Amy’s Life in Brief

I took the G to the neighbor boy’s birthday party the other day.  It was an interesting experience for me.  The neighbor boy attends the local Montessori school.  I have no problem with Montessori, per se.  I just don’t think I would mesh well as a parent with that framework and I don’t think that the G would either.  I guess I’m of the opinion that no one educational style is the be-all and end-all for every child.  I kind of go with the flow and if I think something isn’t working for the G (and the D in the future) I communicate with the teacher.  That has always been adequate in getting his needs met.  However, if we find ourselves in a situation where his needs aren’t getting met and I don’t see a way for them to be met in the given situation we will investigate other option.  Anyway, I digress.

The situation at the birthday party was very interesting.  The G was the only child that wasn’t from the Montessori school.  I listened to many of the parents talking and all they seemed to be talking about was why they chose Montessori for their child.  The reason this seemed so fascinating to me is that I would have thought, given that this is the end of the school year, this would have been a subject that they all would have had ample opportunity to discuss at pick-up and drop-off and other events at the school.  But, maybe the nature of Montessori doesn’t allow time for parents to socialize during these times at school?  And maybe because they have sort of “opted out” of the traditional school system they are always bonding with other Montessori parents whenever there is a gathering?  I just found it interesting because I don’t think that I’ve ever had much more than one conversation about our educational choices with my mom friends from preschool and elsewhere.  The main topic of educational choices has been surrounding full- versus half-day kindergarten.

There was one mother that was telling me how she could always tell a non-Montessori child.  I am not sure what she was noticing in the G as far as the difference.  Looking over this group of about 12 children, I saw a very average group of kids.  There were the shy kids, the kids who were kind of bossy, the other kids just doing their own thing, the kids who made quick friends with the new kids, kids who listened to their parents and kids who didn’t.  There were also kids who got tired and threw fits, kids who didn’t get their way and threw fits, and kids who didn’t throw fits at all over the course of the three hours.  So, like I said, I didn’t see any major differences.  This will sound catty of me, I’m sure, but maybe she was reaching for some way of justifying the huge amount of tuition they pay.  I believe the Montessori school in our city charges approximately $4500 a year for a half-day program.

I wonder if the situation would have been the same if it was a group of families from the Waldorf school or the local Christian school?  I’m just wondering.  In my humble opinion, I think most of the differences you see among children has little to do with their educational setting and more to do with their home setting anyway.