Public Montessori programs strengthen learning outcomes at lower costs: study • Hacker News Board

Re: Public Montessori programs strengthen learning outcomes at lower costs: study

#221

Post by foxglacier » Sat, Oct 25, 2025, 6:55 PM UTC

sersi wrote: post #169

dzhiurgis wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I went to one near me just to check it out. They started to moan about public education system and seemed want to be alternative for the sake of it. Some parents I know there are definitely on a woo-woo spectrum. School system in NZ is already a lot like montessori with heaps of fluidity. p.s. I’ve been joking that soon you won’t be able to take your kid anywhere without a montessori/waldorf/reggio franchise.

The thing is Montessori doesn't mean anything. Any school can call themselves Montessori. So it all depends on actual accreditation. Some accreditations are also not worth the paper they're printed on (like NAMC). AMI and AMS are considered to be the two most serious accreditation My son's school is AMI accredited and at least there's not much woo-woo here. Children have to be up to date with vaccination (or they're…

Sounds like Montessori is healthier than public HK schools but it's more borderline in NZ, as parent said. Nobody has homework in kindergarten there!

Yea Steiner is woo-woo but so what? Most people are woo-woo (religion) and perhaps old Rudolf realized it has some value in human development. The specific details of the woo hardly matter.

As I see it, the main values of Steiner are the close community and the not forcing them to do logical thinking in Piaget's preoperational stage (before 7 years old), which Rudolf seems to have interpreted as play-play-play all day-day-day, but that might be fine.

Re: Public Montessori programs strengthen learning outcomes at lower costs: study

#222

Post by sersi » Sat, Oct 25, 2025, 7:10 PM UTC

em-bee wrote: post #183

rkomorn wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds like a no true Scotsman: "If it didn't work, it wasn't good Montessori."

rather it wasn't montessori period. as it has been mentioned multiple times, the name montessori is not protected. anyone can claim to be a montessori teacher even if they didn't get any training. my wife went through AMI training. i have observed it at times. it is rigorous. and i have observed classes with trained teachers. the difference is noticeable what i am saying is more like: if you didn't learn math in scho…

My son goes to an AMI accredited school with AMI accredited teachers only. In general parents in elementary rave about the school. However, we did talk to a few parents whose kids are in elementary that had the same problem with mathematics. Their kids weren't interested in Math and they didn't do as much as they could do. The teacher did try to push a bit and the kids didn't do no mathematics but they were easily one year below what they should be. One of our close friend who had that specific problem with his daughter solved it easily with tuition but complains that it shouldn't be the case.

In kindergarten (casa), there's a lot of structure with individualised work and a child is unlikely to have gaps in a specific subject. On the other hand, I think that in elementary with the stronger focus on group projects, it's easier for certain subject to fall by the wayside if a student doesn't particularly care for them.

Re: Public Montessori programs strengthen learning outcomes at lower costs: study

#223

Post by sersi » Sat, Oct 25, 2025, 7:34 PM UTC

foxglacier wrote: post #221

sersi wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The thing is Montessori doesn't mean anything. Any school can call themselves Montessori. So it all depends on actual accreditation. Some accreditations are also not worth the paper they're printed on (like NAMC). AMI and AMS are considered to be the two most serious accreditation My son's school is AMI accredited and at least there's not much woo-woo here. Children have to be up to date with vaccination (or they're…

Sounds like Montessori is healthier than public HK schools but it's more borderline in NZ, as parent said. Nobody has homework in kindergarten there! Yea Steiner is woo-woo but so what? Most people are woo-woo (religion) and perhaps old Rudolf realized it has some value in human development. The specific details of the woo hardly matter. As I see it, the main values of Steiner are the close community and the not forc…

Yes, public schools in Asian countries tend to be very problematic to say the least. New Zealand, Australia and Europe tend to have vastly better schools when it comes to respecting the child's need to play. I do see the value of things being child-directed versus being play based but directed by the teacher (like I had as a kid in France) and that for me is the benefit of Reggio Emilia and Montessori.

To be fair, I also wouldn't put my kid in a religious school :) But yes, I agree there's some good ideas with waldorf. Personally though if I had been told when I was a kid not read before 7, I would have been rather pissed off.

