School Leader

Wired article explores implementation of Sugata Mitra's radically student-centered approach to learning

Almost exactly one year ago I wrote a blog post about prominent education professor Richard Elmore's declaration that, "I do not believe in the institutional structures of public education anymore."  Speaking at a forum on the future of school reform, Elmore described his growing conviction that conventional efforts to improve teaching and learning in America's schools will inevitably fail because the structures of school itself are not geared toward meeting the actual learning needs of children.  Elmore suggested that our entire approach to education must be dismantled and rebuilt.  In my blog post, I expressed relief that somone of Elmore's stature was describing a feeling I've had in my own gut for years.

That blog post has garnered thousands of visits over the last twelve months.  I am so grateful for the outpouring of positive comments and affirmations from all over the world.  I've heard over and over again how much Elmore's message resonates with educators, parents, and ordinary citizens concerned about the future of schooling.  And I've made new contacts in the Montessori, Sudbury, and homeschooling communities who have shown me how alternative, student-centered models of learning are getting results, and have been for years.

All of these approaches share the assumption that children are not only capable of learning, but are hungry to do so, and schooling should channel (rather than squelch) their natural curiosity.  In his comments, Richard Elmore cited the work of Sugata Mitra, an education technology research who has conducted compelling experiments in the developing world demonstrating how, which very little assistance from adults, children can teach themselves vast quantities of knowledge and engage in high-level thinking tasks.

Earlier this year Mitra won a $1 million TED prize to launch seven "schools in the cloud" to further implement the learning approach he's been refining as a result of his research.  But a recent article from Wired magazine shows how one teacher in Mexico, inspired by Mitra's work, has gotten similar results in a desperately under-resourced, low-tech school in the drug-infested border city of Matamoros. 

The article by Joshua Davis describes how Sergio Juarez Correa, a 31-year-old teacher at Jose Urbina Lopez Primary School (pictured here with a student), transformed his teaching to put students in charge of their own learning, largely by posing interesting questions and then getting out of the way, interjecting only to offer encouragement.  Such an approach seems farcical to Americans conditioned by a century of industrialized schooling based on the assumption that to learn, kids have to be forced to sit down, shut up, and repeat whatever they are told or shown to do.

The truth is, this one-size-fits-all, teacher-centered approach to education has never actually served students in the U.S. very well either (see my reviews of books on this topic by John Taylor Gatto and Nikhil Goyal).  Student-centered learning is not only more humane, engaging, and better aligned to how the brain actually works; it is also more effective.

The startling results in Sergio Juarez Correa's classroom are evidence.  The students were not only engaged in learning tasks that can be described as rigorous and higher ordered, but also performed among the top students in the entire country of Mexico on state-administered exams. 

Not that Juarez Correa put much stock in exams that are, by and large, ineffective measures of teaching effectiveness.  But as long as standardized tests are the chief currency for measuring student outcomes, it's encouraging to see that student-centered learning isn't harmful to their test scores, and actually contributes to extremely high performance.

Along with Richard Elmore, I am beginning to get some ideas for what the future of schooling is going to look like.  Juarez Correa's classroom is a good first glimpse.

School Leader Book Reviews, 2011-2013

The School Leader blog serves multiple purposes, but it is primarily an extension of my work teaching aspiring school administrators, researching effective leadership practices, and providing service to schools and districts in the Western Kentucky University region.  Since the advent of the blog I have posted numerous reviews of books that may be of interest to practicing educators and the general public.  Below I offer a brief catalog of reviews from the last two years, including links to the original post.

Effective Supervision: Supporting the Art and Science of Teaching, by Robert Marzano, Tony Frontier, and David Livingston, is the latest offering in Marzano's series applying research to practice.  A companion to The Art and Science of Teaching, a book that condenses research on best teaching practices, Effective Supervision offers a host of excellent tools for helping principals provide meaningful feedback that can enhance teaching effectiveness.  Full review here.

Focus: Elevating the Essentials to Radically Improve Student Achievement, is Mike Schmoker's devastating critique of school leadership practices that fail to prioritize improvement efforts and emphasize everything but the essence of what we know works - high-quality curriculum and lesson design, and meaningful literacy embedded across the curriculum.  Review here, with more thoughts on Schmoker's thesis here and here.

