Importance of Sensorial Exercises in Montessori

Since a child naturally uses all his powers of observation during his early years, this is the ideal time to give the child equipment which would sharpen his senses and enable him to understand the many impressions he receives through them. Sensorial comes from the words sense or senses. As there are no new experiences for the child to take from the Sensorial work, the child is able to concentrate on the refinement of all his senses.

Importance of Sensorial Exercises:

The importance and aim of Sensorial exercises are for the child to acquire clear, conscious, information and to be able to then make classifications in his environment. It is believed that sensorial experiences began at birth. Through his senses, the child studies his environment. Through this study, the child then begins to understand his environment. The child is a “sensorial explorer”. Through work with the sensorial materials, the child is given the keys to classifying the things around him, which leads to the child making his own experiences in his environment. Through the classification, the child is also offered the first steps in organizing his intelligence, which then leads to his adapting to his environment.

Different Grouping in Senses:

Sensorial Exercises were planned to cover every quality that can be apparent by the senses such as size, shape, composition, texture, loudness or softness, matching, weight, temperature, etc. Because the Exercises cover such a wide range of senses, Montessori categorized the Exercises into eight different groups:

1.      Visual Sense	2.      Tactile Sense	3.      Baric Sense	4.      Thermic Sense
5.      Auditory Sense	6.      Gustatory Sense	7.      Olfactory Sense	8.      Stereognostic Sense

Visual Sense: In this exercise child learns how to visually discriminate differences between similar objects and differing objects.

Tactile Sense: In this exercise child learns through his sense of touch. “Although the sense of touch is spread throughout the surface of the body, the Exercises given to the children are limited to the tips of the fingers, and particularly, to those of the right hand.” This allows the child to really concentrate on what he is feeling, through a concentration of a small part of his body.

Baric Sense: In this exercise child learns to feel the difference of pressure or weight of different objects. This sense is sharp through the use of a blindfold or of closing your eyes

Thermic Sense: In this exercise child works to enhance his sense of temperature.

Auditory Sense: In this exercise child differentiate between different sounds. In doing these different exercises, the child will enhance and make him more sensitive to the sounds in his environment.

Olfactory Sense: In this exercise child is given a basic to his smelling sense. Although not all smells given to the child in these exercises, the child does work to differentiate one smell from another.

Gustatory Sense: In this exercise child is given a basic to his tasting sense. Although not all tastes are given to the child in these exercises, the child does work to differentiate one taste from another. He can then take these senses, and apply them to other tastes in his environment.

Stereognostic Sense: In this exercise child learns to feel objects and make recognitions based on what he feels. “When the hand and arm are moved about an object, an impression of movement is added to that touch. Such an impression is attributed to a special, sixth sense, which is called a muscular sense, and which permits many impressions to be stored in a “muscular memory”, which recalls movements that have been made”.

Need of Sensorial Exercises:

It is possible for children, to receive any number of sensory impressions and be none the richer. Sense impressions are not enough by themselves; the mind needs education and training to be able to discriminate and appreciate. Montessori materials help the child to distinguish, to categorize, and to relate new information to what he already knows. Dr. Montessori believed that this process is the beginning of conscious knowledge. It is brought about by the intelligence working in a concentrated way on the impressions given by the senses.

Sensorial materials are self-correcting to allow independent use, they foster muscular development which lays the foundation for writing skills, and they are produced to precise metric tolerances. Correct terminology (binomial cube, isosceles triangle) and mathematically exact relationships enrich the child's experience so that abstract concepts may attach to familiar reality.