Uncategorizedmontessori education

Montessori Education has been in existence for more than a century. Since its humble beginnings, this educational approach has continued to provide a holistic development among their students.

 

Created by Maria Montessori, it promotes a child’s peace, social skills, and overall holistic development. Like traditional education, Montessori education follows its own sets of principles in applying is philosophy and approaches.

 

If you’re thinking about enrolling your child in a Montessori school, it’s important to become familiar with these principles. As an overview, these are the eight key principles of Montessori Education that you should know about:

 

  1. Movement and Cognition
  2. Choice
  3. Interest
  4. Extrinsic Rewards are Avoided
  5. Learning with and from Peers
  6. Learning in Context
  7. Teacher Ways and Child Ways
  8. Order in Environment and Mind

Movement and Cognition

Movement is one of the core principles of Montessori education. Lessons and activities are designed for children to apply all 5 senses for a more effective learning environment. Through the activities, each child also has the opportunity to improve their social and cognitive skills.

Choice

The Montessori approach also advocates freedom among children. They follow self-paced activities and it also allows kids to freely choose their work. For example, teachers provide their students with different activity options based on their needs and personalities.

Interest

Since Montessori education is child-centered, the activities are designed to gravitate towards each of the student’s interest. Teachers are dedicated to creating lessons and activities that will spark their interests and even push them to learn about new interesting things in the future.

Extrinsic Rewards are Avoided

Traditionally, educational attainment relies heavily on grades. The Montessori approach avoids that entirely. Based on research, rewards like grades and gold stars have a tendency to let students rush through a given learning activity and have a shorter retention of the lesson.

Learning with and from Peers

Peer interaction is a key ingredient in learning to promote and improve the child’s social skills along with his or her academics. Through this principle, each child’s learning and insights also contribute to the rest of the group and they learn through their social interactions.

Learning in Context

When learning is applied in meaningful contexts, kids often absorb more of the information than they do learning in abstract contexts. Simply applying concepts with a hands-on learning activity is very effective. For example, teachers can teach natural sciences through a fun trekking activity outdoors.

Teacher Ways and Child Ways

Incorporating child and adult interaction learning adds to the overall learning development of the child. Montessori education prides itself on practicing just the right amount of adult interaction from their students while they still encourage them to learn independently and at their own pace.

Order in Environment and Mind

Finally, applying organization skills also helps maximize the child’s learning capacity. When they see order around them, it promotes peacefulness and therefore helps them absorb their lessons and activities better.

 

This is why it’s very important to incorporate organizational activities such as arranging the shelves or the chairs periodically. The sense of order in a classroom also affects the children positively by lowering their anxiety levels, building their independence, and improving their love for learning.


Kid’s Town Montessori School is centrally located at 867 Sycamore Avenue in Vista, California and is proud to serve the cities of: San Marcos, Escondido, Carlsbad and many more