The Montessori Classroom

In the Montessori classroom, children learn from the environment and from other children, not simply from the teacher. Students are almost always taught one-on-one or in very small groups.


Child-Centered Learning Environment

The focus is on the child’s learning, not on the teacher’s teaching. The Montessori learning environment is designed to…
  • Meet the needs of the children and appeal to their interests, correspond with their abilities and challenge their potential.
  • Allow the child to develop at his or her own pace according to their own capabilities.
  • Be “prepared” in advance of their children’s entry, and to be easily adaptable according to the changing needs of the children in the class.
  • Include all levels of intelligence and styles of learning – visual, spatial, kinaesthetic, auditory, linguistic, intuitive, logical-mathematical and musical.


Concrete Learning Activities

Montessori education develops a child’s potential by giving them hands-on experience with materials specially designed to stimulate learning. In the Montessori classroom…

  • Children learn first hand. They don’t just watch someone else demonstrate an activity or listen to a teacher explain a concept, they actually work the problem out with their own hands.
  • Children are encouraged, by the hands-on environment, to pursue their own learning intentions.
  • Children spontaneously seek growth and development. It is in their nature to do so, and the Montessori approach respects this and exploits it to the child’s benefit.
  • Children initiate their own work and continue with it until the task has been completed.
  • Motivation comes from within the individual child. The child’s own curiosity and interest drives them toward competence.


    • The Three-Year Cycle

    Montessori classes are grouped across a three-year age span: ages 3-6, ages 6-9, and ages 9-12. This accommodates each individual child’s educational needs.

    The younger children start off in the role of apprentice, listening carefully and learning from their older peers. Then as they get older and develop more skills, they are encouraged to act as helpers, demonstrators and mentors to the younger students.

    This mentoring approach not only develops leadership skills and confidence, it teaches children the importance of supporting and cooperating with others. This is in contrast to an attitude of competition where in order to be a winner others must be losers.

    The benefits of the three-year cycle are perhaps most obvious in the Montessori preschool, or Casa programme. Starting a full year or more before traditional kindergarten, in Montessori a child is given the opportunity to move from the physical world – where she can develop his motor skills, and all his senses with self-teaching, self-correcting materials – into the abstract world of ideas and concepts, all at his own pace. She must have the proper concrete preparation before she is ready to develop academically.

    During that critical third year of the Casa program, this transition usually happens and the Montessori directress is trained to help the child take great advantage of these rich educational opportunities. This is the period when all the learning absorbed by the child during the previous two years of Montessori trainings suddenly fits together and makes sense; the child begins reading, writing, doing math and showing other spouts of intellectual growth. Some may not start reading and writing during the third year, but usually do so the following year in their elementary class, seemingly without effort because they have gained the strong learning foundation they need.