Welcome to Chicago for American Montessori Society’s 2016 National meeting. I hope you are enjoying the sites as well as the amazing presentations, panel discussions, networking sessions, and honorary guest speakers.
Please find my handouts for my talk here:
Developing Curriculum in the Internet Age draft
AppBrightIdeas Scope In Workshop
Bright Ideas Empty Template for practice Grant Written In Workshop Session 031116
Grant Written In Workshop Session 031116
The AMS 2015 Philadelphia conference is off to a great start. I have already seen old friends and can’t wait to meet new ones. Check out the research posters and workshops.
Check out my talk with Anna Clarke about Using Art and Inquiry to Teach History at 4pm in rooms 411-412.
Back in 2008, the media and education community responded to the alarm bells of Richard Louv’s seminal work, Last Child in the Woods. Herein, Mr. Louv observes a new phenomenon in modern society, calling it “nature deficit disorder,” a lack of outdoors experiences for today’s children.
Today, we rarely hear about it anymore, and if we do, school officials ensure us that children are getting more “field trips” and going outdoors for fresh air during physical education and recess.
Even in my children’s and my Montessori classrooms, children get to garden, play outside, go on occasional walks in the forest preserve or to the nearby beach. I argue that in my nine years as a Montessori teacher, that even isn’t enough.
My own children, three boys, are only truly happy when they are outdoors playing competitive sports and games, or experiencing nature hands-on with fishing, collecting, kayaking, hiking, or photography.
Recently, a doctor prescribed the book Boys Adrift by Dr. Leonard Sax for my reading list. Her recommendation could not have come sooner.
My middle son wants to be a marine biologist, yet he craves video games like they are alcohol or drugs. When I pull him off of the games, he is like an addict who can’t stop and will beg, crying for more. My husband and I have become alarmed. The other boys are similar in their addictions.
After reading Dr. Sax’s clarion call about the five factors that drive a growing epidemic of unmotivated boys, I felt compelled to make changes in my family life and my classroom, especially in the area of experiential learning.
In the book, Dr. Sax talks about two types of learning described in the German language: Wissenschaft and Kenntnis. Wissenschaft can be thought of as book learning, whereas Kenntnis is experiential learning. Throughout European pedagogy, of which Montessori can be classified, both Wissenschaft and Kenntnis are valuable, but the two types of learning must be balanced.
Too many of us teachers are concerned about getting the curriculum finished by the end of the year and raising test scores. Even in the Montessori schools, parents want to see progress with hard data, especially at the Middle School level where the next steps are high school and college applications.
However, I have found that the most meaningful learning experiences and knowledge acquisition happen when we go outside and do full-on experiential projects.
Two years ago, my co-teacher and I created a project where the students would study our rectangular, sloping green space upon which we played sports daily, and develop a plan for the Board of Directors to improve the space for school sports, recess, assemblies, and concerts.
The kids broke up into groups based on their natural abilities and passions. One group who loved math calculations measured and calculated the area of the space for fencing. Another related group calculated the volume of the space to estimate the amount of soil needed to level the area. Another group became naturalists and identified the species of plants and animals that would be impacted by the changes proposed to the space. (We are adjacent to a protected tidal marsh.) Another group researched coverings to shade the area. The results were amazing and the group presented the findings at the graduation ceremony. Along the way, they mastered measurement, area and volume calculations, biological identification, and practical life cost analysis.
Recently, we have begun our study of the Hilton Head Island ecosystem using a curriculum developed by the South Carolina Department of Natural Resources and myself at the recent STEAM Salt Marsh 2014 workshop (see my posts). After receiving a lesson on the gifts of the Animal Kingdom phyla and Chordata classes (a refresher from Upper Elementary), the students and I went on a hunt for an example of each one on Hilton Head to gather photographic evidence for their portfolios. I taught them the basics of photography and off we went. The students were incredibly motivated. So far, they have found 25 different species of birds, reptiles, amphibians, worms, insects, arachnids, and mammals. Next week, we will continue our hunt on the beach.
I love how the children ran all around, looking under logs and in the trees, in the water and in the sky to observe their surroundings with the eyes of a naturalist for the first time. Giving them the “treasure hunt” format with a hint of competition and letting them loose with their iPods, iPhones, and cameras leads to fevered discussions and discoveries.