Re: Public Montessori programs strengthen learning outcomes at lower costs: study

#224

Post by fsckboy » Sat, Oct 25, 2025, 7:38 PM UTC

genghisjahn wrote: post #93

WillAdams wrote: post #32

My children attended Montessori schools, and it really is a wonderful system. I would really like to see an extension of this learning method up through high school --- the closest thing I'm aware of was a school I attended in Mississippi for a couple of years --- classes were divided between academic and social, social classes (homeroom, phys ed, social studies, &c.) were attended at one's age, while academic classe…

I can’t find any record of a Mississippi Supreme Court decision regarding a program like you described. I did find evidence that Mississippi actively permits dual enrollment for secondary and post secondary education. Do you have a source for the decision you referenced? https://law.justia.com/codes/mississippi/title-37/chapter-15...

he didn't say it went to the Supreme Court or even any Mississippi court

he said it was dismantled. teacher's unions and their political allies and pliant schoolboards are always vehemently opposed to any programs like this. something that shows some students excelling and or makes some teachers look good just makes other teachers look bad, and that raises questions and increases scrutiny from outside, and they can't allow that.

Re: Public Montessori programs strengthen learning outcomes at lower costs: study

#225

Post by antasvara » Sat, Oct 25, 2025, 7:46 PM UTC

em-bee wrote: post #209

antasvara wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nope, fully accredited Montessori school and trained Montessori teachers. I'm actually a huge fan of Montessori schools, including the one I went to. It was a great experience. But in my experience and the experience of a lot of others I've talked to, Montessori schools aren't perfect. The method does really well fostering natural curiosity and harnessing it for learning. Essentially, it develops internal motivation…

the method struggles with students that can't find that internal motivation it was my impression that this should not be a problem, but i have to admit that my knowledge and experience with montessori is not enough to understand why this would or would not be the case. if this is really a problem, it needs to be addressed, and i would find it surprising if it hasn't already been solved in the meantime. i don't believ…

I don't doubt that it's a solvable problem. Basically any educational method claims to work for every kid, and in theory they all do.

I just think that any method of education is a series of tradeoffs. Time management and difficulty working on thing you don't like (and a lot of this is personal experience, both my own and in discussions with others) seems to be the largest tradeoff.

Bottom line is that almost no system gets implemented perfectly, so it's important to understand the common "failure" points. This seems to be the Montessori one.

Thats not to say this is a bad thing! Depending on your beliefs, decreased study skills and/or mediocre time management are way less important than maintaining a natural curiosity. But the skills some kids end up missing are very important in traditional schooling environments like universities and high schools.

Re: Public Montessori programs strengthen learning outcomes at lower costs: study

#226

Post by solfox » Sat, Oct 25, 2025, 7:53 PM UTC

ScotterC wrote: post #127

solfox wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

PLEASE do your due diligence before considering Waldorf for your kids. I'm not saying that kids cannot have a good experience at a Waldorf school, or that all their educational ideas are bad. Just that once you children have been there for a couple of years, you learn some very disturbing truths about the organization. It's not an education institution as much as it is a religious organization - your children WILL be…

My kids are at a Waldorf school currently. I would not be surprised by your experience from what I’ve learned. However I’ve also seen a truly incredible environment at my school and zero cult adherence to Steiner. My best explanation is that each Waldorf school is very much its own island - it seems to be a very federated system.

We enrolled our kids in K thinking the same as you - some light eco-minded spirituality never harmed anyone. Until we started to learn more about their actual philosophy.

From my experience, the teachers and admin will actively disclaim any adherence to the Waldorf / Anthroposophy connections, but I can assure you that if this is truly a Waldorf school (not "Waldorf-inspired"), they are 100% absolutely members of the Anthroposophy organization. I saw teachers actually do things like quickly hide away Steiner's books from their desk when parents would drop in. But do dig a bit deeper into your school if you can - you'll find there is a "college of teachers" and other such secretive meetings, religious Christian-inspired songs being taught to the children (speaking of God and angels from heaven), and more such nonsense at your school.

If you are a Anthroposophist, then by all means, send your kids there. But Waldorf has an international track record[1] of hiding covering their tracks and pretending to be secular when they are anything but. They just don't belong to a religion that you've heard much about [2].

[1] https://waldorfcritics.org/concerns/ [2] https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-cult-of-waldorf-sc...

Re: Public Montessori programs strengthen learning outcomes at lower costs: study

#227

Post by antasvara » Sat, Oct 25, 2025, 7:58 PM UTC

ianbicking wrote: post #195

antasvara wrote: post #141

Having been through Montessori, I think it's fantastic for kids that are naturally self-driven. I had a great time when it came to learning science and English (the two subjects I cared the most about). Howrver, I was also pretty far behind in math for reasons unrelated to ability (standardized testing and secondary educational success indicate that I'm actually pretty good at math). I also left with very underdevelo…

I think there might be a pattern across education with a strong ideology (Montessori, Waldorf, Classical education, etc) that they aren't very good at recognizing when the ideology is failing a kid. The relatively weak and mushy educational philosophy of a normal public school is also a somewhat reasonable way to run a school that has to take kids wherever they are at and wherever they came from.