Getting it Done: Leading Academic Success in Unexpected Schools, by Education Trust staff writers Karin Chenoweth and Christina Theokas, describes the specific characteristics of school principals who defy the odds of povery to raise student achievement.  More here.

The Global Achievement Gap by Tony Wagner explores how our test-driven school culture isn't really providing students access to the kinds of critical thinking skills they need in the 21st century, and profiles schools that are pioneering new approaches - and still getting great test results.  Review here.

Weapons of Mass Instruction: A School Teacher's Journey Through the Dark World of Compulsory Schooling, by former New York state teacher of the year John Taylor Gatto, gives a blistering history of schooling in America, exposing how the structures of education are designed to serve the ends of the state, not individual students.  Reviewed in two parts here and here.

Montessori Madness: A Parent-to-Parent Argument for Montessori Education, by Trevor Eissler, offers an excellent introduction to the Montessori method and how this century-old approach to schooling may provide the precise model of education reform all schools need.  Reviewed here; also see interviews with Eissler about the book here.

The Death and Life of the Great American School System, by Diane Ravitch, is the best-selling critique of major education reform movements in the U.S.  Ravitch provides some extremely important arguments about the costs and limitations of our testing obsession, but ultimately fails to properly understand the case for school choice.  Reviewed in two parts here and here.

One Size Does Not Fit All: A Student's Assessment of School, by 17-year-old high school student Nikhil Goyal, synthesizes a lot of excellent perspectives on how education as we know it is underserving the vast majority of American students, especially those who are gifted like Goyal.  The author follows Diane Ravitch in mistakenly convoluting the push for school choice with the test-driven accountability movement, but nevertheless offers a critically important voice in the current debate on the necessity of transforming American education.  Reviewed here.

Less: Accomplishing More by Doing Less, is not necessarily geared toward school administrators, but Marc Lesser's excellent little book is relevant for leaders in any field.  Lesser provides a host of important reflective practices that acknowledge our over-scheduled, fragmented work lives are inefficient and ineffective, and teaches us how to move faster by actually slowing down and doing less.  Reviewed here.

Like Less, Kevin Williamson's new book, The End is Near and It's Going to be Awesome: How Going Broke Will Leave America Richer, Happier, and More Secure, isn't about education per se. Rather, Williamson's book is a critique of government and how its reliance on coercion and force inevitably leads to poor results.  One chapter of The End is Near explicity explores this phenomena in education and offers some thought-provoking solutions to America's schooling problems.  Reviewed here.

It's been a pleasure reading these books and sharing them here on the School Leader blog.  In coming months, look for reviews of books on homeschooling, "cage-busting" leadership, and more.

 

 

Countering educators' bias against homeschooling

Regular readers know I am sometimes very critical of our traditional structures of education.  I hope this never comes across as being critical of the great teachers and administrators who work in traditional schools, many of whom are doing outstanding work given the limitations they face. 

But I am critical of educators who seem to think that the traditional model of educating children is the only or best way, and who use their considerable political clout as a profession to oppose meaningful changes in how we "do" school.  One of the biases I frequently encounter among fellow educators is the notion that homeschooling families are hurting their kids by denying them the benefits of a traditional education.  This infographic makes it abundantly clear that, on average, homeschooled children turn out to be quite successful, academically and in life. 

Note how even families with low incomes or lower levels of parent education get good results from homeschooling (click here for link):

 Among the lessons I think we should draw from these data is that homeschooling can be a successful experience for many families.  Obviously it isn't a choice that all families could utilize, and perhaps there will always be a need for institutional schools.  But we should recognize that there is nothing inherently superior in the traditional model of schooling.  By "traditional model" I mean both the policy of assigning children to attend a government-run school based on the location of their home, and the typical pedagogical practices found in most schools (including many non-government schools) where children are grouped by grade levels, taught and assessed (graded) in a very teacher-driven method with a curriculum and school day fragmented by subject area, often with little attention to the humanities, art, music, etc. 

This traditional structure inevitably tends toward a "one size fits all" approach that does not differentiate for individual student needs very effectively.