The cover photo comes from 8th grader Corbin McKinney. I will post more photos once the students have created and shared their portfolios.
Nature needs to be a daily experience.
“The clearest way into the Universe is through a forest wilderness.”
― John Muir
–Sarah
I have had two careers in my life so far: one, as a research scientist in a biotechnology start-up and two, as a Montessori teacher. In both organizations, a successful CEO builds a community of employees and customers with a common mission and business philosophy. Montessori schools are unique in that the business philosophy should mirror the classroom philosophy being taught to the children and modeled by the faculty.
Montessori philosophy recommends teachers to be high on control and warmth, the qualities of a good parent. They are warmly affectionate and openly communicative. A good Montessori teacher expects maturity and quality work from the student to raise expectations and encourage independence. Montessori teachers also use a peace process to handle conflict in the classroom. Using these techniques, the teacher creates a strong, safe, motivated learning community.
In a successful school, the administration expects the same from the staff horizontally. Teachers within the same grade level (Primary, Lower Elementary, Upper Elementary, Middle School, for example) work as a team and hold each other accountable as they do for their students. They build a strong, safe environment for each other to create lessons, handle difficult conversations with families, and problem solve issues in the classrooms.
But, most importantly, the authentic Montessori school practices this philosophy vertically within the organization. Starting with the Board of Directors, members must understand the core values of the Montessori classroom – respect, independence, peace, responsibility, and communication. While meetings may take place behind closed doors, the Board must communicate business decisions and strategic plans with the stakeholders of the school: the staff and families. When done poorly, parents and teachers feel insecure, gossip abounds, and the school ultimately loses enrollment and staff.
In addition, the Board must treat staff (including the Head of School) with respect and hold themselves to high moral standards as they model to the staff and families the ideals of the business. They are there as mentors to the Head of School and staff to help them run the business effectively – outside observers with business and education experience to lend.
Going down the line, the Head of School must act as the liaison between the Board and staff to communicate major decisions, set expectations, develop a professional atmosphere, run the business of the school, and build community with staff and families. I cannot stress enough the importance of well-timed, regular, short memos to staff throughout the year. As teachers, we need to understand the mission, know the expectations, receive regular, documented feedback, and be encouraged with praise as we navigate the difficult, but rewarding career of education.
More importantly, a friendly check-in in the classroom, either during the school day, or after school, makes a world of difference to staff. I know for me, I need a “high-five” every once in a while for a job well done to boost my self-esteem. When I don’t receive that little pick-me-up, I feel more insecure and worry too much about my job performance.
We teachers know the value of regular feedback to parents and children throughout the year, and on a daily basis. We need to catch them when they are good, to reinforce good behaviors. We need to let the parents know their child’s successes more than their mistakes.
The children always know best. When a teacher has created the safe, beautiful environment, the children show us the way to peace and fun.
Sincerely, Sarah
Below is an anecdote I wrote as an example for a writing assignment for my middle school students. I thought it would be prudent to share with fellow teachers. We need to practice empathy for the parents of our students, as well as for our students. Teachers are guides to help and serve, not to judge.
“As a teacher, I often spend more time with people’s children than they do. I get to know them as family, and think of my students as my own children. As adults, we often have multiple jobs, multiple hats to wear: parent, spouse, sibling, child, co-worker, and so forth. When you work and have children, it is difficult to juggle those hats. As a Montessori teacher, we are trained to observe closely the students in our care and supply not only academic care, but also social and emotional nurturing. I get upset when I see children neglected in small ways. However, as I grow as a mother and a teacher, I increasingly put myself in others’ shoes.
Very early in my career, I taught a young boy who would come to school in dirty clothes, wrinkled like an old newspaper and covered in bright green grass stains and flecks of playground mulch. His hair looked like messy strands of bleached straw upon his head. On cold winter days with crisp biting winds, he would come in simple shorts and a thread-bare t-shirt, without even a coat. I felt so badly as he shivered like a lamb, and I offered him my own coat, which swamped his small body like a blanket. As I look back on the situation, I should have handled it better than I did.
