that represents sun and blue ribbons that represents birds. 

Page2 (night) has a moon made out of silk cloth and few star shaped buttons,

Allah speaks of day and night as his signs in Quran. 

Day and night (Page 1 & 2)

Page3 has clouds made out of towel cloth and few beads as rain.
Page4 has a tree made out of green color cloth ball and brown ribbons.

Rain and tree (Page 3& 4)

Page5 shows water(blue wrinkled cloth), pearls and ship (felt cloth).
Page6 shows mountains

Ship and mountains(Page 5 & 6)

 Page7 Fruits(old dinning table cloth made out of rexine)
Page8 small book with few pages(buckram cloth) and cloth feather pen(this tutorial)

Fruits, book and feathered pen (Page 7 & 8)

Page9 flowers and leaves (velvet cloth)
Page10 camel

Flower, leaves and camel (Page 9 & 10)

 Back cover of the book

Back cover

All of these were made out of the scrap cloths available at home.

Her response to book, when introduced:
Excited to hold it
She liked the sun most.
Was busy with it for more than half hour

Qualities of Good Parent

As humans we must all admit that none of us is perfect. We are designed to fail, then learn then succeed then fail again in something else then learn again, success again and the cycle continues. Learning never ends. As life moves on, it puts us into new roles, gives us tougher challenges. Key is not to stop learning from our failures and these new challenges, that seem so tough and impossible in the very beginning.There are few things which we must posses to keep this learning cycle healthy and productive. One of these is observation. When things go out of our hand or we see a challenge that too big for us to handle then just one deep breath is what is required. Losing our mind in such situations will only help us lose a good learning opportunity. Take a step back, relax, take a deep breath and just observe things as they happen. This opens up our mind to see the reality, to see where the problem lies and to know the solution. This would be my advice to any new parent. Perhaps the biggest challenge in the world is to have in your arms a small, little human being who is so fragile, so dependent, so adorable and above everything whose only medium of communication is crying. If you are a parent and you really wish to help this little baby of yours all you need to be is a good observer. Gradually you will find your self understanding every cry and move of your child.

These little humans who have great powers seek only our help in getting through. They surely are not some beings who must be looked down upon. Unknowingly we do not respect these beings and their needs. What we need to understand is that they deserve respect not less than anyone of us. Its just that they are different and see things differently. Responding to the cries of your child in a respectful way will make you develop a unique bond with her. These responses must be encapsulated with patience and warmth and the driving factor should be your 'want' to understand. Children often do things which violate a lot of rules in this adult driven world. For ex: a toddler making mess out of food or a teenager resisting to participate in chores. But what we need to know is that they learn by changing their environment or by breaking rules. They always are trying to see if the rules can be molded or changed. In such situations, a parent must politely and firmly establish the rules back. A good way is to involve the older children in setting the rules. This will make them realize that you value them and they are old enough to be the part of the decisions. Additional advantage is that they are less likely to break the rules they have set themselves.

A good parent is someone with courage. Panicking in tough situations will only panic your child more. Responding difficulties with courage and confidence will teach your child a lesson which will help her through out her life. Complaining difficulties and hardships will make your child timid. She will not know the great art of dealing with problems. Every human is surrounded with problems and hardships designed specifically for each one of us. But there are only few who take the right approach to deal with them. Next time a problem pops up just try to identify what new thing life wants to teach you. Face it gracefully with all confidence that if this problem is given to you, you and only you have the potential to face it and deal with it. Remember your child sees you as a role model. With that said, here is my simple advice to parents out there: BE WHAT YOU WANT YOUR CHILD TO BE.