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Public Montessori programs strengthen learning outcomes at lower costs: study

phys.org

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

#71

Post by notahacker »

terespuwash wrote: post #22

Only one-fifth of parents gave permission to participate in the study, the schools differed in how “authentic” their Montessori approach was, and the measurements only go up to the end of kindergarten. So we do not know whether the differences persist.

Yeah. Certainly if the US regular pre-school system looks anything like the UK one, the difference between non-Montessori and Montessori pre-schools in the sorts of play actually encouraged probably isn't that big. The authors attempt to control for notable differences in the demographics of the treatment group, but they're there (and in this case, the higher incomes of the parents in the treatment group probably not just a wealth effect, but a correlate of other systematic differences with the parents who didn't...)

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

#72

Post by em-bee »

spicyusername wrote: post #63
obscurette wrote: post #57

Most of public schools over the world struggle with much more basic problems than methods or programs. The most important thing IMHO is a stable environment. You can use the very best methods and programs, but if teachers change frequently, like it become more and more a norm in public schools, all these don't matter much really.

Or even more basic, if the parents don't have the time or temperament to properly participate in parenting, then the teachers or the school aren't really going to matter either.

i believe some countries have a different experience. in a report about participating on online classes from home during covid in germany it was observed that kids with worse conditions at home were disadvantaged the most, which leads to the reverse conclusion that for these kids going to school did matter.

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

#73

Post by notahacker »

mmooss wrote: post #50
cool_dude85 wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the risk is that there is some systematic difference between those who chose to participate and the overall population of public Montessori kids. For instance, maybe those with high incomes disproportionately chose to participate, and Montessori strengthens learning for this group, but if we could measure the whole population the result is more mixed. It can't be a fully RCT if there's some kind of opt-in pro…

This is a speculative criticism about a hypothetical problem. How random was the study?

https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2506130122 You could have answered your own question by reading the abstract, which makes it clear that the OP's conjecture was correct: the lotteries were random or somewhat random, but the groups which consented to the study were notably different, with the treatment group being richer, more educated and whiter. They did of course attempt to control for this, whether the controls were adequate or omitted other underlying differences is another question.

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

#74

Post by paulryanrogers »

ryukoposting wrote: post #37
PiRho3141 wrote: post #27

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 spent months doing research for a blog post about One Laptop Per Child last year, and came to a related, but more broad conclusion: it's extremely easy to reach misleading conclusions when studying novel educational methods. No strong conclusion comes without qualifiers related to culture and economics. Moreover, a shocking amount of harm has been done by people trying to apply an educational method outside of the…

> But how do we remedy the situation when those experiments fail?

Or worse, know we need a remedy when no one is even checking for success or failure?

Thankfully the US is well on its way to dismantling the Department of Education. So no stuffy bureaucrats getting in the way /s

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

#75

Post by andrepd »

gedy wrote: post #44
jedimastert wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you care enough to send your child to a Montessori school Think you mean to say that if you are well be enough to send your child to a private school...I try not to pull out the "privilege" card but good grief.

My kids went to a free charter school, with similar setup and care from parents. The outcomes were notable and it wasn't really about privilege imho. (Though some activist type folks I know who count "parents who care" as a form a privilege.)

Which it is? From the child's pov obviously, not from the parent's.

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

#76

Post by mcv »

technothrasher wrote: post #20
mcv wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These were randomised. It sounds like they eliminated this selection bias. Also, this is just about preschool. For regular school, I've grown more skeptical, because it didn't work well for either of my kids. They struggled with the independence and planning, and didn't get much done. One switched to special education during primary school and is doing excellent there (but that has much more guidance and costs more,…

I think it largely depends upon the child. I thrived in a Montessori environment right through sixth grade before transitioning to a standard “prep school” and found myself way ahead of the other kids in a lot of things. Alternately, my son was much the same as your kid. He struggled in a Montessori school which was very similar to the one I went to (in fact, my lower elementary teacher was the learning specialist at…

It absolutely depends on the child. I phrased it too generally. I like the idea of Montessori a lot, but it depends a lot on executive skills: being able to plan, start project, finish projects, etc. My kids both sucked at that, and I'm not great at it either. My oldest son, despite his stellar IQ, completely drowned in projects. No idea what to do, when to start, how to start, how to finish it, and even when he finished it, he forgot to turn it in. He simply needs more guidance.

