This is a little video Julia put together to support the Montessori teacher residency at Libertas Public Montessori School in Memphis, TN. The administration and faculty there are just doing an amazing job working in a high poverty area.
In Dr. Montessori’s writings, she speaks of an “explosion” into writing. The children spontaneously discovered that they knew how to write and started writing every word, everywhere. But, she insists that she never taught them how to write, she just prepared them to write, indirectly.
But in many Montessori classrooms, you'll find all kinds of handwriting worksheets and programs that have nothing to do with Dr. Montessori's successful indirect plan. Let me give you a brief overview of this indirect preparation and also a specific description of how we introduce the recording process. May it encourage you to clear off the clutter on your shelves and return to the basics of what Dr. Montessori gave us.
PS: Thank you to Jenay Boggs for the lovely chalkboard photos!
This is the talk Julia recorded in preparation for the opening session of the JALT/TESOL conference (see Stress and the Bilingual Brain below for details). She was limited to 4 minutes so couldn't look at dendritic branching, long-term potentiation, the role of attention, how working memory consolidates to long-term memory, or many other key topics. This is just a teaser to wet your whistle and get you interested in learning more about the brain. Enjoy!
In this research study, Julia studied 78 preschoolers using the Montessori movable alphabet. Results demonstrate that young children can phonetically spell words with the alphabet more effectively than they can via handwriting. View the complete study here.
This is the video Julia was asked to present at the Japanese Association of Language Teacher's (JALT) conference offered by their special interest group Computer Assisted Language Learning (CALL). It's focus is on learning in general and online adult learning in particular.
Melrose Montessori School was kind enough to let us record and post a webinar we offered on spoken language. With just a few staff members present, we walked through some key information on spoken language and then dove right into presenting and practicing a few lessons. This may be useful for parents and all members of schools with preschool-aged children. Administrators and support staff may find it especially helpful (giving ideas on what to do during transitions). For more information on spoken language, check out our pedagogy blog posts on sound games, natural conversations, spoken language basics, and spoken language detailed lessons.
The start of school is upon us. We’re either already with our class full of glorious little souls or we’re just about to meet them. Here are a few thoughts to keep in mind during these critical first few weeks of school.
First, if the children haven’t started yet, do your best to get every child in for a visit before the first day (see our Preschool Orientation blog post for details). If you can’t get them in, give their families a call to touch base and introduce yourself.
We all want our children to normalize and blossom and yet many of us run into similar stumbling blocks. We know that before the children will thrive in our prepared environment, they have to feel safe, welcome, and socially connected to us. So, we begin by forming a friendly relationship with each child. But, once we have established this, there are several common areas that often give us trouble:
The children's need for order dramatically affects their behavior. So, get down on your hands and knees and take a crawl around your classroom. As you do, ask yourself these questions:
Here is an overview of how reading works in the brain and a little insight into the many variations of dyslexia. Julia shared this with her students in the Neuroscience of Learning Course (Harvard University Extension School) and they found it useful.
