Session Information
11 ONLINE 47 A, Approaches, theories and models of education quality
Paper Session
MeetingID: 868 4564 4597 Code: zUfh53
Contribution
At the end of the 19th century in Europe and in other countries of the world, criticisms of the traditional way of teaching education began to emerge, giving rise to "The New School". This heterogeneous movement does not have a single founder, but a series of authors who expose and seek to share their vision on the educational fact and who coincide in their desire for rupture and renewal of what until then had been developing in most schools (Sanchidrian and Berrio, 2016). Among these thinkers we find Maria Montessori, who, makes a genuine contribution by highlighting the need to reorganize the interior of classrooms. She considered that it was not only about considering the infant (as had been repeated since Rousseau), but to encourage their autonomy (Sanchidrian, 2013).
At present we find in the different educational stages, studies related to Montessori pedagogy that support its benefits. At the early childhood education stage, we find studies focused on specific areas of the curriculum such as the language area (Courtier et al., 2021) that conclude that the Montessori curriculum seems to promote reading skills, or the mathematics area (Nisa et al., 2019; Ongoren and Ozlem, 2018) that highlight the benefits of the use of Montessori mathematics materials in learning. At the primary school stage, there are also studies (Chytry et al., 2020; Alburaidi and Ambusaidi, 2019) that prove that the characteristics of Montessori materials in the areas of mathematics and science make it possible for students to obtain better results in these subjects, compared to the results obtained by infants in other types of schools. Finally, in the field of the elderly, research has shown that non-pharmacological interventions based on Montessori principles reduce levels of agitation and produce an improvement in mood and interest in activities (Chaudhry et al., 2020) and improve cognitive degeneration in patients with dementia (Chieh-Chun et al., 2016).
We consider Montessori pedagogy to be interesting because it attempts to provide answers to the educational and developmental needs of infants from a scientific perspective. Recent neuroscience research is corroborating many of the principles on which this pedagogy is based (Luna, 2015; Eret, 2020) such as that infants are born with an absorbent mind that facilitates their development and helps them to integrate quickly into their environment (Montanaro, 2007); that sensitive periods are windows of opportunity through which infants can learn new things, master new skills or develop aspects of their abilities almost unconsciously (Seldin, 2016); and ideas such as that humans have mechanisms for acquiring language that are established in the mind long before they learn to speak, but that if they do not hear it, they will not be able to absorb it; that the mind is constructed; or that children are born with neurons (Luna, 2015).
This paper aims to be the first systematic review of Montessori studies in the last decade and the following specific objectives are set out:
- To describe and analyse the Montessori scientific production published in the selected databases during the period January 2010 - May 2021.
- To select, present and classify the different productions by stages of human development, following the application of a program based on Montessori principles.
- Identify, analyse, and reflect on the main educational purposes, the results obtained and their implications in the school context.
Method
This review was developed in accordance with the principles of the PRISMA statement (Urrútia and Bonfill, 2010) and the standardized methodological guidelines proposed for the preparation of quality systematic reviews (Alexander, 2020). For the research search, the Web of Science (WOS) and Scopus databases were selected for the period January 2010 - May 2021. For the search of documents, the term "Montessori" was used as a key word, both in English and Spanish, in the title, abstract and key words fields. However, with the intention of limiting the number of publications initially found in both repositories, three criteria were included. The first was temporal, limiting the search from 2010 to the time the research was being carried out, May 2021; the second was related to access to the documents, as it was sought to be open; and the third was centred on the language in which the articles were written, limiting the search to publications written in English and Spanish, as these were the two most used languages. As a result, 211 articles were obtained: 108 in WOS and 103 in Scopus. The papers were analysed including the categories of title, authors, language, country where the research was conducted, year, educational stage represented, journal where it was published, keywords and abstract. Before starting with the selection of the articles, a first screening was carried out to eliminate all those that were repeated (n=71) or that after reading the abstract we observed that, although the word Montessori was mentioned at some point, they were not related to this pedagogy (n=8). We obtained a total of 132 articles. Subsequently, all the selected articles were read and those that did not focus on a stage of human development (n=29); did not include results in a specific group after the application of a program based on Montessori principles (n=39); and did not include empirical research (n=36) were eliminated. After this selection, 28 articles remained to be analysed: 12 related to the childhood education stage; 7 to elementary education stage; 1 to high school; 5 related to the elderly; and 3 covering different stages, two of them from kindergarten to secondary education; and one from childhood education to elementary education.
