Another thought for the day from Mária Hári

Little Princess and Jolly Professor many years ago. 

I read Mária Hári on the bus this morning instead of writing up my notes on the consultancy sessions in Kindergarten where I spent my mornings this week. Mária Hári on Conductive Pedagogy was much more fun. As I read I could hear Dr Hári’s voice speaking it, in English, during our lectures, as I read so I choose this piece for my blog.

'In accomplishing any task, just like when acquiring any other function, conscious awareness is the most important factor. It is therefore imperative that the child should understand the task and be willing to carry it out. The child does not always find the way of doing something, he must be conducted. With the aid of applied inductive facilitations sometimes we obtain the result in a roundabout way. On the other hand, after experience of successful movement, we make children aware of the activity that they have accomplished. This means that if the child has carried out the task in some way, perhaps with help of applied facilitations, we identify the result as a realised solution. We make the child realise immediately exactly what he has done my relating it to the second signalling system, speech. The child also becomes familiar with his movements by learning to express what he is doing in words too. Children are always aware of the starting point and result when carrying out a task. Inductive facilitation offers an opportunity of activisation; moreover it gives the child the possibility of feeling that he has discovered the solution by himself. By this method his inclination for solving tasks develops.

Let us now turn to another aspect of conductive observation. Conductive observation serves the following purpose: the conductor can give supplementary information when the child’s own reafferents are not sufficient. The conductor keeps in mind the individual way of carrying out a task and before the next occasion she reminds the child of the right way of doing it. When repeating the tasks she decreases the facilitations until the task tied to the intention is carried out successfully, without facilitation. A task connected with speech becomes conscious in every detail. The stability of speech is higher than that of the movement series, therefore the stability of joining the parts of the movements is ensured by the directive effect of speech.'

References

Mária Hári on Conductive Education, 2004 Edited by Gillian Maguire and Andrew Sutton, Birmingham Foundation for Conductive Education, pages 39/40