Abstract/Notes: La educación multicultural ha estado en el punto de mira durante décadas desde finales del siglo pasado. El fenómeno de la inmigración y los asentamientos masivos en determinados puntos de nuestro país, obligaron a las autoridades a cubrir las necesidades de estos nuevos núcleos poblacionales. De este modo, surgieron nuevas escuelas que poco a poco iban transformándose en guetos de un alumnado inmigrante que desconocía tanto la cultura como la lengua del país de destino. Estos centros educativos, focos de controversia, se han convertido en un reto para sus docentes que, implicados/as en su labor, han ido transformando la realidad para conseguir mejorar la calidad. En este contexto, situamos la “buena práctica” en educación infantil, donde una profesora con un alumnado en riesgo ha hecho realidad su sueño de trasladar la metodología Montessori a su clase. / Multicultural Education has been in the spotlight for ages. During the last decades of last century, the phenomenon of immigration and the development of massive settlements of immigrant communities in certain parts of Spain led political and educational authorities to confront and help in assisting the needs of these growing social groups. In this way, new school communities emerged but they slowly became into ghettos of immigrant students who, in many occasions, did know little or nothing about the target language or culture of their new country. These schools may have been seen as spots of controversy and they have indeed been a challenge for their teachers, who have been able to improve the quality of education through their daily work. Considering this context, we place the concept of ‘good practice’ in young children education at the core of this article by making reference to the experience of a female teacher who has made true her dream of implementing Montessori Methodology in a risk group of Infant students.

Language: Spanish

ISSN: 2255-0666

Language: English

Published: Boca Raton, Florida, 2002

Language: English

ISSN: 0277-9064

Abstract/Notes: L’articolo presenta una ricerca basata sull’osservazione di un contesto educativo di ispirazione montessoriana. La ricerca intendeva mettere in luce gli atteggiamenti, le proposte e le strategie delle educatrici, e le risposte dei bambini a queste sollecitazioni. Il testo si articola in una introduzione metodologica che illustra il tipo di servizio educativo, la metodologia di osservazione adottata e la traccia che ha gui-dato le osservazioni; seguono alcune considerazioni sull’autonomia del bambino, l’attenzione al singolo bambino e la cura del bambino, emerse dalla analisi delle osservazioni; conclude l’articolo la trascrizione di una delle tre osservazioni condotte. [The paper presents an observational study carried on in an early educational context inspired to Montessori approach. It is aimed at illustrating the educators’ attitudes, behaviours, and educational strategies and the children’s reactions to them. First, the educational approach of the centre and the observational methodology are described. Then, a detailed analysis of the observations with regard to the educators’ support to child autonomy, attention to children’s requests and needs, and care behaviours is presented. Finally, the transcript of a whole observation is reported.]

Language: Italian

DOI: 10.6092/issn.1970-2221/1760

ISSN: 1970-2221

Abstract/Notes: We explore the use of video and photo elicitation in a research study undertaken to understand the way in which preschool teachers perceive and construct their provision of children’s educational experiences. We explore the value of visually elicited interviews based on video footage and photographs captured during teaching and learning in four classrooms in two preschool settings in Kenya. Through visually elicited interviews, both the teachers and the researcher constructed meaningful conversations (interviews) to explore preschool teachers’ practical experiences and their beliefs, understanding and interpretation of developmentally appropriate educational practices. This paper targets the possible value of and contribution made by visual data generation procedures, as well as their inherent challenges, in order to add to the body of knowledge on visually elicited interviews.

Language: English

DOI: 10.15700/saje.v32n4a661

ISSN: 2076-3433

Abstract/Notes: This study compared the effects of multi-age classroom strategies to those of traditional classroom strategies on the academic achievement of fourth grade students in reading and math. Standardized test scores from 20 fourth-grade students in two multi-age third- and fourth-grade classrooms were compared to the scores of 20 students from 7 traditional fourth-grade classrooms. The Stanford Achievement Test (SAT), ninth edition was used as the test instrument. Scores from the students' third grade test in the 1996-97 school year were compared to their scores from the fourth grade test in reading and math by applying T-tests to the data. Analysis of the data revealed no difference in reading or math achievement between students taught in a multi-age classroom and those from a traditional classroom.