As a young teacher, I didn’t feel comfortable offering advice to a parent. But now, I am older and more comfortable talking to and offering advice to parents. I have more experience under my belt as a parent and a teacher. I know how I would want to be helped as a busy, working mom. Perhaps I should have given a gentle reminder about the cold weather at carpool, along with having a back-up supply of old coats and pants from my boys to clothe this young boy. Those simple hints to the mom without judging, and helping the young student without singling him out, would have been better than just talking about it, remembering only the negative experience. I should use this story as a reminder of how to treat others, as I would wish to be treated.”
In Montessori middle school programs, it is vital to start the year with community building lessons and activities.
“To learn, children and adolescents need to feel safe and supported.” – William H. Parrett and Kathleen M. Budge
We begin every morning with a fun game to get the students relaxed and energized before academic lessons. These include name recognition, charades, sports-related/coordination building, and trust-building activities.
Then, we have morning meeting daily. Each week, a different student facilitates the meeting with a set agenda that includes sharing, acknowledgements, mental challenges, PACE (Brain Gym), and announcements. The regularity and positive sharing aspects allow the students to communicate in a respectful way and wake up their brains and bodies for learning.
During academic work times, all subject areas involve individual, small group, and large group assignments. This way, introverted children have some personal time to complete assignments suited to their personality, and extroverted children get their group discussion needs met. In between, small group work allows children to build leadership and cooperation skills. Middle school children especially desire more social interaction and learn better from peers than teachers. (see article here)
At Sea Pines Montessori Academy, we are off on the right foot with our class of 2014-2015. These wonderful young men and women are going to do great things…
–Sarah
With our growing lower school, my middle school program had to move from one large classroom into two smaller spaces at the opposite end of the school. A larger pre-school program means more children for our upper school. But, as any teacher will tell you, moving your entire classroom and its contents is no easy task.
On top of that, I had to put two years of curriculum for every subject I teach (language arts; history – world, American, South Carolina; math – Pre-Algebra, Algebra 1 and 2, Geometry; Chinese; science – physical and biological, and practical life) somewhere in that space. All while leaving room for eight teenagers to move around. Phew!
My motto became when life hands you some nice lemons, make lemonade! I re-imagined the space, and with some help from friends, the local thrift shops, and creativity, succeeded in creating a welcoming environment.
The video below is a slide-show of my classroom and its contents. As a Montessori Middle School teacher, I am a generalist. I have a cultural area for history and science. My language arts and math books are in another room where we have created a library and work space. This year, we are focusing on biological science and using the Estuary 101 curriculum I received from the South Carolina Department of Natural Resources (see my week-long post from the Salt Marsh STEAM experiences).
I maximized floor space with three small tables, and kept the wood as light as possible to make the space seem larger. I used natural wood and table decorations to infuse the classroom with vitality and nature. I kept familiar items (student mementos) so that they would have a continuum from the old space. I added some inspirational messages for the front door so the teens would feel hopeful as they walked into the room.
Overall, I am pleased with the outcome. The students and parents who visited last week enjoyed it too. I look forward to the exciting things we will be doing as we study our beautiful island ecosystem and study global peace through our Model United Nations projects.
Peace, Sarah
We have come to the end of the Salt Marsh STEAM program with South Carolina’s Department of Natural Resources, Salt Marsh Consortium, Sea Grant, NOAA, Bobino (did I leave anyone out?). E.V. Bell and her co-workers put together an amazing week of learning, fun, community, and swag. Thank you all!
Today, each participating teacher presented his/her proposal for a project based on the Estuaries 101 curriculum and activities that we learned this week involving science, technology, engineering, art, and math (STEAM). I learned so many different, creative approaches to educating children about these ecosystems.
We had edible marshlands, iMovies, Bobinos (Arduino-based buoys), watercolors, poems and more. An English teacher teaching literature archetypes created a project where students would research animals and plants in the estuary and match that fauna or flora to a certain literary archetype. Students would then compose an origin myth about that particular organism and archetype. Another is having her students build a Bobino from PVC tubing and connectors and then monitor weather and water quality around Hilton Head Island.
I will be using the Estuaries 101 curriculum to teach biology units all throughout this year. My particular presentation is on a poetry anthology that the students will complete based on the flora and fauna of the ACE basin and Hilton Head. The theme for the six-week cycle is systems, where we will study economies, systems of equations in algebra, ecosystems, and “systematic” poetry. Students will write a haiku, Shakespearean sonnet, ode, and sestina; all of these poetry types require the writer to use certain rules for topic, syllable count, meter, rhyme, and word count.
