Ms. Beitler Goes Back to Chicao, Part 1

Students in Sylvia's Class Prove and Disprove Conjectures

A nice meeting space for older students.

Some students in Sylvia's class matched cards with equivalent fractions and percentages

Students complete independent projects investigating social issues using statistics and graphs.

I came to Chicago for last Saturday's Teaching for Social Justice Curriculum Fair.  I attended this event once before and found some useful resources, but this time I was especially impressed by the energy of everyone there.  We saw inspiring speeches by parent and student activists (I'll post video if I can find some online) and I sat at a table chatting with people about the Free School.

Since there were only a few days between the fair and Thanksgiving, I decided to stay in Chicago and take the time to visit the classrooms of some colleagues.  My first stop on Monday morning was the Ancona School, a Montessori school in Hyde Park.

I first visited the pre-school classroom where my housemate Rachael used to be the assistant teacher.  The current assistant is her friend Gilad, who I had met several times.  What Rachael and Gilad had described to me about teaching pre-school using Montessori methods sounded very intriguing.

I was immediately impressed by how relaxed the children seemed.  The first part of the morning was devoted to a story about animals in the Sonoran desert.  Some kids were a bit wiggly as you would expect of three-year-olds, but they remained calm and didn't cause major disruptions.  There were between twenty and twenty-five students in the class.  As Gilad read the story, Myriam, the head teacher, greeted students who were arriving.

The classroom space was not extremely large but was very carefully arranged.  There was a big rug in the middle surrounded on all sides with stations where students could do various activities.  A small desk held writing materials.  Miniature couches and chairs were stationed near bookshelves.  Other tables were arranged near blocks and math manipulatives.  I could see that this school had resources and also that the teachers took great care in arranging the space.

After storytime the students sang songs in Spanish led by Myriam, and then a guest teacher came in and led movement activities.  Then it was time for the students to choose their work, which is at the heart of the Montessori method.  Students were called on in turn and told Myriam what they wanted to work on.  Some students pulled out boxes with pattern blocks or letter shapes into the middle of the carpet, others found a station around the room.  Students were quiet but not silent, and seemed calm and interested in their work.  I mentioned this to Rachael later and she said that one main goal of Montessori teaching is to help students develop this relaxed concentration.

After observing the pre-school classroom, I went up to see a fifth-sixth grade math class taught by my friend Sylvia.  Pictures of her classroom are shown above.  The class I observed is called I-Math, which happens for students once every three days as a supplement to regular class time. During this independent math time,  students finish homework, have time to complete projects, study for skill-based quizzes, and work on the computer using a program called Scratch or Geometer's Sketchpad.

Again I saw the same relaxed concentration as in the pre-school.  A few boys had trouble settling into an activity but most students got right to work.  Students did not have the same level of choice that they would at the Free School - Sylvia instructed them on what work to start with - but once required work was complete students also had their own projects to do.  Students seemed to take ownership in their work and to go about it happily.

Again I saw that the classroom space was very supportive of students' learning - there were whiteboards for them to access to write on together, plenty of table space, six computers, and a meeting area. 

It used to upset me to visit schools with such rich resources because it just underscored the extent to which my own students, almost all of whom were living in poverty, were being underserved.  This time I was able to put those feelings aside enough to appreciate what I was seeing.  But those feelings are not gone.  They re-emerge at other moments.  In my next few posts I will tell you all about visiting some very different Chicago schools and what students experience there.