Picture this. Your two-year-old wants to pour their own milk. Every instinct in your body screams to grab the carton. You can see the spill before it happens. The puddle on the table. The milk dripping onto the floor. The dog licking the floor. The extra laundry. The wasted milk. Your hand reaches out to take the carton back.
Now picture something different. You have placed a small amount of milk in a tiny pitcher. Your toddler picks it up with both hands. They concentrate with the intensity of a surgeon. The milk wobbles. Some of it makes it into the cup. Some of it does not. Your toddler looks at the cup, then at the small puddle, then at you. You hand them a cloth. They wipe the table. They pick up the cup. They drink. They beam.
That second scenario is Montessori. And that beam on your toddler’s face is the entire point.
“The Montessori Toddler: A Parent’s Guide to Raising a Curious and Responsible Human Being” by Simone Davies, with illustrations by Hiyoko Imai, has quietly become one of the most influential parenting books of the last decade. It has been translated into numerous languages, embraced by parents on every continent, and recommended by educators, therapists, and pediatricians who may never have set foot in a Montessori classroom.
Davies is an AMI-certified Montessori teacher who runs Jacaranda Tree Montessori, a parent-toddler class in Amsterdam. She brings over fifteen years of hands-on experience with toddlers and their families to this book, and every page reflects the kind of knowledge that can only come from thousands of hours spent at child height, watching small people navigate a big world.
But the question that every exhausted parent asks before picking up any parenting book remains: Will this actually help me? Not in theory. Not in a perfect world. In my house. With my child. On a Wednesday. When we are late and nobody is wearing pants.
Let us find out.
What Montessori Actually Means at Home
Before we examine the book itself, it is worth clearing away the fog of misconception that surrounds the word Montessori.
Montessori is not an aesthetic. It is not wooden toys on white shelves photographed in golden light. It is not a brand. It is not a price point. It is not a competition to see whose playroom looks most like a Swedish furniture catalog.
Montessori is a way of seeing children. It was developed over a century ago by Dr. Maria Montessori, an Italian physician who observed that children learn best when they are given freedom within a carefully prepared environment, when they are respected as capable individuals, and when adults step back enough to let development happen naturally.
Davies takes these principles, which were originally developed for classroom settings, and translates them into the language of home life. She does this with a warmth and accessibility that makes the philosophy feel not like a foreign system you must adopt but like a natural extension of the respect you already feel for your child.
The Montessori home is not a school. You do not need a teaching degree or a certification. You need a willingness to slow down, a commitment to observing your child, and a step stool.
The Toddler as a Developing Human
The foundation of everything in this book is a simple but profound shift in perspective. Davies asks you to stop seeing your toddler as a problem to be managed and start seeing them as a person in the process of becoming.
Between roughly twelve months and thirty-six months, a child undergoes a staggering amount of development. They learn to walk, climb, run, and jump. They acquire language at a rate that would put any adult language learner to shame. They develop a sense of self. They begin to understand that other people have feelings and perspectives different from their own. They start to grasp cause and effect, time, and spatial relationships. They develop preferences, opinions, humor, and imagination.
All of this is happening simultaneously, inside a body and brain that are still profoundly immature. The toddler who screams because you handed them a broken cracker is not being unreasonable by their own internal standards. They expected a whole cracker. They got a broken one. The gap between expectation and reality has overwhelmed a nervous system that has no tools for managing disappointment. The scream is not a choice. It is an overflow.
Davies returns to this point again and again throughout the book. The behavior that looks like defiance is usually development. The behavior that looks like aggression is usually frustration. The behavior that looks like manipulation is usually a child trying to meet a need they cannot yet articulate.
When you internalize this perspective, your response changes. You stop taking the behavior personally. You stop interpreting it as a power struggle. You start asking better questions. What is my child trying to do? What skill are they developing? What need is unmet? How can I help without taking over?
The Prepared Environment: Engineering Calm
If the philosophical shift is the heart of the book, the prepared environment is its hands. This is where Davies gets extraordinarily practical.
The prepared environment is the Montessori term for a physical space that is designed to support the child’s independence, concentration, and development. In a classroom, this means child-sized furniture, carefully curated materials, and an orderly layout. At home, it means rethinking your living space through the eyes of someone who is two feet tall.
Davies takes you room by room through the home and shows you how small adjustments can produce dramatic changes in your toddler’s behavior and your own stress level.
