51–60 of 247 posts
I went to a Montessori school from pre-K through 6th grade. I totally agree with this article. It is not easy to make this work on a public school-sized scale. The problem in education is not funding. We were a private school, but we made it work on a shoestring.
Why not? Costs are lower, etc.
I send my child to a private Montessori school. With that said, there's no denying that sending your child to a private Montessori school is similar to parents who buy books in learning to parent are typically better parents not because they read the books but because they care enough to buy the books. If you care enough to send your child to a Montessori school, the parent is invested in the child's success and I th…
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…
Which should make no sense because the teachers themselves work odd years in one school, even years in the other school.
I went to a Montessori school from pre-K through 6th grade. I totally agree with this article. It is not easy to make this work on a public school-sized scale. The problem in education is not funding. We were a private school, but we made it work on a shoestring.
Kids stop caring way too young as a self-preservation mechanism. This means many of them also stop trying... It's a spiral that can only be broken by restructuring.
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 had a good impression of "Montessori" from hearing that Larry/Sergey/Bezos went to one. When I put my kid in it at 3 years old, he hated it. As I looked into it more, it seems to me that it is actually very rigid, with kids being able to play with just a small set of toys that don't really exercise their creativity, and with little opportunity for group play. We switched him to a Reggio Emilia school where the kids…
There exist various implementations of Montessori. AMI was founded by Dr. Montessori [0] and certifies schools so that parents can have some assurance of adherence to a standard. The many materials in a Montessori classroom, including things that look like a dollhouse, don't exist for unstructured play but are learning tools for the guide and student to use in their work. Once the student gets a lesson using a material, then they can choose to practice using the material in their self-directed work periods, which can be in groups.
My kids had a mostly positive mixed experience in Montessori. In addition to evaluating how a child comes to grip with the method, there is also how they work with their guide. My observation is that even skilled practitioners don't always achieve a strong rapport with every student. In those situations the Montessori classroom's weakness is that there is only one guide for all subjects as opposed to a traditional school's subject-specific teachers.
0. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Association_Montessori_Interna...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I had a good impression of "Montessori" from hearing that Larry/Sergey/Bezos went to one. When I put my kid in it at 3 years old, he hated it. As I looked into it more, it seems to me that it is actually very rigid, with kids being able to play with just a small set of toys that don't really exercise their creativity, and with little opportunity for group play. We switched him to a Reggio Emilia school where the kids…
There are different “factions” and accreditation organizations in Montessori. Some are more liberal and others are authoritarian and rigid. Not all Montessori schools are like you describe, but some certainly are.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I had a good impression of "Montessori" from hearing that Larry/Sergey/Bezos went to one. When I put my kid in it at 3 years old, he hated it. As I looked into it more, it seems to me that it is actually very rigid, with kids being able to play with just a small set of toys that don't really exercise their creativity, and with little opportunity for group play. We switched him to a Reggio Emilia school where the kids…
There are different “factions” and accreditation organizations in Montessori. Some are more liberal and others are authoritarian and rigid. Not all Montessori schools are like you describe, but some certainly are.
I went to a Montessori school from pre-K through 6th grade. I totally agree with this article. It is not easy to make this work on a public school-sized scale. The problem in education is not funding. We were a private school, but we made it work on a shoestring.
> It is not easy to make this work on a public school-sized scale. Why not? Costs are lower, etc.
The upfront costs of teacher training and Montessori materials were amortized
over their expected lifespan of 25 y. Total costs for Montessori and
traditional programs were divided by the average number of children in each
type of classroom at the PK3, PK4, and kindergarten years, then summed to
yield the cost difference of Montessori and traditional programming over
three years of public preschool.
Any alternative school system is lower-cost than public schools if they don't have to support the needs of students with severe disabilities.
That's taken care of in the study design. The population was all kids who applied to the lottery. And the treatment group wasn't those who actually attended the Montessori school, but those who were offered a place due to the lottery. So I don't see how special needs would bias the results. If the lottery excludes those with special needs (either by design or due to self-selection) then there's no bias between contro…
That doesn't necessarily mean the result will extrapolate, though. It seems plausible that teachers in Montessori schools are more motivated and knowledgeable than the average teacher and have made a conscious decision to teach in such a school. If every public school were to become a Montessori school, you would still get the cost savings (student-to-teacher ratios are higher in Montessori!) but you might lose that above-average enthusiasm and expertise and so the learning gains might not carry over. It's just really hard to know whether something might generalize in the educational sciences.