ADD & The Montessori Method
I have a daughter with ADD. From K-2nd grade in public school she struggled to the point where almost no work was getting done at school and getting her to do any homework at night was almost impossible.
The school offered her very little help, 3 hours of resource per week, and we had to go through a year and half of meetings with administration to get that.
The teacher and administration continually pressured me to put her on ADD medication. I was against it but got desperate enough to try it. For the first couple of weeks, things were much better. Then, her personality started to change. She went from being sweet and mild mannered to having major mood swings with screaming, pushing, fighting & crying. We took her off the medication immediately and we will never use it again.
I felt like we were out of options with her. I had 6 weeks of school left but I felt like I couldn’t keep her in public school another day. The school was breathing down my neck constantly trying to get me to put her back on medication.
I called a private Montessori school in the area and talked to the owner about my situation. She said she wasn’t sure how she would do at her school but said that we could try it for a day and see how she did.
To my surprise, my daughter did REALLY well. The teachers said that she seemed to have a little trouble paying attention, but not anything major. I was just happy to get her in a lower stress situation and to get the public school off my back about giving her medication. So, I put her in the Montessori school for the last 6 weeks of school.
My daughter is in the same Montessori program this year as well. She is now in her 8th week of school so far this school year. So, she has had a total of 14 weeks of Montessori education and I have to say that I am stunned at what it has done for her.
My daughter is like a different student now. I cannot believe how much work she has produced in the 14 weeks she has been at the school. She has produced stacks and stacks of writing assignments. She went from not being able to do any homework at all to being able to sit down at night and complete all of her homework by herself. She went from not even being able to complete tests to being the first student finished and she is getting A’s on those tests. This work isn’t any easier than the work she was doing before. She is now showing a lot of interest in science and other subjects. She is enjoying school now. She is like a completely different student.
All of these results were without medication. I have talked to the teachers at the school to see what they are doing different from public schools that might be helping her so much. The only things I can tell that are making such a big difference are:
Hands on Learning – The Montessori method has a lot of hands on activities. They use a lot of manipulatives with their curriculum.
Flexibility in Time – The Montessori daily structure is much more relaxed with more flexibility to work on projects and activities longer. They said that the kids have almost 2 hours to keep working on an activity whereas in public school, they can be changing tracks as often as every 20 minutes. My daughter can take 20 minutes just to get going on an activity.
Smaller Class Size – My daughters class size is very small. She is able to get a lot of help from the teacher and there are fewer distractions in such a small class.
I am glad that we finally found a way for her to learn and be happy. I’m not exactly sure why it works but I’m glad it does. I’m interested to find out more about why it works.
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