A host of reforms in pedagogical practice is now pushing against this traditional structure, including  personalized learning, competency-based instruction, and even more sweeping changes like utilizing Montessori and other radically student-centered methods, even in government schools.  These kinds of changes are extremely difficult to implement in traditional school structures, especially when the educational establishment tends to resist the kinds of policy changes that would really allow for meaningful reforms of teaching practice.  That's why an increasing number of Americans favor school choice to drastically expand the number of educational options available to families and give educators, including those working in government schools, a chance to engage in real innovation.

One of these options is homeschooling, and educators should recognize the practice as valid and viable for many families.  Doing so would counter the implicit bias of many educators that, because we are the "professionals," we know what is better for kids' education than their parents do (see Educational Paternalism: What Do Super-sized Softdrinks Have to do with School Choice?).

Watch for my review of Josephy Murphy's new book, Homeschooling in America: Capturing and Assessing the Movement, in coming weeks.

Online learning and the future of schooling, Part II

A few weeks back I began a two-part series of posts responding to Francisco Dao's assertion that "online learning is a fantasty."  Dao, a tech/innovation guru, argued that online courses lack the structure and interpersonal component to be effective for unmotivated learners, and will therefore be ineffective for "educating the masses" as some school reformers imagine (or as Dao seems to think some people imagine).

In my first post I concurred with some of Dao's concerns about online learning, based both on my experiences as an instructor in online classes and as a former principal who worked with at-risk high school students.  But I also challenged the notion that many serious thinkers actually believe that online learning - in general - is a silver bullet for solving all the problems in 21st Century education.

Moreover, Dao doesn't ask the most basic question about unmotivated learners: why are so many unmotivated in the first place?  Besides many other factors, what does the structure of schooling itself have to do with that lack of motivation? 

Dao's blog post misses a fundamental point: that schooling as we know it, especially at the high school level, is possibly broken beyond repair.  Or, perhaps more accurately: schooling as we know it no longer functions in any effective way for educating the vast majority of children, given our goals for education in the 21st century and the economic and moral imperative of improving student learning.  We should be seeking strategies and that would help us transform the very structure of schooling rather than continue to (expensively) tinker with a system Richard Elmore has a called "a dying institution."  In whatever renewed form schooling takes, technology is sure to play a key role.

As John Taylor Gatto points out, the present system of American schooling was based on an early 19th century, Prussian model that was designed to rank and sort students into effective roles for a compliant, efficient industrial workforce.  To the extent that this system ever "worked" for students, it did so by standardizing learning in a way that largely brushed over, neglected, or worked around individual student differences and needs.  Creativity, intuition, and especially student choice were largely ignored if not squelched outright. 

The NCLB era brought a demand that all students reach proficient levels of learning (whereas the older era accepted that large percentages of students would drop out or be minimally educated), and established rigorous accountability requirements for school improvement, but preserved the industrial structure of schooling that was never intended to educate all children, while also adding an obsession with standardized tests that remain a clumsy and highly limited measure of teaching or learning.

The 21st Century economy demands a level of individualization in student learning and a focus on innovation, creativity, and human relations skills that the present structure of schooling cannot accommodate.  Moreover, the 21st century digital culture means that families and students have become thoroughly accustomed to a range of individualized choices in all aspects of their life never before seen in the history of humankind.  It's not just that the current structure of schooling will fail to adequately meet student needs; parents and their children will not abide by the stifling, limited, one-size-fits-all format of the traditional school. 

Something will have to change in the way we "do" school, for moral, economic, political, and cultural reasons.

What will the future of schooling look like?  No one can accurately predict, of course, but it's becoming increasingly clear that the future of schooling must be much more highly individualized than in the past.  If we want a future generation with more capacity for critical thinking, perseverance, creativity, and collaboration, one-size-fits-all formats for schooling with fragmented, disconnected curricula must give way to approaches that emphasize student choice, self-pacing, and an integration of the academic disciplines. 

Trevor Eissler and his merry band of brothers have suggested the Montessori method as one strategy for renewing the structure of public schooling, and the National Center for Montessori in the Public Sector has been established as a clearinghouse for resources and information on this century-old approach to student-centered learning.  The Sudbury method, pioneered at the famed Sudbury Valley School, offers an even more radically student-focused approach.

