Montessori School Observation

This observation took place at the Carlow campus school Montessori school. Observation began at 8:30 am. At this time, the teacher/director called the children to the line for morning meeting. A child was tasked with ringing the chime, before they had a chance to ring the chime the children were already noticing and were letting their work go and sitting on the line to begin morning meeting. The children knew where they needed to be and they knew how to sit. During morning meeting, the teacher showed the children what their new jobs would be for the day. Each job was taken out on a mat and the teacher explained the job. She explained whether the job was a one person or two-person job and she showed the children what to do while they were doing the work and what the steps were to complete the work. She gave the children time to complete a part of the work and to ask any questions that they may have had about the work. The teacher apologized to the children as she

She would remind children who were off task to complete their work and she would ask them to please complete their job so that they could move onto another job in a different area. One child in particular was struggling keeping on task of his job. He would lose concentration and while he was supposed to be working he would wonder away from his mat and watch the other children. The teacher continued to try and refocus his efforts till finally she needed to set right beside the child and tell him step by step what to do next to complete his task.

If a child was struggling with a job they had no problem asking for help. They asked the assistant teacher the practicum student and this observer without hesitation. When the child would approach and ask for help the teachers response would be, “ Tell me what you have to do to complete this job?” This method of questioning promoted the Montessori approach to child directed