Then, students will create watercolors, photographs, or movies to illustrate their poetry. Finally, the teens will be required to write an essay where they explain their choice of topic and how that poetic structure fits with their topic. The anthologies will be compiled with cover page and presented.
I have enclosed a video slideshow to display my examples and SC state standards met by this activity.
Thank you STEAM friends. I had a lot of fun. Remember, Neptune’s Nest foreva!
–Sarah
Today was a TOTAL blast. We got to find our inner geek (or use our outer one) and engineer buoys. Buoys play an important role in monitoring the environment and providing data to find trends in ecosystems.
The instructors proved a great maker space of different sizes of PVC pipe and connectors along with swimming noodles. Our goal was to create a buoy that would float upright and keep a frisbee still to prop up an Arduino board. The Arduino board contained sensors to measure air temperature, ambient light, barometric pressure, and humidity.
Once we tested the buoy for buoyancy, we added the Arduino weather monitor. Our “eBOB” or “Bobino” collected data every minute for 30 minutes. Some groups kept their eBobs inside, while others placed theirs outside.
Then, we analyzed the data using the information stored on the enclosed SD card. WOW! Using Excel, we graphed the data and saw neat patterns: a rise in temperature once the unit was placed outside, correlating with a rise in ambient light.
The gentlemen who provided the equipment, free of charge to us teachers, were part of the North Carolina School of Technology. Taylor Brockman, Chief Technology Officer at Brain Power Software, helped two young men create the Arduino boards. These young men, Benson and Maxwell, were polite, intelligent, and inspiring. (I asked for the leader’s business card to seek out opportunities for my son.)
Jen, my partner in crime, and I had so much fun and were proud to be first to finish our sea turtle inspired buoy. Peace out!
–Sarah
I had a two-hour workshop today on sketching and watercolor techniques with Marie Nichols, an instructor at Charleston School of the Arts. She is an amazing lady with a kind, gentle approach to visual arts.
We started with blind contour drawings of shells and hands. Let’s just say, my drawings were pretty messed up! Then, we worked our way to a modified contour drawing where we could take peaks at our paper to follow the prominent lines in the object as we drew. Finally, we concluded our drawing study with adding value to the modified contour drawing. Hatching and cross-hatching, with shading added texture, shadows, and depth to our shells.
After our sketching lessons, we learned watercolor techniques. Starting with a flat wash, we used a broad brush dipped in rather concentrated dark color and brushed it straight across the page. We repeated these steps, covering our 140 lb. watercolor paper in one, even hue.
We contrasted the flat wash with a graded wash, where you dip the brush only once in the concentrated, dark pigment (in our example), and then brush across the top of the paper. Then, we washed the brush the clean, dabbed in water and ran the brush partly across the dark brushstroke at the top to get a lighter value. After each stroke, we dabbed our brush in water and voila, we had a graded background on our paper.
Other techniques included the use of salt, plastic wrap, and lifting to get different textures on the background wash. We used drops of alcohol to achieve beautiful, round lighter spots on the paper. Another technique involved wetting the paper first, then applying watercolor on vertical paper to get interesting secondary and tertiary colors from primary hues. Finally, we splattered paint on the surface, then used a straw to get streaks.
After all of that work, we composed quick pieces of nature scenes using all of our new-found knowledge. You see mine at the top…an ode to my youngest son, Joey.
–Sarah
Words cannot express what we did today at Botany Bay beach, on Edisto Island. I have always seen sea turtle nests on Hilton Head Island, marked by wooden posts and signs alerting the public to stay away. I knew they emerged from their nests at night to follow the moonlight into the ocean, where they swam to an unknown future.
I learned today that only 1 in a thousand or possibly even ten thousand survive into maturity at the ripe old age of thirty years. As the guide Meredith dug deeper into the relocated nest, I was hoping to see a little baby loggerhead sea turtle in person. I was not to be disappointed.
Nestled within broken eggs, a dead baby, and multiple unhatched eggs was a tiny baby sea turtle. We rescued him from the pile of sand heaped on top of him, first by his mother, then by his caretakers. Meredith grabbed him gently and then let him go in the crushed oyster shells lining the beach.