Expected Outcomes
Although more research on Montessori pedagogy is still needed (Ackerman, 2019), the results of the articles in this review support the benefits of Montessori pedagogy. At the educational level, this result reinforces the need to increase the presence of this way of working in educational centers (Aljabreen, 2020) and in programs focused on the elderly (Nwadiugwu, 2020), but as Chavarría (2012) explains, in many ways to venture into issues related to Montessori pedagogy implies a double rupture: the first would be related to the prejudices generated by its name, particularly in academic circles. And the second, with practices that are not congruent with Montessori and that, appropriating its name and materials, use it as an attractive lure for parents in search of innovative systems in the education of their children. One of the reasons why Montessori pedagogy is rejected today is precisely because of its frequent misimplementation. However, it continues to attract considerable attention and loyalty as it is a unique system that is well aligned with the science of development and learning and has strong social-emotional and academic outcomes (Lillard, 2019). More than one hundred years later, the Montessori method is still topical. This is possible thanks to its adaptability; however, greater adaptability implies less fidelity (Sanchidrian, 2020). To achieve this fidelity it is very important, on the one hand, the design of the spaces where this way of working will be carried out, and on the other hand, adequate teacher training, since the teacher must help the infant to work, to concentrate and to learn using the appropriate material and environment (Montessori, 2013)
References
Ackerman, D.J. (2019). The Montessori Preschool Landscape in the United States: History, Programmatic Inputs, Availability, and Effects. Policy Information Report and ETS Research Report Series. doi:10.1002/ets2.12252 Alburaidi, A. y Ambusaidi, A. (2019). The Impact of Using Activities Based on the Montessori Approach in Science in the Academic Achievement of Fourth Grade Students. International Journal of Instruction, 12(2), 695-708. doi:10.29333/iji.2019.12244a Alexander, P.A. (2020). Methodological guidance paper: The art and science of quality systematic rewiews. Review of Educational Research, 90(1), 6-23. doi: 10.3102/0034654319854352 Aljabreen, H. (2020). Montessori, Waldorf, and Reggio Emilia: A Comparative Analysis of Alternative Models of Early Childhood Education. International Journal of Early Childhood, 52, 337-353. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13158-020-00277-1 Chaudhry, N., Tofique, S., Husain, N., Couture, D., Glasgow, P., Husain, M., Kyran, T., Memon, R., Minhas, S., Qureshi, A., Shuber, F., y Leroi, I. (2020). Montessori intervention for individuals with dementia: feasibility study of a culturally adapted psychosocial intervention in Pakistan (MIRACLE). BJPsych Open, 6(e69), 1-8. doi: 10.1192/bjo.2020.49 Chavarría, MC (2012) ¿Está Montessori obsoleta hoy?: A la búsqueda del Montessori posible. Revista Rupturas, 2(1) 58-117 Chytry, V., Medová, J., Rican, J. y Skoda, J. (2020). Relation between Pupils’ Mathematical Self-Efficacy and Mathematical Problem Solving in the Context of the Teachers’ Preferred Pedagogies. Sustainability, 12 (10215). doi:10.3390/su122310215 Lillard, A.S. (2019). Shunned and Admired: Montessori, Self-Determination, and a Case for Radical School Reform. Educational Psychology Review, 31(1), 939–965. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10648-019-09483-3 Montessori, M. (2013). El niño, el secreto de la infancia. Montessori-Pierson Publishing Company Nisa, TF., Ariyanto, FLT., y Asyhar, AH. (2019). Montessori learning: understanding the concept of early childhood mathematics. Journal of Physics: Conference Series, 1211(1). doi:10.1088/1742-6596/1211/1/012094 Nwadiugwu, M. (2020). Early-onset dementia: key issues using a relationship-centred care approach. Postgrad Med Journal, 97(1151). doi:10.1136/postgradmedj-2020-138517 Ongoren, S. y Ozlem, D. (2018). Investigation of Mathematical Concept Skills of Children Trained with Montessori Approach and MoE Pre-school Education Program. European Journal of Educational Research, 8(1), 9-19. doi: 10.12973/eu-jer.8.1.9 Sanchidrian, C. (2013). Tres modelos de espacios educativos y de materiales pedagógicos: infant schools, kindergarten y casas de los niños. Tabanque Revista Pedagógica, 26, 15-37. Sanchidrian, C.y Berrio, J. (2016). Historia y perspectiva actual de la educación infantil. Graó Sanchidrian, C. (2020). El método Montessori en la educación infantil española: luces y sombras. Historia de la Educación, 39, 313-335. doi: 10.14201/hedu202039313335 Urrútia, G. y Bonfill, X. (2010). Declaración PRISMA: una propuesta para mejorar la publicación de revisiones sistemáticas y metaanálisis. Medicina Clínica, 135(11), 507-511. https://cutt.ly/qyFsDKJ
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