Por /By Diane M Nickerson, MS Ed.
Castle Island Bilingual Montessori
Giving Students the Gift of Trust
Using our financial resources to make expensive purchases for students in schools has come to be the norm in the educational systems throughout the Western hemisphere. There is a belief that children can learn best with newer and “better” things, even though the educational approach remains the same – that of teacher-directed whole-group simultaneous lessons, largely still lectured-based. What if we gave children other kinds of educational gifts, the kinds that enhance learning free of financial costs? What if we gave them trust and freedom of choice?
The public school district in my hometown has purchased a Chromebook for every one of its 8,500 students, has built a new turf football field and stadium for $2.5 million, and has made several other high-end purchases of materials and supplements to the core education it offers. Over the last few decades, adults have put value on giving of material things to children to show care, and to show others that they are mastering parenting. Of course, we all want the best for our children and giving things has come to equate the level of quality of parenting .
However, research on how our brains learn has revealed we all, young people included, learn best from our experiences rather than from listening to words out loud of a teacher, or of a parent. In the Montessori method, for example, educators create a prepared environment to optimize children’s learning potential. This is an intentional learning setting where everything a child comes in contact with facilitates and maximizes exploration of interests, independence, and long-term memory with academics – as well as practical life skills. Classrooms are prepared to meet the individual needs of all children; they are encouraged to make choices from a finite selection of developmentally appropriate sensorial materials and learning activities. They may
request individualized lessons from their teachers and work at their own pace. This is a real gift to children and young people, one that asks us to trust them in the certain development of their learning, with educators as their guide.