Traditional Classroom |
Montessori Environment |
- Child is led toward textbook-driven curriculum; pencil and paper, worksheets and dittos primary source instructional material dependence from adults
- Adults are the main providers of learning, discipline, social problem solving
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- Prepared kinesthetic materials with emphasis on conceptual understanding; incorporated control of error; specially developed reference materials
The Goal is to lead children toward independence, academically as well as through social problem solving
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- Working and learning without emphasis on social development
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- Working and learning matched to the social development of the child
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- Narrow, unit-driven curriculum
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- Unified, internationally developed curriculum
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- Blanket approach to teaching - everyone doing the same thing at the same time
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- Education is set to each child's academic individual academic level; subject choices made by student
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- Block time, period lessons
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- Uninterrupted work cycles that allow the child to complete tasks before moving on to the next
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- Students passive, limited to desks; problematic transition times
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- Students active, softly conversing, with periods of spontaneous quiet; freedom to move
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- Students fit mold of school, primarily designed for middle level achieving students
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- School meets needs of all students, from the academically gifted to the challenged
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- Limitation on cooperative learning- students in direct competition with each other
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- Cooperative learning is encouraged; students willing to aid one another
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- Product-focused report cards
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- Process-focused assessments, skills checklists, mastery benchmarks
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- Environment is prepared for the teacher to be the sole and center of attention
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- Environment is prepared for the child; apparatus is systematically placed in accordance by the progression (difficulty) of the materials
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- Teacher acts as dispenser of knowledge. Greater part of learning is presented, in auditory fashion, from the teacher; or read from text books
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- Teacher acts as facilitator of knowledge. Greater part of learning comes from child's own discovery and work with the materials
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- Instruction primarily dealt within units; no particular order, later to be tied into a whole concept
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- Instruction presented in the whole, in chronological fashion, then broken into parts
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