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The children at Shenandoah Woods learn size relationships and the concepts of larger and smaller by arranging bright red wooden rods in order from shortest to longest. Mary Beth has boxes filled with different sized peas and beans for the children to mix and separate. The youngsters work with blindfolds on, feeling different sorts of fabric and trying to guess which is which. “They’re learning to see with their fingers,” Mary Beth explained.
In reading readiness, she uses sandpaper letters for the children to feel as well as look it when they’re introduced to the alphabet. The sandpaper letters reinforce with the hands what the children see with their eyes, sending the message of what an “A” is to the brain by two different paths.
This same approach is the basis for remedial reading programs. “Montessori starts that way so there’s no failure,” Mary Beth noted.
Under the Montessori method, young children learn from practical life exercises. Pouring water into a vase for cut flowers improves a child’s coordination. Cooking, polishing, sweeping, washing dishes and performing other supervised activities give them ' a seriise " of accomplishment and at the same time develop muscles and skills which will be needed later for academic exercises.
Following the Montessori method, Mary Beth emphasizes completing tasks and putting things away. The children work individually at learning activities that spark their interest. On a normal day, the three knee-high girls who make up the class dart back and forth from tables to shelves, selecting the instructional materials they need for their projects. If they don’t return their learning tools when they’ve finished, the room could look like a ground zero bomb hit in no time.
Maybe Mary Beth had to nag at the beginning of the year to persuade her charges to cooperate. By late May, however, cleaning up after themselves—at least at school—had become second nature. “It really builds character,” said Mary Beth. “And it’s the only way (the Montessori method) will all work. They have to put things back so the second child can use them.”
Mary Beth believes in the Montessori principle that children will learn if given the freedom to explore and participate. “I ask them what they want to do because I’ve found that I have greater success (in teaching) when they’re doing what they want to do.”
This method coupled with the close individual attention that Mary Beth is able to give each child brings results. Her youngsters scored higher than the norm on standardized tests and, more - important to their teacher, showed dramatic improvement in vocabulary between the beginning and end of the year.
Mary Beth attributes the
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