The entryway gets a low hook for the child’s coat and a small bench where they can sit to put on shoes. The child can now arrive home and manage their own belongings instead of standing helplessly while you juggle bags, coats, and keys.
The kitchen gets a learning tower or sturdy step stool, a low drawer with the child’s own dishes and utensils, and a designated space where the child can access water and snacks independently. The child who can get their own water does not need to whine for water. The need is met before the frustration begins.
The bedroom gets a low bed, clothes stored at the child’s height with limited choices, and a small shelf with a few books displayed face-out. The child can choose their own pajamas, select their own bedtime story, and eventually get into bed on their own.
The living area gets a low shelf with three to five activities, rotated weekly. A small table and chair for art or snacks. Open floor space for movement. Materials displayed in baskets or trays so the child can see what is available and return items when finished.
The bathroom gets a step stool, a low towel hook, a mirror at the child’s height, and their toothbrush in a reachable location.
None of this is expensive. Davies repeatedly emphasizes that the prepared environment is about arrangement, not acquisition. You do not need to buy Montessori-branded anything. You need to move things down, reduce clutter, and create spaces where your child can function without asking for help.
The result is not just a prettier home. It is a calmer home. A shocking number of daily conflicts between parents and toddlers are actually environmental failures, not behavioral ones. The child who melts down at the coat rack is not defiant. They cannot reach their coat. The child who screams for a drink is not demanding. They cannot access water. Fix the environment and you fix the behavior, often without saying a single word.
Involving Your Toddler in Real Life
There is a section in the book that, for many parents, is the single most transformative idea they have ever encountered. It is the concept of practical life, and it is deceptively simple.
Your toddler wants to do what you do. Not a toy version of what you do. Not a pretend version. The real thing. They want to wash real dishes. Sweep real floors. Prepare real food. Carry real objects. Water real plants. Fold real laundry.
Davies provides detailed guidance on how to involve toddlers in every aspect of household life. She breaks activities down by difficulty and developmental stage, offers specific tips for setting up each activity for success, and describes what the child is learning through each task.
A toddler who helps wash lettuce is developing fine motor control, sensory awareness, sequencing skills, and a sense of contribution to the family. A toddler who sweeps the floor after a meal is practicing bilateral coordination, spatial awareness, and responsibility. A toddler who sets the table is learning one-to-one correspondence, categorization, and social participation.
These are not chores assigned to a reluctant child. They are invitations extended to an eager one. The difference in framing matters enormously. A toddler who is told “Go clean your room” resists. A toddler who is invited to “help me put the books back on the shelf” practically runs to participate.
Davies is honest that involving a toddler in household tasks takes longer. Much longer. A task you could complete in five minutes will take twenty with a toddler’s help. But she argues persuasively that those extra fifteen minutes are not wasted. They are among the most productive minutes of your toddler’s day. The child is learning. The child is contributing. The child feels competent and valued. And the parent, rather than trying to keep the child busy while simultaneously getting things done, is doing both at once.
Handling Difficult Moments
Davies does not shy away from the hard parts. The book addresses tantrums, hitting, biting, sharing conflicts, bedtime resistance, and all the other daily crises that make toddler parenting feel like an endurance sport.
Her approach to these challenges rests on several consistent principles.
First, stay calm. You are the adult. You have a fully developed prefrontal cortex. Use it. When your toddler is falling apart, they need you to be their external regulation system. If you fall apart too, there are now two people in crisis and zero people managing the situation.
Second, acknowledge the feeling before addressing the behavior. “You are so angry right now. You wanted that toy and she took it.” This is not permissiveness. It is neuroscience. A child whose feelings are acknowledged calms faster than a child whose feelings are dismissed or ignored. The acknowledgment opens a door through which you can then walk with your limit or redirect.
Third, set the limit clearly and without drama. “I hear you. You are angry. But I will not let you hit. Hitting hurts people.” The limit is non-negotiable. The delivery is calm and factual. There is no yelling. There is no shaming. There is no lengthy explanation. There is a boundary, stated plainly, held firmly.
Fourth, offer an alternative. “You can stomp your feet if you are angry. You can hit this pillow. You can come to me for a hug.” The child’s feeling is valid. The child’s expression of that feeling needs to be redirected into a channel that does not harm anyone.
Fifth, follow up with connection. After the storm has passed, reconnect. A hug. A conversation. A simple “That was a big feeling. I am here.” The child needs to know that the relationship survived the conflict. This is how secure attachment is built, not through the absence of conflict but through its repair.
