Children’s School Makes Adjustments to Montessori to Meet State Requirements Different Times Call for Different Methods

By Karen Bair, The Herald, Rock Hill, S.C.

Mar. 11–There was little technology and few standardized test mandates when Maria Montessori developed the Montessori method 100 years ago.

The method, which uses children’s natural curiosity and hands-on materials so youngsters can learn in their own way at their own pace, removes competition and fear of learning. The founders of Google and Amazon.com were Montessori-educated. So was Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis.

But educators in today’s public Montessori schools, including Rock Hill’s Children’s School at Sylvia Circle, find themselves blending Montessori with modern mandates.

Alterations at the Children’s School in the coming school year will include more computers and advanced technology such as interactive Promethium boards in nearly every room. The children still will work at their own pace with hands-on Montessori materials, but electronics will enhance education for visual learners.

One major change is that third-graders will work separately from first- and second-graders. Montessori usually blends grades one through three to foster cooperation and to allow older children to serve as mentors.

But in South Carolina today, the standardized PACT test is administered to grades three through eight. PACT does not forgive children for learning at different rates. While Montessori children sit on mats as they learn to add and subtract, then multiply by the third grade, the PACT test requires them to sit at desks with pencils, filling in the circle that corresponds with the correct answer.

“Now, they fall under all the public school requirements,” said Harriet Jaworowski, Rock Hill’s associate superintendent of instruction and accountability.

“The bottom line is doing what’s best for students and trying to meld public elementary education with the Montessori model,” she said. “There are other public Montessori schools around us that have been very successful. What they have done is a sort of hybrid.”

Both Jaworowski and Sylvia Circle principal Sandra Lindsay-Brown point out it is difficult for a teacher to accommodate first-, second- and third-graders in one classroom.

“In the third grade, children move from concrete to abstract reasoning,” Lindsay-Brown said. “If I asked first- and second-graders to name five colors, they would probably say red, blue, green, yellow and orange. If I asked third-graders, they might say violet, magenta and chartreuse.”

Complicating matters for Montessori third-graders in South Carolina is that they must study S.C. history and their curriculum moves closer to fourth- and fifth-grade levels, she said.

“We are a public school now, and we deal with accountability issues,” Lindsay-Brown said.

Since joining the Rock Hill district, she has visited a number of public Montessori schools that modified their programs due to state standardized-test accountability concerns.

She is retaining Montessori’s sense of a homey, serene classroom environment with group discussions. She visits each classroom every day and welcomes children to visit her in her office.

But once a week, third-graders will sit in a room with desks and begin their acclimation to a regular classroom environment.

In today’s electronic world, “we have a lot of visual learners,” she said.

“The Promethium boards have increased involvement and learning,” she added. “Once they can see things visually, they can go back and learn hands-on in small groups. All kids learn differently. This may be the way to connect with that child you can’t reach.”

Maria Montessori was ahead of her time and thought outside the box, Lindsay-Brown points out.

“If she were alive today, I think she’d tweak her program,” she said. “She’d say, ‘Let’s use computers and interactive programs.’”

Jaworowski said district educators still believe in the Montessori method but are forced to deal with the reality of state mandates. They await changes new state schools superintendent Jim Rex and legislators might devise.

“It is going to be very interesting to see what Dr. Jim Rex is going to do with his testing piece,” Jaworowski said.

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Copyright (c) 2007, The Herald, Rock Hill, S.C.

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