The role of the Teacher

• Our Montessori teachers have trained teachers qualifications as well as an additional diploma in Montessori education. The teacher is a guide or facilitator whose task it is to support the young child in his or her process of self-development. The teacher is foremost an observer, unobtrusively, carefully monitoring each child's development, recognising and interpreting each child's needs.
  
  
• The teacher provides a link between the child and the prepared environment, introducing the child to each piece of equipment when he or she is ready in a precise, clear and enticing way. On a broader level the teacher provides a link between the classroom and parents, meeting with each child's parents to discuss progress.
  
  

The ideal classroom environment

• The purpose of long, uninterrupted blocks of work time is to allow students to select work freely, eventually becoming absorbed in work that has a particular fascination for them at this point in their development. Interruptions, no matter how valuable the alternative activity might seem to be, disturbs the fragile development of the child's focus, concentration, and intellectual exploration on his or her own.
  
  
• To allow for a complete 3 hour work period in the morning, children take a snack time individually or in small groups at any stage through the morning. This prevents disruption of the working tone for the whole class.
  
  
• Children are taught to speak in quiet voices that only the person they are speaking to will hear.
  
  
• Teachers do not speak across the class but move to the children they wish to speak to and also speak in quiet voices so as not to disrupt others working.
  
  
• Materials are displayed aesthetically and there is a place for everything and everything in its place so children will see the space on the shelf from which they took their materials and be able to return them again when finished.
  
  
• Wall displays are kept to a minimum to allow for a calm, uncluttered environment in which the learning materials are the focus and visual distractions are limited.