But even within the existing structure of traditional schooling meaningful innovations are emerging, like the "Independent Project" at Monument Mountain Regional High School in Great Barrington, Massachusetts, where students are crafting their own curriculum, assessments, and learning strategies with the support of teachers who truly function as "guides on the side." 

To Francisco Dao's argument that online learning will fail to "educate the masses," at Monument Mountain, as in many other places across the country, technology is playing a key role in helping students and teachers craft new approaches to learning.  In fact, the notion that students must attend a brick and mortar (government-run) building to obtain knowledge and skills is as outmoded as the factory design of schools themselves.  Many states are now experimenting with "a la carte" options for student learning, heavily facilitated by technology, that allows students to supplement their education and add a high degree of flexibility and personalization to learning that doesn't necessarily mean the wholesale replacement of schools by computers.

As Sugata Mitra and Charles Leadbeater have vividly documented in their TED talks, adults grossly underestimate what students can do all by themselves given the right tools.

Ultimately, I don't believe these kinds of innovations can succeed in a system wherein the state has a total monopoly on schooling for the majority of families.  Of all the structures that must change to accommodate 21st Century learning, the notion that the government can adequately plan, direct, and deliver education is perhaps the greatest, and serves as the chief obstacle to moving us forward.  Meaningful structures of school choice must be developed and implemented so that a far wider range of educational options are available to families.

So is "online learning" the answer to education's ills?  Certainly not, if by simply grafting online learning onto traditional notions of schooling is what we mean.  But technology could play an essential role in the total transformation of schooling as we know it.  And that's what all of us should be working toward.

Uniting the adults in schools around a common purpose

I found the short video below via the National Center for Montessori in the Public Sector Facebook page.  It features Dr. Katherine Merseth of the Harvard Graduate School of Education discussing school improvement and the necessity of "creating a common culture of coherence:"

 

Among the highlights:

•  No one (including education reformers) seems to agree on the actual purpose of schooling.
• The bureaucratic structures of schooling appear to be more designed for the benefit of adults rather than students.
• In high functioning schools (which are, in fact, student centered), every person in the school can answer the question, "What is your purpose?  Why are you here?"
• Teachers in high functioning schools function as advocates for children, with whom they have strong personal relationships, know their content deeply so they can answer (or, I would add, help kids answer for themselves) the big "why" questions, knows how to personalize learning for individual student needs, and is continuously learning from and with other educators.

Merseth seems to have fairly conventional perspective on what schooling is all about (no real mention of Montessori, Sudbury, or any of the radically student-centered approaches I've become interested in).  Nevertheless, I think in this three-minute video she gives a terrific summary of some of the key problems vexing schools and the absolute necessity of uniting the adults in a school around a common purpose.  It's a message relevant for leaders of any school.

One Size Does Not Fit All: A Student's Assessment of School

I started seeing Nikhil Goyal's name about a year ago and immediately took notice.  I follow the work of a group called the Alternative Education Resource Organization (AERO), which advocates root-and-branch transformation of education to make schooling far more democratic and student centered.  AERO had just published Goyal's book, One Size Does Not Fit All: A Student's Assessment of School, with a subsequent torrent of media attention. 

One Size Does Not Fit All is a scathing indictment of American schooling that synthesizes a lot of arguments familiar to people who closely follow the various streams of education reform.  But what makes Goyal unique is that, at the time of the book's writing, he was a 17-year old New York high school student.  Now 18 and a graduate, Goyal travels widely and writes copiously in his advocacy for new ways of thinking about schooling.  I've been pleased to follow Nikhil on Twitter and correspond with him via e-mail, and I was happy to finally get a chance to read his book.  While One Size Does Not Fit All has some flaws, Nikhil Goyal's message is worthy of every educator's attention and consideration.