He's now finally getting better at it, at 16, which is about time, because at the university, you have to be able to do all of this. I sucked at it in university, so maybe it's actually good that he ran into these problems earlier than that, but for him to actually finish school, it was not a good fit.

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

#77

Post by cma »

rahimnathwani wrote: post #25
cma wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Still the ones who got in would be with more other students who opted in, the ones who didn't get in would be with more students who didn't opt-in to the lottery. You would need to have a second group of those who lost the lottery and were all put into the same non-Montessori school with no others who didn't opt-in maybe.

Oh you mean it could all be peer group effects?

Yeah but even then teachers that opt in to train in Montessori might just be better teachers, and converting a whole school system to Montessori, training everyone, might not have as good results.

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

#78

Post by inglor_cz »

bdangubic wrote: post #62
inglor_cz wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Class sizes under 20 and schools under 120 at least through middle school would raise a far less pathologically self-centered society." This is a big if. Until the 1990s, class sizes routinely exceeded 30 and school sizes 500 in former Czechoslovakia, but I wouldn't call us "pathologically self-centered society". As for self-centeredness, shrinking family size might be the true reason. Only children tend to be a lot…

> As for self-centeredness, shrinking family size might be the true reason. Only children tend to be a lot more pampered than kids who were born into a family of six. to quote @inglor_cz - this is big if… you are arguing against generalization in your first paragraph and then you are proceeding to generalize… I am only child and my daughter is too and neither of us (especially me) have been pampered

I am an only child too. "Tend to be" is quite a soft claim, though, with plenty of room for exceptions.

The Little Emperors phenomenon is still a thing. If a kid has two parents and four grandparents who have no other descendands, it is USUALLY on the receiving end of a lot more attention and resources than if there are six of them.

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

#79

Post by em-bee »

bonoboTP wrote: post #54

Might be due to many other things than the Montessori methodology. Such as peer quality and teacher quality, potentially better and more expensive/healthy lunches or a million other things.

montessori methodology and training (at least as certified by AMI) is a strong selector for teacher quality. trainees have to spend 90 hours in class just observing children and writing reports about their observations as part of their training. they learn to understand what the kids need and how to teach them. i am not aware that traditional teacher education does any of that.

likewise peer quality should not be even a factor because of the way how montessori education works. children are not given the opportunity to disrupt others.

the methodology is all-encompassing. it affects the children from the moment they enter the school, until they leave to go home. most of the potential other factors in the school are eliminated by the methodology itself.

it's hard to envision. you have to observe a class in action to understand why.

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

#80

Post by bityard »

obscurette wrote: post #57

Most of public schools over the world struggle with much more basic problems than methods or programs. The most important thing IMHO is a stable environment. You can use the very best methods and programs, but if teachers change frequently, like it become more and more a norm in public schools, all these don't matter much really.

Somehow most of my circle of friends are public school teachers. Sure, there are teachers who forgot their "why" and only still do it for the (not very impressive) paycheck and eventual pension. But most teachers really, REALLY care about seeing kids succeed. The problems they talk about frequently are:

1. Lack of support from parents. Many parents treat school as free daycare and are not invested at all in their kids. They don't care of their kid gets good grades, they don't care if they get bad grades. They don't come to parent-teacher conferences. When their kid gets in trouble, they either insist that their kid didn't do anything wrong. Or literally tell the school, "hey, after that morning bell rings, he's your problem, don't hassle me about it."

2. Lack of funding. Need I say more.

3. Lack of authority. If a kid is being constantly disruptive, the teachers are told they just have to deal with it. They can't eject a kid from the classroom for ANY reason except when physical harm is imminent. My son's class had several students who were pretty much allowed to be on their chromebooks all day every day because the alternative was constant verbal abuse toward the their classmates and teacher. My son thought this was deeply unfair. He wasn't wrong.

4. Many school systems have a kind of twisted version of "no child left behind." All the kids who have special educational, emotional, or behavioral needs get plopped into regular classrooms with regular teachers. This is bad for basically everyone. The kids with special needs aren't getting the specialized teaching they require. If they are disruptive (and they often are when they aren't getting what they need), the whole class falls behind in learning because the teacher has to spend 1/2 their time dealing with 1/30th of the class.

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