The Montessori materials facilitate a transfer of non-specific knowledge; that of a general idea or principle that can later be used as a basis for recognizing special cases or applications of it. Therefore, the material is limited to the essential idea or principle to polarize the learner’s attention and to eliminate all distracting factors. (Montessori, Mario Jr.)

“…it is necessary to eliminate as far as possible all other perceptions, …and so to polarize attention on them that all other images shall be obscured in the field of consciousness. This would be the scientific method tending to isolate perceptions, and it is, in fact, the practical method adopted by us in our education of the senses… this will initiate order therein, because with the help of the technique of isolation, they will begin to make him distinguish one thing from another.” (Montessori, Maria, The Advanced Montessori Method Volume I, pp. 32-32) “The perfection of this exercise consists in removing as far as possible all distracting factors. It enables a child to engage in an inner and external analysis that can help him acquire an orderly mind.” (Montessori, Maria, The Discovery of the Child, p. 104)