Montessori Philosophy Superwoman was already here!

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MONTESSORI EDUCATION



*The Montessori philosophy video was very interesting and something I have never heard about before. Dr. Maria Montessori was a women who pioneered for the first half of the 20th century and came up with her own personal method of education, and a model that can end the race to nowhere. Today in the United States, over there are over 4000 Montessori schools which include 300 public schools where students attend for free! Even though there seems to be a lot of Montessori schools, this makes up less than 5% of American children attending Montessori schools which is very low.

In the video there are three reason stated of why Montessori schools are beneficial and a good school for children to attend:
Reason number 1: CURIOSITY
*On average,Preschoolers ask their parents over 100 questions a day usually include the word why. Parents want their children to stop asking questions and these questions stopped being asked when the children are in middle school because student motivation decreases. The video states that children don't stop asking because they lose interest but students actually lose interest because they stop asking questions. At Montessori schools, questions matter MORE than answers and natural curiosity is welcomed, not shunned (which drives the lesson forward). The video gives an example of students asking a teacher if a triangle is always 180 degrees? The teacher responds by honoring the students question yet gives a method for the students to answer the question on their own. (Tells the students to try and make a triangle that is NOT 180 degrees so that they figure it out on their own instead of just giving a straight answer to the question). Students need to explore and answer questions for themselves.
Reason number 2: NO HOMEWORK
*Parents always ask if my child is in school for 6 hours a day, why is there so much homework?! At Montessori school students are assigned multi-week research projects and they do not have daily homework. The class time is more productive. The video gives an example of a father talking about his son and he says "My son learned more in one day at a Montessori school than he did in one month at a traditional school". The video indicates that throughout Educational research, homework serves for no correlation on academic achievement. Because students do not have homework at a Montessori school, they are able to do what they like after school such as sports, outdoor activities, read, etc. Also, parents do not have to battle with their children every night if they did their homework or not.
Reason number 3: CALM AND PEACEFUL ENVIRONMENT
*The video addresses that parents think that their child's brain it interest in learning, yet in reality the brain is interested in survival. Children to not survive to learn, but they learn to survive. Also, a well educated child means a child who has an environment of safety. The teachers at Montessori schools are taught to create sense of calm and peaceful order in their classroom which helps to build and foster a safety environment so children can learn. The video also includes that there are public, private, Catholic, Jewish, Islamic, and bi-lingual french Montessori school that are all expanding.

**I believe that this video was extremely insightful for educators and that it is a great way to teach students in a positive way. I think that having students answer their own questions is a very beneficial approach to teaching because this gets students to learn on their own instead of depending on the teacher for the answer every time they have a question. Also, I think that having no homework is beneficial for the most part because this will give children time to do other activites such as playing outside and socializing and that weekly projects will help the teacher to see what students learn by the end of each lesson instead of pressuring students with having an assignment every single night. The fact that Montessori schools provide a calm and peaceful enviroment and that the video backs up how Montessori schools work with using educational research and real life situations with parents and students shows how serious they are about providing students with a good education. I believe that Montessori schools would be a positive effect in the social studies community because students can ask questions, will be given proper lessons in a positive enviroment, and teacher truly seem to care about each and every student being able to succeed at the Montessori schools.