As he flipped and flopped (like a drunken sailor) over the shells, we surrounded him like the rabid paparazzi who follow celebrities. Finally, he made it to the surf, flapped away, and embarked on his new adventure in the Atlantic Ocean.
We named him Steamer because of his “little engine that could” attitude.
I say a little prayer that he lives long enough to have children of his own. I know that he had an impact on my life today. And on the lives of the many children who I will touch with the lessons learned on this trip.
–Sarah
Today, we met at Neptune’s Nest and went on our first adventure as a team to Pine Island, located in the ACE basin. The ACE basin is a protected estuary about 1.4 million acres in size located at the mouths of the Ashepoo, Cumbahee, and Edisto rivers. The Discovery vessel from the South Carolina Department of Natural Resources took us to Pine Island and back. During the trip, they used a trawl net to collect creatures from the water.
In a short amount of time, we caught an iron bed frame along with an Atlantic sharp nose stingray, peppermint shrimp, hogchoker, tongue fish, and spade fish (my son’s favorite fithy!).
This evening, we heard Mary Edna Fraser (of the Frasers who founded Sea Pines Resort) talk about her art advocacy through batiks that depict barrier islands from around the world, as well space photos and deep ocean images. She stressed the relevance of environmental activism for young people, and the importance of using art as a visual tool to relate science to the masses. I was totally inspired to bring this lesson to my students! As Margaret Mead would say,
I am so excited for next week. Through the Salt Marsh Consortium and Sea Grant (NOAA) programs, I get to go to Edisto Island and study the ACE basin estuary system. Marine biologists, alongside artists and writers, will help teachers from around the state turn STEM lessons (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) into STEAM (adding art to the mix). We get to learn photography, sketching, watercolors, creative writing, and marine biology.
I will add posts daily to let you all learn about the wildlife and the art techniques I will experience every day.
Join me starting August 4th!
American education is under fire again in the news media with the latest set of articles by Elizabeth Green, who works for a non-profit called Chalkbeat (and is plugging a new book). Her original article asks the question, “Why Do Americans Stink at Math?” and the follow-up article tells us “5 Ways to Help Your Kid Not Stink at Math”.
As a Montessori teacher, I am livid. My students do not “stink at math.” Rather, they master the concepts and thrive in high school and college classes. In fact, my students score as well as college-aged young people (post-high school score level) on nationally recognized standardized tests. These teens leave middle school with at least a credit for high school level Algebra 1, and most teens leave with credits for Algebra 1 and Geometry Honors. How? Montessori math materials and lessons.
Well-known Montessori teacher, trainer, and author Michael Duffy shows how well the Montessori math pedagogy and materials work, through scientific evidence and current brain research in his book, Math Works. (Math Works by Michael Duffy)
Over the past seven years, I have seen miracles worked through the use of these materials, teaching abstract math concepts with concrete manipulatives. I currently teach middle school students at Sea Pines Montessori Academy, but have also taught elementary students from ages six to twelve. (See “About” on my home page.)
What is Montessori? The curriculum was developed by Dr. Maria Montessori in Italy at the beginning of the twentieth century. She worked with children with Down’s Syndrome, developing materials to help them to learn basic life, math, and language skills. These materials worked so well that she begged the Italian government to try her method with children who did not have severe learning differences.
Dr. Montessori settled for a group of poor, neglected children in a tenement building in Rome. History was made. She turned unruly, uneducated children born into poverty into productive, self-motivated learners who were able to read by the age of four and five, and do complex math computations. (See Maria Montessori: A Biography by Rita Kramer.)
What are these special materials? Traditional educators like to call them “manipulatives.” Montessori materials are just concrete representations of math concepts like place value, numeration, value, quantity, area, volume, operations, and so forth.
For instance, she uses the colors green, blue, and red to represent the units (or ones), tens, and hundreds place values, respectively. Children learn the correct place value in numbers, fractions, and decimals through the use of these symbolic colors in “building” numbers by gathering a quantity of beads, wooden blocks, or counters in a certain color and matching the quantity to the name or value we give it, like 1,435.
The power of the symbolic colors and actual quantity of beads for a number is that children use these counters/beads to perform operations like addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division. They truly see that multiplication is serial addition. The children learn that division of a number involves evenly dividing the dividend among the divisor, and the answer to division is always what one “person” gets.
