Imagine this: you’ve worked hard all day. You’ve done drop-offs and pick-ups. You’ve made sure everyone was fed, bathed, and tucked into bed. The kitchen is clean, and you finally have time to yourself.
What is it that you do to reset your mind and body, preparing yourself to do it all again tomorrow?
For children, that reset comes through free play—not an adult-led activity, not an extracurricular class, not TV time, nor tablet time. True free play, the kind that stems from just being home, being bored, and being forced to create and expand their own imagination.
If we continue this train of thought and I ask you how much free time your children have per week, is it more or less than the time you have for yourself?
Does it sound like enough?
A lot of our children’s day is fully planned out for them. There is a time to wake up, a time to get dressed, and a time to leave the house. Then when they get home from school, we are often rushing them from one activity to the next, squeezing in bath time, dinner time, maybe a book, and then, finally, bedtime.
It’s a constant rush, as I’m sure we all know.
However, Montessori intentionally offers something different.
When they come to school, their teachers do not tell them what to work on or when to do it. They do not dictate that everyone learn the same thing at the same time.
Here, they have freedom of choice.
Once they are ready to enter their classroom for the day, they are met with an environment that patiently asks, “What is it that you want to do?”
The environment doesn’t rush; it waits, because the only one who can truly answer that question is the child.
But if they are used to having an adult plan out every second of their day, will they know how to answer?
Will they know how to fill time on their own?
Will they take advantage of the sea of options around them?
Or…
Will they find themselves waiting for an adult to guide them, repeating the phrase, “I don’t know what to do”?
Through observations over many years, teachers have noticed that children who do not have time to play at home will often struggle to stay focused during their work period. Their bodies long for that free play in order to recharge and they can’t wait until recess to do that. Soon, parents begin receiving reports from the teachers about their child’s lack of interest in the material, their inability to focus or perhaps their interruption of peer’s work.
This can lead parents to start wondering, “Am I not doing enough?”
That worry can get the best of them. It tells them their child must be behind, leading them to sign up for reinforcement classes and drill them with numbers and letters at home.
And in trying to help, parents overwork, overschedule, and deprive children once again of their essential need to play.
The very play that is so crucial in developing their ability to entertain themselves and make independent decisions.
So I hope you release yourself from the pressure of needing to do more and lean into the serenity that letting children explore life at its normal pace is more than enough.
Because when they play at home, they will feel ready to learn at school.
I’ll leave you with the wise words of Maria Montessori who has said it best;
“Let the children be free; encourage them; let them run outside when it is raining; let them remove their shoes when they find a puddle of water.”
