“The needs of mankind are universal. Our means of meeting them create the richness and diversity of the planet. The Montessori child should come to relish the texture of that diversity.”
— Maria Montessori
I teach a group of culturally and socioeconomically diverse learners in a mixed age classroom comprised of 4th through 6th grade at a free/public Montessori Charter School. The beauty of a Montessori environment is the range of skills possessed by each child. Students who are still learning to read and write have amazing talents in other areas. Children who are learning English are confident mathematicians, historians, artists, and scientists. Each child is different, and those differences make our classroom a community that embraces our similarities and celebrates our unique qualities. These children are future leaders and change makers.
My Project
Children develop aspects of their cultural identity through the role models represented in the stories they read. Many children at my school are unable to find characters with similar experiences to their own from the current selection of books in our library. This lack of representation causes my students to question the validity of their own cultures.
Providing a variety of culturally relevant books to my students will allow them to build confidence in their sense of self and to learn to love research and reading.
My students with disabilities will discover that others share similar struggles and see how they can still make a change. For the students who speak Spanish in my classroom, these books will allow them to connect to their home language and to find similarities and differences between the cultures of the characters and their own.
For the classroom overall, the addition of these new books will help children to become aware of the differences among groups of people and their commonalities. Children will read and learn that even young people can make a tremendous impact in their community. In addition, a crucial aspect of Montessori education is research about the unsung heroes of the past. These books will give the students the ability to start that research because the material is accessible with pictures and language that is appropriate for 4th, 5th, and 6th graders.
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