Goyal makes the case that American schooling is stifling to children's creativity and treats learning as a kind of industrial, input-output process that promotes rote memorization and behavioral compliance.  Drawing inspiration from the work of John Taylor Gatto (whose book Weapons of Mass Instruction I reviewed here and here), Goyal explains how schools are still configured for the 19th-century industrial workforce and a mission based on ranking and sorting students.  He argues that if schools are going to properly prepare 21st century students, a shift to emphasizing innovation, creativity, and student-directed learning must take place, and here he borrows liberally from the work of school reformer Tony Wagner (whose book, the Global Achivement Gap, I reviewed here; I think the links between Goyal's interest and mine are probably becoming very clear).

Goyal lays most of the blame for the poor condition of schooling on the test-obsessed culture of education, which started emerging with A Nation at Risk and its concern for America's education standing relative to other leading countries, and then rapidly accelerated with the ill-conceived No Child Left Behind Act.  Goyal draws heavily here from the work of Diane Ravitch (more reviews here and here), who makes one of the best cases for how standardized testing has been misused to improperly measure student learning and mischaracterize the work of teachers and schools.  And like Ravitch, Goyal disparages the move toward for-profit educational alternatives and "corporate" educational reforms that he believes work hand-in-hand with the drive for test-based school accountability.

Goyal calls for a radical transformation of schooling to include far more student voice in school governance and especially in learning and a richer, broader curriculum infused with the arts and real-world learning, enhanced and facilitated by new technologies.  His vision closely aligns with my own interests in dismantling the structure of schooling and rebuilding it into something that is far more student centered (like the Montessori Method).

I would recommend, however, that Goyal rethink his allegiance to Diane Ravitch and her crowd of educational traditionalist because their ultimate goals and methods will not bring about - and in many cases stand diametrically opposed to - the kinds of changes in school that he envisions.  As I have written elsewhere, Ravitch makes a vital contribution to the debate on education reform by raising questions about the place of high-stakes standardized testing, but errs in conflating the school choice movement with testing and "corporate" interests. 

The transformation Nikhil Goyal is looking for will best be accomplished by establishing meaningful school choice options for all families that will foster new innovations in teaching and learning.  Simply paying teachers more, giving them more autonomy, and forgetting about testing and accountability will give us the educational outcomes of the 1970's - not a time when schooling was particularly student centered or conducive to rigor and higher-ordered thinking.

These disagreements notwithstanding, I am thoroughly enamoured with Nikhil Goyal and his book, in no small part because he speaks with the passion, and above all the authority, of someone who has just lived the experience of schooling as a high school student.  On a personal level he reminds me of myself at the same age, all full of idealism and hubris, but with far more drive, organization, and follow through (after all - how many high school students write books and then launch worldwide speaking tours?). 

Nikhil Goyal represents our future.  As one of the best and brightest - both because of and in spite of our flawed educational system - we need to heed his warnings, and his calls for how to make schooling better for all students.

 

Montessori in public schools

I was delighted to receive an email message yesterday from Trevor Eissler, author of Montessori Madness: A Parent to Parent Argument for Montessori Education.  Trevor had discovered my blog posts on Montessori learning, including my review of his book, and pointed me toward a relatively new organization called The National Center for Montessori in the Public Sector.

The Center, which is affilitated with the American Montessori Society (AMS), is an effort to promote the Montessori method in public school environments.  The Center's website provides a wealth of resources which I strongly recommend to other educators interested in this unique, student-centered approach to learning.  Some highlights:

• FAQ's on the differences between Montessori and more conventional methods of education and a useful one-page handout, "Students at the Center; Structure at the Forefront."
• Research on Montessori and student outcomes. 
• A map of public school Montessori programs in the U.S., profiles of select schools, essential elements of successful public Montessori schools, and a look at how the Montessori curriculum correlates with the Common Core Standards.

I must confess, as I shared with Trevor, that I am a bit skeptical about the capacity of traditional schools to faithfully implement the Montessori method (admittedly, I've grown pessimistic about the structures of public schooling in general).  I'm worried about schools that might try some half-baked version of Montessori ("Monte-something," as Trevor called it), see it fail, and then (like so many other poorly-implemented initiatives, say, "We tried that and it didn't work" (or worse, "It won't work with these kids").

