Hi Everyone!

I’m excited to welcome you all to the introduction of my blog, and the start of what I hope to be a long and fruitful journey in my work to support the expansion of equitable Montessori education for readers everywhere! First things first, let’s get to know each other with a few good questions…

What what would like people to know about you as an educator?

I never dreamed I would be an educator. I always loved my teachers, but I grew up singing on my trampoline and lining my dolls up along my bed while I pretended to be Sally Jesse Raphael (talk show host extraordinaire of the 90’s). It wasn’t until I graduated from McGill University with a deep love for learning that I realized how much I wanted to share that with others. I started out working with elementary students, teaching English in South Korea, but found them temperamental, sensitive, and uninterested in me – difficult for the first year teacher. I quickly transitioned into the primary Casa Montessori classroom, and after moving to Beijing, China, this age of children (2.5-6 years old) became my deep passion.

I have loved observing children at this age, as they work together with classmates to separate amphibians and reptiles, sew their own princess bags, and cut up their own bananas for snacktime. These are the children who push your leg to make sure you don’t step on ants in the middle of the sidewalk, and who hug you before they leave the classroom because they are proud of what they have learned to do for themselves. What I love about being an educator for these children is each and every moment I have with them in which they educate me.

What first drew you into Montessori?

I will always remember the moment when I was first invited to observe a Montessori classroom. I was given a small chair on the side of the class, and a sign was put up next to it that said “I am observing!” The teacher told me I could watch for the entirety of the 3 hour work period – to which I shook my head with disbelief. Children would be working for 3 hours? Not possible. I could barely get them to sit for a 45 minute English lesson. The children came into the classroom a few moments later, and I watched as they went to their cubbies and hung up their backpacks and jackets, put away their snacks, changed their shoes. A young child, maybe 2 years old, struggled to take off his shoes, but no teacher interrupted this process. My inner adult jumped at this moment, wanting to run and help him but two minutes later I saw the boy get his shoes off and he got up and went to where his other friends were sitting in Circle and said “Look, look, look!” One of the friends gave him a high five and laughed.

The children had a short Circle, where the teacher asked them to collectively build the Pink Tower, and then put it away. Every child had a chance to hold the cube, and carry it to/from the shelf. Every child was recognized and acknowledged. I had not heard a classroom so quiet…in my life. And with a ring of the bell, suddenly, there was a flurry of activity. I didn’t know where to lay my eyes. Suddenly, a child was pulling out knobbed cylinders and organizing them by size, children were laying out cards and spelling red and blue words, a group of children were sitting with a Montessori guide learning about types of dinosaurs…There was activity everywhere, bursts of chaos which quickly turned into self-directed learning. The teacher was not lecturing, not instructing but guiding and supporting these children as they transitioned into their own explorations for learning. There was independence, confidence, and there was respect; Respect for each action, each child, each material that held space in the classroom. I had never seen anything more beautiful in my life, and I knew from that moment on I wanted to build a place like that for children myself.

If I were to visit your classroom and take a polaroid photo, what would I see in that photo?

I love the idea of “organized chaos”. That’s most likely what you would see from far away when someone handed you a photo of my classroom. As you zoom in though, you’d find pockets of beautiful exploration going on in each part of the environment. I would hope you would see children engaged in meaningful learning interactions, whether that being in building structures with Sensorial materials, or in mastering real tools (like screwdrivers and chopsticks!) to do everyday tasks around their environment, or even in putting together numerical quantities up to 9,999 using the Montessori golden beads! Some children would be working on their own, some would be in groups, some would be with our Montessori guides. From far away it looks like maddening crowds, but to be a presence within it one would see that there is a flow to the Montessori environment as we move around each other in our learning planes. I hope you would see the brightness, the sunshine, and the nature that I try to breathe into the classroom. Children, I fear, spend far too little time feeling the touch of our Earth to their skin, and so I try to make that a presence in their every day life in the Montessori environment. And I hope you would see the smiles, the joy that I see every day on the faces of children in the classroom as they learn, as they pursue knowledge and skills and figure out – as they say – that “I can do it by myself!”

What does challenging behavior in the classroom mean to you?

One thing a new teacher rarely is prepared for is challenging behaviour in the classroom. And one thing every teacher can be assured they will have to learn to deal with is challenging behaviour. There will always be one child who will tell you they don’t like you, or one child who doesn’t want to line up with everyone else, or one child who just can’t control their hands from touching everything and everyone. What challenging behaviour does NOT mean to me, however, is that the child is bad. I will always love the words of the late Rita Pierson, who said, “ Every child deserves a champion, an adult who will never give up on them, who understands the power of connection, and insists that they become the best that they can possibly be.” (Ted Talk: Every Kid Needs a Champion) When a child lashes out, loses control, or just challenges me in every way, I know there’s something else going on and I make it my priority to figure out how I can help them solve that problem. I learned, the hard way, that observation, quality time and connection are often the best ways to learn from the child and initiate a deeper understanding of what they may be looking for from you.

What doesn’t help? Losing my temper. When I feel that coming on, I hit the pause button and tell them I’m going to walk away for a few minutes. This, to me, normalizes the process of taking time out for ourselves, for reflection, for breathing, for self-control – something many children rarely see from adults anymore. And when I’m ready, I make sure to come back and initiate connection with that child so that they know reflection is a healthy part of the process in problem-solving and supporting them in redirecting their behaviour.

There’s a lot more I could say on this subject – and will say on this subject later, pending common questions many parents have asked me to address. Nonetheless, I wanted to give you a quick window of insight as to where I come from when looking at all aspects of classroom life as an educator.

More Q&A’s to come in the next post! Look forward to sharing with you then!

Until the next time,

Miss Charlie Montessori 🤍💛