Davies also addresses the less dramatic but equally exhausting daily negotiations. Getting dressed. Leaving the house. Transitioning between activities. Brushing teeth. Going to bed. For each of these, she offers practical strategies rooted in the same principles: prepare the environment, offer choices, give warnings before transitions, involve the child in the process, and be patient with the pace of a developing brain.
The Adult’s Inner Work
One of the most honest and valuable sections of the book is Davies’ discussion of the adult’s role in the Montessori relationship. She does not just tell you what to do with your child. She asks you to examine what is happening inside yourself.
Why do you feel the need to control? What triggers your anger? What were you taught about obedience and respect as a child, and how is that conditioning showing up in your parenting? Are you reacting to your child or reacting to your own childhood?
Davies does not push this self-examination aggressively. She raises it gently and returns to it throughout the book. But the message is clear. You cannot give your child something you do not have. If you want your child to regulate their emotions, you must learn to regulate yours. If you want your child to feel respected, you must examine what respect actually means to you. If you want your child to be independent, you must confront your own fear of letting go.
This is not therapy. It is not a self-help book disguised as a parenting book. But it is an honest acknowledgment that parenting a toddler will surface every unresolved issue you have, and that the work of becoming a better parent is inseparable from the work of becoming a more self-aware human being.
The Visual Beauty of the Book
This deserves its own mention because it is not merely decorative. Hiyoko Imai’s illustrations are functional. They show you what a prepared environment looks like in a real home. They depict adult-child interactions in a way that communicates posture, proximity, and tone. They represent diverse families across race, ability, and family structure.
For parents who learn visually, who struggle to translate written descriptions into physical reality, these illustrations are invaluable. You can see exactly how a toddler kitchen setup works. You can see what it looks like to get on a toddler’s level during a conflict. You can see the calm, unhurried pace that Davies is describing. The illustrations do not just support the text. They teach alongside it.
Where the Book Falls Short
No book is perfect, and honesty requires acknowledging the gaps.
The book assumes a level of time, space, and flexibility that not all families have. Single parents working multiple jobs, families in cramped apartments, parents with multiple children of different ages, and families without support networks may find some suggestions difficult to implement. Davies is never condescending about this, but the book would benefit from a more extensive section on adapting Montessori principles to constrained circumstances.
The approach to discipline, while philosophically robust, may feel insufficient for parents dealing with extreme behaviors. Children with significant sensory processing challenges, autism spectrum traits, or trauma histories may need more targeted strategies than calm limits and empathetic redirection can provide.
The book does not engage deeply with screen time, which is one of the most pressing and contentious issues in modern parenting. Davies mentions it briefly and suggests limiting it, but a more thorough discussion of how Montessori principles apply to the digital world would strengthen future editions.
Finally, the book can inadvertently create guilt. The beautiful images and calm descriptions of family life can make parents feel that their own chaotic, imperfect homes are failing. Davies would almost certainly say that imperfection is not failure, but the aspirational quality of the presentation does not always communicate that message.
Who This Book Is For
Parents of toddlers between one and three who want a respectful, practical, and comprehensive approach to daily life.
Parents who are exhausted by power struggles and want to reduce conflict at its source rather than managing it after the fact.
Parents curious about Montessori who want an accessible, non-dogmatic entry point.
Caregivers, grandparents, and nannies who want to understand and support a toddler’s developing independence.
Parents of any philosophy who believe that children deserve respect and want to know what that looks like in practice at seven in the morning when nobody is wearing pants.
The Final Verdict
“The Montessori Toddler” is the rare book that is simultaneously idealistic and practical, philosophical and grounded, beautiful and useful. It will not solve every problem. It will not eliminate tantrums. It will not make your mornings serene or your toddler cooperative on demand.
What it will do is change the way you see the small person standing in your kitchen, demanding to pour their own milk. It will help you see not a mess in progress but a mind in progress. Not a battle of wills but a bid for competence. Not a terrible two but a remarkable human being doing the hardest developmental work of their entire life.
Simone Davies has written a book that trusts children. And in trusting children, it teaches parents to trust themselves. That double trust, offered with patience and practiced with imperfection, is the foundation of everything good that follows.
Hand them the small pitcher. Let them pour. Clean up the spill together. Watch them beam.
That is Montessori. And it starts with this book.
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