But I applaud the efforts of public schools that are trying to faithfully bring the Montessori method to diverse populations of students, and the Center's goal is to promote authentic presentations of Montessori in public school environments.  In fact, until we have meaningful school choice options available to families of modest means, I am as enthusiastic about this endeavor as just about anything still contained in the structures of public education, and I'm eager to learn more and share what I can with other educators. 

Kentucky presently has three public school Montessori programs, all in the Jefferson County Public Schools.  I'm hoping to pay a visit to these schools in upcoming weeks.  In observation of international Montessori Education Week, February 25-March 1, I'll be writing more on this topic.

I also encourage parents and practicing and aspiring educators to visit Bowling Green's only Montessori elementary option currently available.  In its first year of operation, The Montessori School of Bowling Green's elementary program, 506 State Street, serves 13 children ages six through twelve.  Visitors are welcome, and especially during Montessori Education Week, the school invites observers.  Educators will be most impressed by the thoughtful strategies of differentiation and individualization of learning that are basic to the Montessori method.  Call the school at 846-1122 to schedule a visit, or contact me for more information.

#SchoolChoiceFacts Day on Twitter this Thursday

This Thursday, September 13, has been designated by School Choice Week as School Choice Facts Day on Twitter.  Tweeters the world over will be offering data, testimonials, and comments using the hashtag #SchoolChoiceFacts.  I'll be joining in the discussion.

"School choice" is a broad term that refers to a set of policies meant to give families far more control over decisions about where their children attend school.  Our present educational system is essentially a government-run monopoly for most families.  Only the affluent can afford private school options, which are exceedingly rare in many communities.  And many of the issues we face in public education, including our one-size-fits-all approach to both educational delivery and accountability, and the seeming impossibility for schools to innovate in ways that lead to more substantial gains in student achievement, can be easily explained, in part, by the government's monopoly on schooling.

School choice policies usually preserve the public good of education by letting money follow the student, rather than being doled out to local school districts.  This allows private schools or public charter schools (where they are legal; in Kentucky there are not) to compete with local school districts for students.  New educational markets can be opened up, with a much richer variety of schooling options available to all families.  And schools can face the ultimate form of accountability: if they cannot draw students because families choose to send their children elsewhere, those schools go out of business.

Most people in the educational establishment - public school teachers (and their unions), administrators, and my colleagues in higher education - oppose school choice.  I find that their views are usually misinformed about how school choice works, and I hope #SchoolChoiceFacts Day can help to dispell some myths and shed light on why a growing number of veteran educators like me are concluding that school choice is a good policy direction for Kentucky and for the nation as a whole.

Among the things I'll be tweeting about tomorrow are the following:

• Read my debate with James Harvey in Educational Leadership magazine here and here.
• Kentucky is currently one of only nine states that prohibit public charter schools.  Here's why charters would be good for Kentucky's families.
• Kentucky's new "districts of innovation" bill is no substitute for school choice.
• Most research studies on charter schools have serious methodological flaws.  The ones that are rigorous and sound, however, show that charter schools kids do as well or better than their traditional school counterparts.
• Research indicates that teaching conditions are as good or better in most charter schools, though charter teachers report higher levels of participation in schoolwide decision making (and longer work hours).
• There's nothing "magical" about charter schools.  Some will be great and some will fail.  But school choice is nevertheless a good thing and leads to better living in every other segment of the economy.  As the Cato Institute's Neal McCluskey has pointed out, to oppose school choice means to endorse something that looks like the old Soviet economy - applied to schooling.
• School choice could open up innovative educational approaches like the Montessori method to more kids.  Read a review of Trevor Eissler's book Montessori Madness and how public schools in Jefferson County are giving the Montessori method a go.  See Trevor's interview series on Montessori here.
• Why school choice might be the only thing that can change the structure of schools, and why the structure of schools is actually opposed to its mission.
• What does school choice have to do with super-size softdrinks: a meditation on educational paternalism. 
• How school choice could be a substitute for high-stakes testing and other ill-conceived ideas.
• How acting like parents have a choice - even when they don't - could improve education.

 To learn more, follow me on Twitter and check out the tweets under the hashtag #SchoolChoiceFacts.

 

Montessori Madness

While you call tell from the title of Trevor Eissler's book, Montessori Madness: A Parent to Parent Argument for Montessori Education, that the author is gearing his message toward parents, her nevertheless provides a introduction to the Montessori method that is accessible and valuable to professional educators as well.

