If Parenting Advice is Giving you Whiplash, This is for You

In the parenting climate, we are currently trying to navigate, advice is at our fingertips.You can type something into Google and instantly have thousands of articles. 

But, so many of them are conflicting. 

Potty training with rewards, or not using rewards because it takes away the natural reward.
Giving rice cereal as first solids and avoiding meat, or staying away from rice cereal and going straight to table food.
Using a soother, or avoiding them.

How are we supposed to know which advice is sound, and which isn’t?

I felt like I had whiplash trying to decide what was best for my children.

Until I started reading Tim Seldin's How to Raise an Amazing Child the Montessori Way and it changed my motherhood.

Parenting advice abounds, but much of it doesn't seem to work that well. This is part because it tends to offer a cookbook approach with detailed suggestions about what to do in specific situations rather than a comprehensive, systematic, approach to parenting. 

This comprehensive, systematic approach to parenting is part of why I have come to love Montessori. 

Why does Montessori make sense for my parenting? 

I have found that the answers within Montessori are cohesive, they flow together through one simple belief: children are worthy of respect as whole, capable, intelligent human beings.

This ensures that when you research a specific question through the Montessori lens, you will find answers that fit together, cohesive to that overall belief, each parenting decision supporting the others you have made.

• When I started to research Montessori potty learning, there were answers.
• Montessori had cohesive answers for how to approach mealtimes from babyhood through to childhood.
• Through Montessori research, I have come to a peaceful way of dealing with tantrums, sleep training, sharing, developing concentration, encouraging free play, developing habits that incorporate my kids in our home and result in more helpful children, among so many other things.

I am not perfect in implementing this approach, and I never will be. And I don't believe you have to be, either. In fact, I think you may be surprised by the ways you may already be implementing Montessori in your home.

However, I am committed to being the best Montessori parent I can be, difficult as it may be at times. Committed because of the results I already see in my children, and because of the promise of Montessori:

"Maria Montessori taught that a child who feels respected and competent will develop a far greater level of emotional well-being than a child who is simply loved and doted upon." Tim Seldin, Raising an Amazing Child the Montessori Way

Montessori has been defining for my parenthood in the answers it has given me, but even more than any of that, Montessori is helping me raise well-rounded, emotionally healthy, kind, and strong people, and that's the goal, isn't it?

Thank you for reading!


Want to dive into respectful parenting but do not know where to start, or where to go from here? Check out some of the books that I have found most helpful:


Secret of Childhood - Maria Montessori | No Bad Kids, Toddler Discipline With No Shame - Janet Lansbury | The Absorbent Mind - Maria Montessori | Unconditional Parenting - Alfie Kohn | Raising an Emotionally Intelligent Child - John Gottman, Phd

If you have any questions or comments, please feel free to contact me. And if you are interested in following along in our daily adventures, follow us on Instagram where I post daily.

God bless,
Olivia Fischer