>that they aren't very good at recognizing when the ideology is failing a kid.

I would amend this somewhat to say that most ideologies have aspects that are much less effective in practice than they are in theory. I think this matches your sentiment, but addresses the likely rebuttal of "But X method has this specific element designed to address the shortcoming."

Re: Public Montessori programs strengthen learning outcomes at lower costs: study

#228

Post by antasvara » Sat, Oct 25, 2025, 8:30 PM UTC

em-bee wrote: post #187

rkomorn wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So every good Montessori school has a 100% success rate? Edit: and corollary, I guess, any Montessori school that has less than 100% success rate is not a good Montessori school? > the no true scotsman fallacy does not apply here. I don't buy this at all.

the no true scotsman fallacy goes like this: no true scotsman would to X, but then you find one that does X. but the situation here is more like: no true scotsman doesn't have scottisch ancestors or at least live in scotland. i don't have scottish ancestors, and i have never even been there, so i can't ever be a true scotsman, as much as i'd like to be one. it doesn't have to be a 100% success rate but being pretty f…

>it can't be a failure of the montessori method because the very design and goal of the method is to not let that happen. or at least the chance is very small. and then it is still a failure of the teacher and not the method.

High intensity interval training (HIIT) is an exercise method that involves very short (think under 5 minutes) intetvals of max effort exercise followed by breaks. This methodology validates very well in scientific literature, both conceptually and in exercise studies that show impressive fitness gains.

It also, by many accounts from researchers and participants, sucks super hard to do correctly. You need to be putting in truly grueling amounts of effort during the intervals to see the advertised benefits. Most people, even when they try to do this, aren't doing it correctly.

I think you could say two things about someone that's not seeing results from HIIT:

1. HIIT is super effective; if you're not getting good results, it's because you're doing it incorrectly. 2. HIIT is not actually a reasonable exercise regimen for most people; this means it's not a great exercise regimen.

Statement 1 is logically true. Statement 2 can be more or less true depending on the theory (walking 20 minutes a day is a lot more reasonable than requiring total exhaustion, whereas a theoretical routine that requires Tasering yourself is less reasonable and makes Statement 2 much more true).

What I've described as my experience in Montessori is definitely Statement 2. I'm sure the method has ways to combat my problems, and if I had gone to a "better" Montessori school it's entirely possible they would have dealt with them. But from what I've seen, these specific problems crop up enough that I think they're a fair criticism.

Re: Public Montessori programs strengthen learning outcomes at lower costs: study

#229

Post by didibus » Sat, Oct 25, 2025, 8:36 PM UTC

diordiderot wrote: post #151

didibus wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This means the students in class 1 get undisrupted classes, learning more and raising their grades. That's pure hypothetical, and some disruptive kids are also good and could make it to the top class and still be a class clown. Unless you propose more splitting kids up by "disruptiveness". I don't think any of this tells us of the quality of the method for actually teaching. It's like schools that have really hard…

It isn't hypothetical, lower disruptive peer-behaviour in a class is associated with better outcomes for the class, across the world.

That's not what was proposed though, what was proposed was to have kids move up as their ability develops.

It's pure hypothesis that this would coincide with less disruption in classes, even more that it would be causative.

I also find it purely hypothetical that it does anything to make kids better.

You said lack of disruptiveness is associated with better outcomes, have any research or data about it? Otherwise it too is pure hypothetical.

A hypothesis isn't bad, but since we're on the topic of ability, let's not devolve into cargo cults.

Re: Public Montessori programs strengthen learning outcomes at lower costs: study

#230

Post by HPsquared » Sat, Oct 25, 2025, 8:55 PM UTC

zorked wrote: post #52

mlinhares wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I did high school at a prestigious technical school at my hometown, hard to get in, very competitive. The education itself wasn't that much better than my previous school but they had the name recognition and as getting in was very hard, likely the best students around town. Almost 100% pass rate to college, mostly the best colleges. Did the education provided there affect this? Likely, but it was much more the self…

In my hometown there is something like that. There are two schools, one of them had a year with particularly good approval rates. Competitive parents started preferring that school, finding ways to send their kids there. That school has been sustaining better approval rates since then. Which should make no sense because the teachers themselves work odd years in one school, even years in the other school.

Goes to show the students are more important than the teachers.