The children carry these mental pictures of operations for the rest of their lives. Dr. Montessori, along with her son, developed materials to represent algebraic concepts and geometric proofs. In an interview with Montessori high school students at School of the Woods, in Houston, Texas (one of the few Montessori high schools in the country), life-long Montessori kids told me that they still think of the materials when doing complex calculus. These mental images help them solve integrals (used to calculate area and volume).
When I read such articles as Elizabeth Green’s, and how the Japanese have found a “new way” to approach math, with the development of understanding of a concept, not just rote memorization, and how they help train teachers to give and perfect those lessons with peer observations, and that the teacher, above all, must reflect on what it means to be teacher, I just want to scream!!!
Dr. Montessori and her legions of disciples have been using and making materials for over one hundred years. To be a Montessori teacher, you need at least two years of training on pedagogy, child development, and materials use, design, and implementation. You also have peer and administrator observations to earn your credential. Finally, Dr. Montessori wrote that the teacher must spiritually prepare himself or herself to properly prepare the educational environment and help the child learn through activity.
I will leave you with some quotes from Dr. Montessori made over sixty years ago, with some made almost a hundred years ago. American educators and educational administrators need to get their heads out of their butts and go observe a successful Montessori school. You will see children who rock at math. You will also see what needs to happen in American education to make our children successful in life: academic mastery with meaningful social and emotional support in a caring community of self-motivated learners.
Some of my “cosmopolitan” friends may have already read David Sedaris’ New Yorker article about his fanaticism with his Fitbit. (D. Sedaris New Yorker article) Well, he Fitbit-shamed me into wearing mine again. Here is my story:
Last year, after my co-teacher received a Fitbit Force for Christmas, I had to have one. As I couldn’t afford that particular model, I bought the Flex. I wore it for two weeks, then set it aside on my dresser after the novelity wore off. I figured with my job as a Montessori teacher, between P.E. and doing my rounds in the classroom, I was easily reaching the prescribed, magical “10,000 steps” needed to be healthy.
David’s rambling story and walks inspired me to search my new house from top to bottom for my Flex and its charging cable. Once found and charged, I moved the miniature computer into a turquoise bracelet and fumbled with the Fitbit’s clasp, donning it once again.
My adventure had begun. First, the clear, plastic clasp on the new bracelet broke within a week. “What the heck?” (or something to that effect) I exclaimed. I thought it would last a bit longer than that for the price I paid.
Then, my sister, the one born with all of the common sense, rolled into town. Katie purchased her own Flex at Dick’s Sporting Goods. She also bought the extra pack of super cool bracelet colors, but didn’t notice they were size Large. Little did I know, that was a fortuitous mistake. As I was exchanging my bracelet for hers, I noticed that hers had a strange metal clasp. Aha! Dumb me, I was using the placeholder, clear plastic clasp instead of the sturdy, official metal clasp. We had a good laugh.
Problem solved, I trudged ahead, keeping track of my daily amount of steps. I was on a roll! Once again, I was racking up the 10,000 daily steps with all of the unpacking of my moving boxes, washing many loads of laundry, and running after my boys.
However, once again, my sister proved my foil. As we were “cheering” each other on and messaging in the Fitbit app, I noticed a “settings” section I had never perused. I dug deeper, clicking on more links until I found a toggle for “dominant” or “non-dominant.”
“Are you freakin’ kidding me?” I yelled (or some such phrase since this is a family page). So, I slid the toggle over to dominant hand and watched in anguish as I was walking fewer steps than I thought per day.
In the period I will call “after,” I was only reaching 6,000 steps max. As with David Sedaris, it only spurned me farther. I walked up and down our beach path, even in circles around my house, until I reached the magic number.
Lucky for me, I live on Hilton Head Island. This is the view I have every morning and evening. I thank God for this house, this life, and of course, for my sister and her common sense. How else would I get by!
Dear friends,
I am starting my own blog because I feel constrained by the 140 characters of Twitter and by the limits of Facebook. Here, you will find my thoughts, rants, and ravings on subjects ranging from education to parenting, from science to history, from pop culture to philosophy. I promise thoughtful, funny, kind posts with a PG rating. Thank you for joining me on this long, strange trip.
Sarah W Baird: Montessori Musings 