Montessori: My Beginnings

As a child, I attended a Montessori school in a rural Louisiana town. I knew I attended a Montessori school but of course I didn’t realize what that actually meant for me growing up or how it shaped my life. I remember my younger sister in my class. I remember her begging to do more work after school. I remember a pink tower, sound cylinders and pricking. I remember eating lunch at a round tables with friends and a lot of outside play time. I remember songs and friends and freedom of choice. But, as childhood goes, I grew up and attended a traditional school. I remember traditional school being strict and hard. My earliest memories of school always included a feeling of struggle and of not being enough. I remember trying my hardest and it still wasn’t enough. I always got by and eventually I learned what I needed to do to be successful in school. I went on to college and decided to pursue teaching as I had finally discovered a love of learning and wanted others to experience it also. I knew my struggles could help others. My first teaching position was in a brand new preschool class - brand new-like walking into a public school that had never before had a preschool classroom - the chairs and tables were too big for 4 year old children and there was nothing else. Personal time was spent setting up the classroom, driving to the school warehouses to pick up materials that had been ordered but had no one to deliver it, and scouring books to determine what I needed to do with these new preschool children coming into my care. What a year of learning and growing that was. I moved to a new parish and a new grade but again had to start a completely new classroom except this time I wasn’t given materials! I ordered my own from catalogs, had parents donate, and accepted donations from veteran teachers. Life continued as a teacher, each year growing in materials, growing in learning, growing in experience and growing in knowledge.

Each year I felt accomplished, yet that still something was missing in my experiences. Over the early years of teaching, I had my own children. First a boy - a boy who was content to observe the world around him. He was so easy going and never rocked the boat (aside from his rocky premature birth). Two years later, a girl, who rocked the boat from the beginning. She was never content, never settled, never at ease. Two years later, another boy, this one a rule follower to the end. Equal is fair and fair is equal. He was easy to parent but not always easy for others around him. Then three years after that, the baby of the family was born, quick and easy and he has been anything but quick and easy since then. He is complete opposite of the others - He is in constant motion and never content, nothing is ever equal or fair, anything can be bargained and everything can be thought of differently. He has by far been the hardest to parent and I often say children don’t come with instruction books but he doesn’t even know they exist! As a parent I have also grown. I have learned that each one is different, each one requires a slightly different way and each has had experiences that make me a better mom, a better teacher and a better person.

So how does all of that tie into Montessori? A few years into teaching and parenting, I again came across Montessori. Montessori philosophy hadn’t been taught in my education classes and I didn’t know anyone who had been to a Montessori school. But looking for a preschool that was more than a daycare but not yet public school for my daughter who had just made 4 landed me touring a Montessori school. I was hooked again on the ideas of Montessori! Without even realizing it I was already “montessori” in my classroom philosophy and my parenting ideas. At the time, my teaching wasn’t quite mainstream public school teaching and my parenting ideas weren’t quite the mainstream parenting ideas of the time either. But when I walked into the Montessori school and my daughter was invited to join a circle that was already in progress, we were home. She immediately felt at home and I had felt a breath of fresh air. I decided this was the philosophy for my family. This was the style of parenting and teaching that felt like mine. I continued to teach in public school while getting my Montessori certification. I eventually joined the staff at the same Montessori school my children attended and I’m still there today. I’m still learning and still growing but in the Montessori way, in a place that believes like I do. Montessori philosophy believes in children, believes that children deserve mutual respect, have their own ideas and are capable to many things. Montessori teaches respect and independence. Montessori teaches conversation and conflict resolution, social skills and grace and courtesy. My place is Montessori!