My experience was that how the children and materials were treated was very school dependent. I was trained to teach the use of the materials in a way that helped the children feel comfortable using them and how to care for them but that was very little more than a basic way to use them with lots of encouragement to figure new/more ways to use them. I also got to work with children this way in my student teaching classroomss. When I went to a teach in a full time class it was at a school that taught all the ways to use the materials and didn't allow any experimenting, my leading the children to freedom was unappreciated, I was reprimanded. It was soon after that I stopped teaching, instead I started homeschooling my own girls. There is such a strong drive in the educational system to train children that many schools that offer Montessori, Waldorf and other alternative methods end up training and forget what the method was intended to do...educate.
On Oct 25, 2014 Michell Armeanu wrote :
My experience was that how the children and materials were treated was very school dependent. I was trained to teach the use of the materials in a way that helped the children feel comfortable using them and how to care for them but that was very little more than a basic way to use them with lots of encouragement to figure new/more ways to use them. I also got to work with children this way in my student teaching classroomss. When I went to a teach in a full time class it was at a school that taught all the ways to use the materials and didn't allow any experimenting, my leading the children to freedom was unappreciated, I was reprimanded. It was soon after that I stopped teaching, instead I started homeschooling my own girls. There is such a strong drive in the educational system to train children that many schools that offer Montessori, Waldorf and other alternative methods end up training and forget what the method was intended to do...educate.