My little world
began in a kindergarten through 12th grade private school in a
Columbus suburb, followed by a public high school, eventually leading me to
Texas Christian University. All of these
provided me with incredible opportunities, but I wouldn’t consider any of them
atypical from the majority of educational systems in the United States.
Recently, I had the opportunity to visit Montessori
Children’s House (MCH),
a Montessori school located in Fort Worth.
I had previously heard of the Montessori approach to learning, but never
really knew what exactly it meant. My
visit was pleasantly surprising!
This school was
founded in 1968 by two teachers who sought to bring the teachings of Dr. Maria
Montessori, an Italian doctor who studied child development, to the children of
Fort Worth. MCH’s goal is to set the foundation for children as learners, so
they can continue on with the skills necessary to reach their full potential in
all areas of life.
Dr. Montessori’s
plan fosters a natural way of learning—most prominently the notion of learning
by doing. The younger children use hands-on learning devices to give them a
“feel” for concepts, progressively working toward an understanding of abstract
concepts. You can learn more about the
Montessori method here.
The classroom
style at MCH was incredibly different from anything I’d seen before. Students
are separated by age into four learning communities: toddler, preschool, lower
elementary and upper elementary. Our
tour guide explained that the learning communities enable students to develop
with their peers, fostering teamwork and collaboration, instead of having rigid
grade structures that can inhibit the developmental process.
As we walked
into a classroom we saw a traditional school’s nightmare: there were children
everywhere! While this preschool class only had about 12 students, each was working
on something different. (I was most impressed by the child who successfully
completed a South America puzzle.) Our
guide explained that each student works on his or her own individualized
learning plan at his or her own pace, fostering independence.
Not all of the
day is spent on individual lesson plans, however. The class comes together for
group enrichment lessons every day, ranging from a topic on geography or
history, to special classes in Spanish, music and art to foster creativity and
stimulate other learning. Students are also taught life-skills lessons through
manners classes and a child-friendly kitchen environment where they are
required to clean up after themselves after eating lunch or a snack.
The other
learning communities rooms functioned in similar ways, but the environments
placed a greater emphasis on teamwork.
Computers are not introduced until the upper-elementary level, as the
faculty and staff try to minimize student’s time in front of the screen, which
can be detrimental to development.
Further, faculty and staff attempt to maximize students’ time outdoors
as we are increasingly becoming a vitamin-D deficient society.
This environment
was vastly different from the standardized educational system many schools
follow. At first, I was a bit leery of the individual nature of learning, but
the more I observed the more I grew to appreciate this pattern of learning and
realized its long-term benefits, as these students will have mastered the art
of self-sufficiency and group collaboration when making the transition to
college.
I found my time
at MCH to be intriguing and enlightening. It was a wonderful opportunity to
step out of my “own little world” and experience the unfamiliarity of the
Montessori method to education, definitely something to keep in mind for those
school-shopping for their children in the future.
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