Why should you choose Montessori for your child?

Montessori education is driven by an ambitious aim: To aid the child’s development into a complete adult human being, comfortable with himself, with his society and with humanity as a whole.

The Montessori approach is focused on giving support to the natural development of the human being. This is done with the understanding that the fully developed human being is then better disposed to learning the things that he needs to become an integrated and contributing member of society. The substance of the human being—the development of character and integration of the whole personality—are traditionally approached as values that must be instilled into the child. The resu lt is children who are bored or stressed and a society with increasing levels of mental illness.

Today, as it was a century ago, education is rightly seen as a means to tackle poverty, inequality, anti-social behaviour and other ills of society. Prior to birth, it is of course the embryo that guides its own development. The fundamental p roblem with traditional education is a lack of faith in the child to continue to guide his own development—and to guide the educators in supporting this task. Montessori education begins with the understanding that the role of the adult is to help the unfolding of the child’s inborn developmental powers. The child, from the earliest moments of life, possesses great constructive energies that guide the formation of his mind and the coordination of his body. The Montessori approach was developed without preconceived ideas as to how best to aid the child in his journey to adulthood. Instead, key Montessori ideas emerged from the observation of children in diverse cultures and in many countries:

2.    That within each of these planes the child or adolescent has specific ‘sensitivities’ or ‘windows of opportunity’ to acquire a particular human trait, for example a sensitivity that guides the child to the acquisition of language in the first plane (0-6 years), or that guides the child to the development of a moral ‘compass’ in the second plane (6-12 years).

3.    That in addition to these age-specific sensitivities, human beings have a number of behavioural tendencies that give each child the ability to adapt to his or her place and time. These human traits—for example, to explore, order, manipulate, imagine, repeat, work and communicate—have been crucial to human evolution and are active within the child

A prepared environment

Montessori emphasizes reality-based hands-on learning. Classrooms are arranged with child-size furniture and open spaces to invite movement and exploration, with materials available on shelves around the room. Prepared environments allow the directresses to spend each day giving presentations or demonstrations of activities available on the classroom shelves. Children can observe a presentation, work independently, get their own snack or visit the in-class bathroom as the need arises. To the extent that they’re able to accept and respond to it, this freedom allows children to develop self-control and an internal set of guidelines that become part of their personalities.

These special environments also let children explore materials through a variety of tasks, which leads to thinking about how the tasks and materials all relate to each other. Each activity takes place at a table or while the child is seated at a rug. Free interaction in the classroom helps our students develop social relationships, with the older children in the room helping the younger students. Meanwhile, the logical, sequential nature of the curriculum provides orderly structure that guides discovery and creativity. Expectations are clearly stated in the classroom and reinforced by the directress and the students.

This setting naturally leads to every child feeling important and like a member of the community. Children in the Montessori environment feel active, strong, excited, happy, relaxed, sociable and proud as they do their daily work. In short, Montessori students discover the joy in learning, and develop a sense of pride and ownership in their work.

There are no grades or tests in the curriculum. Instead, Montessori directresses provide feedback and qualitative analysis as a list of skills, activities and critical points. A written evaluation of the child’s achievements and strengths, with an emphasis on areas of anticipated growth and improvement, is reviewed with the parents twice a year during a conference with the directresses. Parents can always contact the directress at any time during the school year if they have questions or concerns.

"I observed a 5 year old child telling a 2 and a half year old child to roll up a rug before choosing new work. Because kids take responsibility for the class environment, the teacher is freed up to teach."