Montessori Sunday: Scrubbing a table

I apologize, this was scheduled to post and never did for some reason...sorry about the delay. I did actually write it on Sunday, promise!)

Ah practical life, definitely one of the most relaxing and normalizing areas of the classroom. Dr. Montessori talks about the process of the child normalizing, or coming back to the normal path of development. According to her books children who are this normal path of development are calm, eager to learn and develop themselves. Think about it in context of being an adult. Is there any activity that you do that calms and centers you? Many people run, work on a craft, bake, garden, etc. Usually these activities include some kind of repetitive motion that you can lose yourself in as it becomes habitual (the word cathartic comes to mind).

The lovely table washing set from my Montessori Training cente
(note how there is red color coding to help distinguish the set)

Many practical life activities try to help children lose themselves in these repetitive motions for the same purpose. Table scrubbing consists of these lovely, repetitive circular motions that satisfy the child's need to move while directing that energy into purposeful work. And when I talk about purposeful work I'm not really thinking about the table getting clean. In fact most often the table will end up being soaking wet and possibly even still soapy when the child finishes. Instead the purposeful work is for the child themself. These repeated motions are helping them learn how to control their movements and build up their muscles. Everything the young child wishes to accomplish they must repeat over and over until they master. We as adults have long forgotten how impossibly thick our fingers used to seem when we were trying to learn a new task. For children almost every task is new and requires immense amounts of concentration.

But let's get off theory for a bit and look at the actual activity of table scrubbing. The activity begins with the child putting on an apron and choosing a table which may or may not be dirty and need scrubbing. They move the chair aside and set up a chowki (a small, short table used while sitting on the floor) and lay an oilcloth on it. The materials are all brought over and laid out in order of use on the chowki; scrub brush, soap, sponge and drying cloth. The small basin is filled using the pitcher, and then the scrubbing can begin.

The child is shown how to wet the bristles and apply the soap using a circular motion. The table is then scrubbed, top to bottom and left to right. Circular motions, beginning slowly and then speeding up in the middle of the table, and slowing again as the end is reached demonstrate paying attention to the edges of the table. The circles are overlapped and the child is show up to apply more soap as needed.

After the scrubbing the teacher demonstrates how to wet the sponge and squeeze it until no more water drips back into the basin. The sponges is then drawn in a straight line across the bottom of the table, collecting the suds and stopping just short of the edge. This is the only time a circular motion is not used. The child is show how to rinse the sponge out in the basin and squeeze it dry before collecting the last of the suds. Finally the drying cloth is pulled out, folded into a small mitt around the hand and (using circular motions!) the child is shown how to dry the table.

And of course once everything is cleaned the child is responsible for drying the materials, wiping up any spills on the floor, and returning it to the shelf for the next person. Typical expectations for any Montessori activity. If you're ever having a bad day I honestly suggest setting up something similar at home, it's actually really relaxing and you've got a nice clean table when finished!