The Montessori Toddler by Simone Davies

(New York: Workman Publishing Company, 2019), 257

Jordan read this in detail and I read parts and focused on her notes. The Montessori model, in many ways, just makes sense. Start with understanding a toddler and build an environment conducive to their development. Much of this method revolves around looking at the world through their eyes first, respecting them for who they are, and forming the environment and our interactions with them from there.

make it a “yes” space (3)
be mindful of the relationship between child, adult, and environment (13)
target one skill at a time to learn (25)
children gain mastery though repetition (25)
talk less when when teaching and focus on showing them (27)
lower your expectations for the result; focus on the process rather than the result (39-40, 44, 103)
use child-size and child-height furniture they can learn to use independently (72)
try to redirect rather than saying “no” (90), or use positive language for what they can do rather than negative language for what they can’t do (114)
“Are you trying to tell me...” to translate their needs into words (100)
give them time to process a request before repeating yourself (117)
allow all feelings, but not all behavior (101)
for tantrums, important to help them calm down (126)
don’t jump in the help too quickly when they are frustrated, the struggle is important (169)
she talks about the importance of morning and evening rituals, and even includes elements similar to Michael Hyatt in them, like writing good things that happened today and an “intention” for tomorrow (181)
when we hear those little feet coming to interrupt try to use it as a reminder of how lucky we are to have our family (181)
as a parent it’s important to slow down, especially by saying no to some things so we can say yes to our family (185)
the role of a parent is not to solve every problem for your child but to support them (186)
lots of further reading on 218-219