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Understanding the Sensorial Environment Series: Part 2June 21, 2008 by Miss Norma | No comments

The Sensorial environment is important in a Montessori classroom because learning is reliant on the five senses. This bonded relationship between learning and the senses is relevant in the development of the forming child. The importance of the senses in relationship to the expansion of the mind is enriched through the Sensorial environment. “There is in a child a special kind of sensitivity which leads him to absorb everything about him, and it is this work of observing and absorbing that alone enables him to adapt himself to life” (Montessori, 1967, 62). They are learning to refine all of their senses by experiencing contact with the Sensorial equipment. The exercises and materials that comprise the Sensorial environment are designed to target one sense at a time. This is exactly what the Sensorial environment provides for the children, an opportunity for them to explore all of their senses through individual activities that help to isolate, yet, still enhance all the senses.

The Sensorial environment is divided into the following six senses: Visual, Tactile, Stereognistic, Auditory, Olfactory, and Gustatory. The Visual materials aid in the child’s discernment of unique colors, shapes, and dimensions. The materials that represent the Tactile portion consist of texture, density, baric, and thermic. Texture materials demonstrate how things feel. Density materials help differentiate between sizes of objects. Baric materials demonstrate weight differences. Thermic materials exemplify temperature differences. Stereognistic materials represent the combination of touch and movement without visual assistance. “Two sensations, tactile and muscular, are mixed together, and give rise to that sense which psychologists call the ‘stereognistic’ sense” (Montessori, 1985, 117). Auditory materials accentuate the distinction of unique sounds and tones. Olfactory materials address the difference between odors. Gustatory materials are geared to the taste buds and deciphering the contrast of flavors.