Montessori vs pre-school - help please

Thanks ladies - I will definitely go with my instinct, I am definitely leaning more towards a montessori but at least I have 3 of those to choose from and I am going to look at the outstanding normal preschool with an open mind too! The montessori that we looked at last week had a lovely calm atmosphere and Tyler loved it there, they also had loads of lovely projects and things that they were doing out on display!

TBH I have never heard of them, are they along the same lines as Steiner schools? I would have loved/still love to get K into a Steiner school but worry about him loosing touch with the school friends he does have and also how well he would do once back in mainstream education at high school x]

Yes they are very similar I think, a lot of similar methods - although I don't know a lot about Steiner schools. There is a Steiner school about 12 miles away from us but we decided that it was just too far for a daily travel so I didn't look any further into it. One of the nurseries that I am going to look at is a montessori school up to age 11 and they are applying to be one of the free schools and I would love Tyler to be able to go to it but they aren't going to be offering many places so not sure we have much chance

Which ones are you looking at Kerry? Will ask at Stevens school if they're round here for opinions if you want

Thanks hun but none of them are particularly local - one is Bear Wood, one is Corfe Mullen and one is Penn Hill! I will just go by my impressions of them after visiting!

Hey hun,

i worked at a montessori nursery for nearly 5 years

there are some fantastic teachings in a motessori environment that i still use now at home with alesha and children often could both read and write before they left to go to school,

but on the other hand there are things i didnt really like about it, the lack of colour was one, everything was plain natural wood, all toys etc and i missed the bright colours i think young children need to be around,
but there reason for this was they thought birght colours everywhere over stimulated young children and hyped them up, stopped them from concentrating etc

children there had to behave in a certain way, and i sometimes thought there was too many rules and expectations put onto such young children,

i think a lot of it depends on how you want you children to be brought up

any questions please fell free to ask hun

x