Eissler gears his book toward those who have little to no prior knowledge about Montessori education.  In an accessible and personal voice, he relates his own frustrations with the traditional education system as he considered options for his own three children.  Eissler explains that when he and his wife were  about to opt for homeschooling, they discovered a Montessori school in their community and became passionate advocates for the Montessori method.

Beginning with a pointed critique of traditional schooling, which he calls the "Factory Model of Education" (he frequently quotes Weapons of Mass Instruction author John Taylor Gatto, whose book I reviewed here and here a few months back), Eissler spends the rest of Montessori Madness explaining how Montessori schools differ, offering a child-centered approach that traditional schools, by their nature, cannot provide.

Eissler offers a readable introduction to Maria Montessori's conception of how children learn in their early years, describing the "sensitive periods" of development when, thanks to an "aborbent mind," children are most ready to learn in certain modes.  Far from the kind of "do your own thing" stereotype that some people have of Montessori classrooms, Eissler explains how the entire Montessori experience hinges on a carefully prepared environment and how a teacher (or "guide" in Montessori parlance) functions to allow the child a maximum of choices within a range of activities and opportunities geared specifically for the child's development level. 

In short, accessible chapters, Eissler describes the Montessori approach to discipline, competition, and reward and punishments that many parents exploring new educational options would be interested in.  Of particular interest to educators is his two-chapter discussion of Montessori's philosophy regarding errors a child makes during the learning process.  Eissler explains how making errors is a natural part of the learning process (and life itself), but notes that traditional schools treat errors as something to be avoided, punished (with bad grades, for example), or hidden.  In Montessori schools, Eissler says, errors are welcomed.  In many cases, the materials themselves include components that allow children to discover and correct their own errors.  The whole notion of a teacher "marking" a student's homework for errors is unknown in the Montessori environment (much of the traditional teacher's role is unknown in Montessori classrooms, and Eissler's discussion of the role of the "guide" will be most interesting to professional educators trained in the traditional mode).

Eissler ends his book by arguing that Montessori methods are demonstrably superior to traditional approaches to learning and calls upon parents to demand Montessori options in their public schools, where all children regardless of their family's affluence can have access to this compelling, child-centered approach. 

As a relative newcomer to Montessori and someone interested in educational policy and school choice, I was most interested in Eissler's argument, but was disappointed that he devoted only a few paragraphs at the end of the book to this topic.  Perhaps it was beyond the scope of what he was trying to accomplish to discuss the need for public Montessori options, but it's a discussion well worth exploring elsewhere.  It's hard to imagine the Montessori philosophy operating to its full capacity in a traditional public school, but the idea is not unheard of and many readers will be interested to learn more about how this works.

Likewise, as an educator with a background in middle and high school, I was left with many questions about how the Montessori approach works with older students.  Perhaps because his own children are still young, Eissler doesn't address this topic, and the reader will need to look elsewhere for additional information.

My criticism are largely the product of my own interests and needs as a reader.  Eissler doesn't attempt to make Montessori Madness all things to all people.  The end product is a good one.  As a non-educator (Eissler is a professional pilot who draws heavily on his own experiences in describing the learning process), the author writes in a straightforward and engaging way that will appeal to all readers.  Montessori Madness offers a great first step on the Montessori path.

See a series of video interviews featuring Trevor Eissler here.

Montessori Elementary program open house March 23

Bowling Green, Kentucky's first-ever Montessori elementary program will open its doors this August 2012.  Associated with the Montessori School of Bowling Green, the new elementary program will welcome children ages six through twelve.  Benedicte Bossut, who is currently completing her training with Association Montessori Internationale, will be the school's first teacher.

Benedicte and other Montessori staff will hold an open house for interested parents on Saturday, March 23, from 9:30 to 11:00 a.m. at the Montessori School of Bowling Green, 506 State Street.  Call (270) 846-1122 or email mesbgky@gmail.com for more information.

The video below offers an introduction to key aspects of a Montessori elementary education:

 

To see other School Leader blog posts on Montessori education, click here.