Montessori Early Childhood Education
The history of early childhood education goes all the way back to 1500 and has definitely come a long way in recent years. Early childhood education has a very long and rich history, with valuable contributions by some of the greatest theorists of child development and education.
Several more amazing minds helped to form our education system and provide deeper insights into children's early learning. Friedrich Froebel is another one that gets much of the credit for his contributions to early education and childcare. He is considered the originator of daycare, but his beliefs about how younger children should be taught have influenced even the modern-day classroom.
Although my dad was only eighteen at the time - one year older than most people who graduated from high school - he started with high school and did not stop until after his graduation from Atlantas Morehouse College. I went through the public schools in Atlanta for a while, then went to what was known as Atlanta University Lab High School for two years.
An only child, it was afforded every facility any student would hope to have in a middle school and a university. She was sent to the best schools and colleges available and generally protected from the worst ills of discrimination. Maria Tecla Artemisia Montessoris initial record at the school is not particularly remarkable. However, in 1st grade she was awarded certificates of good behaviour, and in the following year for her lavori donneschi, or womens labour.
During her two years in school, Montessori developed methods and materials that she would later adapt for use with regular children. Maria Tecla Artemisia Montessori came to view independence as an educational goal, with the teacher acting as a supervisor and guide of children's natural psychological development. In 1899, Montessori was appointed as an advisor in the newly formed National League to Protect the Rights of the Incarcerated and was invited to give lectures at the Teachers Training School at the Universita Cattolica degli Studi di Roma about the specific methods of education of intellectually disabled children.
In her classes, Maria Tecla Artemisia Montessori observed behaviours in these small children that formed the basis for her teaching methods. The Montessori method was to see children as sources of knowledge, while the teacher, or educator, was a social engineer. Further based on this concept, Maria Montessori (1870-1952) saw children as sources of knowledge, with the educator as the social engineer.
Montessori and Waldorf are both approaches that may continue far past early childhood levels into secondary education. In Montessori, children are exposed to a humanitarian, socially responsible, and compassionate way of approaching the world.
In a Montessori classroom, the emphasis is on the child's interaction with materials, with the teacher as a facilitator, in contrast to most traditional classrooms, where the emphasis is on the child's interaction with the teacher. There are no standardized tests, and learning is demonstrated by projects that the child explores, which are documented by the educator. Instead of being taught, teachers guide children toward materials and activities suited for that child.
Typically, an educator who works with a single cohort of children will remain with the same cohort as he or she grows older and moves up from grade to grade.
The children learn their work is valuable and essential, and teachers develop a stronger connection with their students and become more familiar with them. Over the years, education has become more formalized, these things have been introduced to the classroom.
Clarence S. Marsh, the education director at CCC, compared the program to the Great American Folk School (Tyack, p. 121). By 1930, the bill had topped $29 million, and nearly 4.5 million children in 14,000 schools had participated in the program.
During World War II (1939-1945), the last New Deal programs related to education were eliminated. It was only during the Depression economic crisis that the government entered the schoolhouse arena via the New Deal programs.
Through various government programs from 1933 to 1939, such as the Public Works Administration (PWA) and WPA, the New Deal was behind 70% of all school building projects. In addition to creating jobs-relief programs to build public buildings, including schools, the WPA had an emergency education program. Public financing for schools was one of the most significant changes to public education in the 1930s.
After suffering in the first years of the Depression, from 1935, the post office enjoyed a steady increase in revenues, in part because of the economic policies of the New Deal.
New Dealers began developing programs to assist students who had dropped out of school and those still in mainstream schools. Some educators believed health services were precisely the programs needed in the 1930s, when a growing number of students from poor families were staying in schools. Focused on younger children, the Emergency Education Program offered daycare to children of poor families and parenting classes to their parents.
The Montessori Method allowed children to develop at their own pace and provided educators with new insights into children's development. The Montessori Method is a way of education for young children which emphasizes developing the children's initiative and natural abilities, particularly through hands-on activities. Maria Montessori (1870-1952) considered education to be the means by which a child's life is improved, meaning the environment in which one studies is just as important as learning itself.
Maria Montessori (1870-1952) took the stance that the child's senses must be taught first, followed by the child's intellect later. Building upon this idea, the next person who contributed to early education was John Amos Comenius (1592-1670), who firmly believed that learning for children was rooted in sensate exploration.
By 1929, Indian poet Rabindranath Tagore had established a number of Montessori schools Tagore-Montessori schools throughout India, and Indian interests in Montessori education were well represented in an international congress held in 1929. In 1929, the first International Montessori Congress was held at Elsinore, Denmark, concurrently with the fifth conference of the Fellowship for a New Education.
If President Roosevelt needed counsel about educational issues, he turned to college presidents, professors from The New School, individuals in his staff with experience in social work, and to his wife and friends. Because Montessori was such a particular style, there was even a governing body for Montessori schools and educators by which they were supposed to receive certification. Generally speaking, theorists in early education would all want to see a shared objective achieved: the success of children's primary years.
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