Montessori Great Lessons in the Washington Post

This one is a little complicated but worth following.








3 responses to “Montessori Great Lessons in the Washington Post

  1. Marianne Giannis

    I’m not exactly sure what point Daniel Willingham is trying to make by connecting the Montessori Great Lessons to Common Core Standards and that vocabulary list. Here is my explanation that I posted in the Answer Sheet comments: Daniel, I am a teacher in a 1st-6th grade class. Your explanation and sequence of the Montessori lessons is incomplete. The Montessori Great Lessons as described in the above article are meant to strike the imagination of the 1st-3rd grade students. They are typically presented in large group lessons which utilize pictures, discussion, and activities to explain the big picture (or “Cosmic Idea”) of the origins of each of the academic areas. The lessons aren’t really about a study of ancient civilizations. That is part of the 4th-6th grade Montessori curriculum.

    In 4th-6th grade, Montessori students do in-depth research of these topics. The materials and lessons are different than the 1st-3rd grade levels. The vocabulary listed above is indicative of work done by 4th-6th graders in a Montessori classroom. Using these lessons to somehow make a point about Common Core and Montessori is misleading to say the least.


    • Montessori Observer

      Thanks for the comment.

      I think Willingham’s point was that young children can actually understand the vocabulary referenced in his post, because he’s seen it happen in his child’school. And I would argue that he’s on solid ground there. The AMI Elementary training (which is what I’m most familiar with) doesn’t make that big a distinction between 1st-3rd and 4th-6th. In fact, as you may know, it’s given as one course, not separate certificates as is done in other organizations. I’ve certainly seen plenty of “lower el” children get excited about ancient civilizations, and access vocabulary such as what’s listed here.

      What struck me was Montessori advanced as evidence against developmental stage theory, since that’s such a core feature of our philosophy. I followed up with Willingham, and his sense is that the empirical research for stages is not strong, and that Montessori, as a scientist, might have come to some different conclusions had she lived to see more data come in.


  2. Marianne Giannis

    Yes, I am basing my comments on my AMS training where the lower elementary and upper elementary training is separate. While separate, it still follows Montessori’s theory of child development. Young children may get excited about ancient civilizations but most of the vocabulary list (and the text that it would be part of) intended for 1st graders probably too abstract for most children that age to really comprehend. 6 year olds are pretty concrete beings. Montessori students do tend to have a great vocabulary and ability to discuss but it is a result of the whole Montessori method. You can’t take bits and pieces of it, or certain lessons, to make such a statement about child development, curriculum, etc.


Leave a Reply


You are commenting using your account. Log Out /  Change )

Google photo


Twitter picture


Facebook photo


Connecting to %s