Readiness for Language begins at home in infancy as the child absorbs oral language. A young child needs to be talked to and read to from birth on.
Preparation for Language takes place in both Practical Life and Sensorial activities. In Practical Life the child develops control of the hand. In Sensorial the child learns visual discrimination.
Maria Montessori believed that if the environment has been prepared with the appropriate materials, the child will need little formal instruction to experience an “explosion into writing”.
The Language materials offered in a Montessori classroom breaks down the elements of reading. This enables the young child to experience the structure of Language in a concrete way.
These systematic activities teach the child who can express himself/herself how to analyze the sounds of the language. The child learns that these sounds are represented by symbols. We communicate by how we use these symbols to represent our speech pattern.
It is our role as caretakers of the adults of tomorrow; to teach our children today that communication is the means by which human beings share their passion for life with each other!