montesori

[jenz]

hello, could anybody pls give me the pros/cons of this type of teaching and schools.there is a montesori school in my area and i have wondered about sending ds there.headteacher is a very lovely lady.
the other day i noticed kids leaving the local "conventional" primary after a hard days work.every child i passed had their head down staring at the pavement whilst walking.most would have walked straight into me.i was shocked these children must leave school like this every day ,after 10 years what is left of their souls! i know i detested school("could try harder"and i dont imagine its got any easier since then(1990).in an ideal world i would hope that school helps to open my childs eyes and mind to possibilities not shut them off to the world.
i know this is a very complex problem on many different levels but i would love to hear what other people think.would also like to hear about other alternatives to mainstream schools.

My dd currently goes to a Montessori nursery and she loves it. Many people criticise Montessori as being "too rigid" and at first I didn't understand that comment at all because the whole point to Montessori is learning through play. My daughter is incredibly happy there (its easter and she's spent the last week demanding to go there!) but I do now sort of see what people mean. They follow a strict routine in which the child can join in or not. This suits my dd down to the ground and she rarely joins in and goes off with a couple of others to do what she wants - however the teachers always review her on this. Its funny whilst they talk about the child having complete freedom to do what they want I suspect secretly they want her to follow the routine.

She's only 3 at the moment and if we could afford it we would seriously consider allowing her to stay at this school until she's 11. The main thing that would concern me then would be how they would ensure that she learnt all the standards needed to move onto senior school. The problem is that we all have areas that we enjoy but that doesn't mean that other areas should be neglected at such a young age. Since they have an excellent OFSTED report and very good results they must manage it somehow but it does interest me.

Finally when dd first started at 18 months when I went in for her first review the teacher told me she didn't know her colours or her shapes. Since dd had just had her 2 year review (the result of which much to our pride we had been told that she was far in advance of her age in these areas) I was pretty disgusted. I proceeded to demonstrate that not only did my dd know her shapes and colours but had also recently started to learn her letters (her choice not ours). It appeared that because my dd liked going off and playing house that the teachers assumed she couldn't do things. Luckily when she moved into the next class she gained a far better teacher and at her last review I was pleased to note that the teacher had pretty much the same view as me.

As I said up top, dd absolutely adores going there and is very happy but I suspect different children react differently and I think you would have to assess the school individually. Also I suspect that all schools will have teachers that you and your child will like/dislike etc. I visited a seperate montesori nursery only and hated it! But with this one if we could have afforded I would seriously investigate keeping dd there as overall I really like it.

Good luck

My ds, aged 2 and a half, started Montessori nursery in January. He loves it - cries when it's time to go home. Currently only goes 2 mornings a week (4 hr session), but I will probably increase to 3 sessions when he is 3). His speech and general knowledge of things like colours, counting, letters have come on in leaps and bounds which is really pleasing. But the main thing is he is so happy there - he runs in and gives his favorite teacher a hug! They do so many different activities with them, all the messy things which perhaps you may not do at home, cooking, painting. sticking things etc. They also have a little garden and grow things, also have some fish and Giant African Land Snails which are quite disgusting!! All in all I can't praise it enough.

Another alternative is Steiner. Formal learning starts later than in conventional schools- the children learn to read and write form age 7. But they do spend the earlier years doing lots of pre-writing skills. Play is a very important [art of the early curriculum.

From the age of 7-14 they have one main teacher who moves up the school with them. They do quite alot of physical activity - gardening for example, and even things like maths lessons involve a lot of movement.

I think it is a lovely education. You don't leave a Steiner school with lots of qualifications but that doesn't seem to have stopped graduates of our local Steiner school going onto Cambridge or to become doctors or whatever (they may need to do an extra year of collecting qualifications iyswim- having taught in that sector that's fairly easy these days- and universitys are becoming much more flexible anyway).

We would love ds2 to go to Steiner - I have a feeling that it may end up being logistically impossible- at least for the early years (we are a bit constrained by ds1 who has SEN). We are down on the waiting list for the school though - so we'll see at the time.

A lot of people think that steiner is very unstructured, but it isn't- "rhythm" is very important in Steiner schools- I think people often confuse Steiner with say Summerhill which is totally different - at least around here as there is also a summerhill type school nearby (summerhill is the school where pupils have an equal say and are fairly notorious for swearing at teachers a lot )

I know less about Montessori- unfortunatelty there aren't many establishements in the UK that carry on above nursery level (there are a few on the south coast I think)

No experience of this myself yet, but my mum is head of a state nursery school and is not keen at all on Montessori eduction. She has commented that children transferring to her school from Montessori schools have trouble mixing with the other kids and don't really know how to collaborate and play together. She has described to me how Montessori schools give children a space of their own, and they are expected to go fetch an activity, bring it to their space, play with it alone and then put it back before selecting another activity.

My son sorry ds (2 and a half)has been attending a pure Montessori nursery for one term (Jan - Mar) and he seems to thoroughly enjoy it. I was a bit concerned myself about the individual approach and a Montessori trained teacher friend of mine said she , having gone through the training would never send her child through Montessori school. That did concern me but he seems to like it. It is terribly difficult to decide. Some more traditional nurseries would be inclined to say that the Mont. equipment is useful to a degree but can be a bit restrictive and not very colourful. You could try and see if there is an Ofsted report on this particular school. There are many confictly views on it but ds loves it so you have to be pleased with that I think. Many of these difficult schools decisions to come I fear!!!

Have just read NQWWW's comment and would say that my dd and her friends at her Montessori nursery could not be more gregarious and friendly! Of course they may have been like this regardless of which school they attended, it's impossible to know.

I am sometimes upset and how some other children react to my daughter's friendliness, either by ignoring her or simply staring at her (she is not pushy, she just loves talking and playing with other children of all ages).

One of the reasons we decided to sent dd to Montessori is that we noticed how happy the children seemed to be when they came out of school - unlike so many others schools around.