Language: English

Published: Salem, West Virginia, 1998

Abstract/Notes: This study had several objectives. First, to investigate the practices of forest kindergartens in three different geographic regions of Türkiye. Second, to explore how the founders of forest kindergartens overcome challenges and take advantage of favorable circumstances as they set up and run the kindergartens. Third, to research the challenges and favorable circumstances that teachers face in such kindergartens and ways to deal with them. Fourth, to examine what kinds of cultural adaptations kindergarten founders and teachers need to make to use Forest Pedagogy in their own culture or location. Fifth, to elicit the kindergarten founders', teachers', and parents' knowledge of Forest Pedagogy. And sixth, to explore how parents' knowledge of Forest Pedagogy relates to their expectations of forest kindergartens. This study included members of the forest kindergartens (N = 21), which comprised the founders (N = 3), teachers (N = 9), and parents (N = 9). The study discovered that forest kindergartens were not typical, despite sharing similar practices with other kindergartens, such as the daily use of outdoor playgrounds. The diversity of the outdoor settings employed by forest kindergartens varied from region to region, depending on their geographical characteristics. However, they shared certain challenges with other kindergartens, such as a lack of unstructured and affordable natural settings surrounding the kindergartens. In all cases, the kindergarten founders and teachers had limited knowledge of sustainable attitudes for children and the significance of risky play. Yet, the parents possessed the knowledge to value free, muddy, and risky play throughout the year.

Language: English

Published: Ankara, Turkey, 2022

Abstract/Notes: If the purpose of an educational system is to guide pupils towards achieving independence, then certain conditions about the design and conduct of that system must be met. In this paper, those conditions are formulated from a socio‐cultural perspective on learning and development. This paper examines the extent to which those conditions were fulfilled by teachers judged ‘good’ by their pupils and by school management in a case‐study in two Montessori secondary schools. Because discourse is assumed to play a central role when pupils work on assignments with the teacher assisting them, dialogues occurring in various teaching‐learning situations were analysed. The types of language genre used by the teachers and pupils were found to be important characteristics of the ongoing dialogues. The main results were that ‘good’ teachers excel in the adoption of a personal approach to pupils, but they work much more intuitively than systematically or deliberately to stimulate pupils' development of higher mental functions.

Language: English

DOI: 10.1080/00220270903079237

ISSN: 0022-0272

Abstract/Notes: I review recent practices and studies of the Montessori method from 1979 and intend to discover some tasks for future studies. I researched fourteen files in the DIALOG database, and tried to find papers from 1979 using the key word "MONTESSORI". Sixty-seven titles of books and papers were output from the DIALOG database. I classified them into five large groups. Each large group was further divided into small groups. The following are these large groups, with the numbers of books and papers contained in each large group shown in parenthses. 1. Studies which compared the Montessori method with other methods. (27) 2. Practical examples which developed and applied the Montessori method. (18) 3. Studies about the Montessori method for handicapped children. (12) 4. Philosophical and theoretical studies about the Montessori method. (8) 5. Scientific studies about the Montessori method. (2) The group of "Scientific studies about the Montessori method" had only two papers, the smallest in number of the five groups. The Montessori method was created scientifically by Maria Montessori at the beginning of this century. During the following years the educational and psychological sciences have developed gradually. I think that the Montessori method should be further studied scientifically from the modern educational and psychological points of view. Scientific studies will clarify new aspects of the Montessori method and add new elements to it. The Montessori method will develop and be applied to various fields.

Language: English

Abstract/Notes: The realities of child development defy efforts to categorize children's abilities and attainments within the conventional graded structure. Pupil readiness varies, and children progress in all subjects at different rates. The development of multiage or cross-age groupings, sometimes coordinated with youngsters in tutoring programs, has produced promising outcomes, especially in the affective and social skills areas. (26 references) (MLH)

Language: English

DOI: 10.1177/019263659507956805

ISSN: 0192-6365