A systemic model of furniture meant for stimulating development of a child based on educational aids from M. Montessori

Abstract

In furniture design, understood as a kind of evolutionary process, there is room for designer’s creativity, but not in the sense traditionally accepted in the psychology of creation. The creativity of the designer shapes the products of the evolutionary algorithm but does not replace them. This can be illustrated by the genesis of any design, such as furniture that stimulates the development of the child. The Montessori pedagogy leaves a lot of room for new designs of Montessorian teaching aids. The Montessori didactic material forms a logically structured whole. It enables the child to move out of experience and sensual cognition; it serves not only the development of the intellect but also the education of the whole personality. The Montessorian materials take into account the child’s stage of development, corresponding to a given sensitive phase and the very logic of things, so that the child, while learning, can embrace larger cognitive sequences, arouse a sense of aesthetics, motivation, curiosity and interest, thus triggering various forms of activity.