Mentorship in our classrooms: Why Mixed Ages Work

Have you ever noticed the mixed-age classrooms in a Montessori school and wondered why? This is a specific design that allows younger children to benefit from having older peers as role models and mentors and enables older children to step into leadership roles. This model mirrors real-world experiences where people of different ages work together and learn from each other.

In our IMSP classrooms, older students relish and value the opportunity to be leaders, sometimes stepping into a teaching role. Mentoring their younger friends increases the independence and competence of the older students. This model is also beneficial to the younger children as they look to older students to be role models and helpers. They know that they can count on them for help and, because of this, they can accomplish tasks they may not be able to do independently yet.

As a whole, children can cooperate rather than compete, creating an environment of learners who support and care for each other. Check out this video to see Montessori mentorship in action!

Want to learn more? Read our next article:

STARTING PRESCHOOL: HOW TO HANDLE SAYING GOODBYES?

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Learning Mathematics in our Primary Classrooms

Maria Montessori often stated that not only does every human being have an innate drive to understand the environment around them, we all also naturally have what she called a “Mathematical Mind”. In the Montessori classroom, mathematical learning begins through indirect preparation long before a child is ever introduced to any Math materials.

Toilet Training: A Key How to Succeed

How to handle toilet training? It’s often considered one of the first big parenting “tasks,” and can bring a lot of anxiety and frustration. But it doesn’t have to! In Montessori Infant and Toddler classrooms, we use a time-tested and practical approach to toilet training that is (dare I say it) easy on both parents and children.

Montessori Sensorial Materials Lead to Sensory Awareness

The materials in the Sensorial area of the Montessori classroom are quite unique – they speak to the tactile observer in all of us. When you consider the way humans take in information, you realize how often we use more than one sense to explore. Maria Montessori’s work in the Sensorial environment was designed to take advantage of this tendency. Today, I will discuss the materials featured in the Children’s House classroom (ages 3-6).

Mindfulness: A Key Part of Our Elementary Curriculum

If you visit the Upper Elementary at IMSP on any school day in the late morning, you would hear a gentle bell ring at around 11:20. The students clean-up, and by 11:30, they gather on the classroom carpet and light a candle. A teacher sets a timer. At the sound of a bell, they begin their 5-minute awareness/mindfulness practice.

Cooking With Children can be fun

It is often said that “the family that eats together, stays together”. We would like to suggest taking it a step further – and encourage every family to cook together, too. In Montessori, we know that kitchen work provides a host of benefits to children, all the way from toddlers to adolescents; it is a part of the Practical Life curriculum as soon as children can walk! However, its advantages are in no way tied to the classroom and can be just as easily – if not more so – applied at home.