President Barack Obama visited an the College Heights Early Childhood Learning Center in Decatur, Georgia, in February. This school visit follwed his State of the Union Address, which included his intention to support public funding to make early childhood education more available to four-year-old children across the nation. While it is clear from the photograph that the College Heights Learning Center is not a traditional Montessori classroom,...

Students at Winfield Children’s House were singing along to their favorite ukulele band, Dos Eckies, on Friday, March 7, 2013. The children from toddlers to Kindergarten were a wonderful audience at a concert given by Kris and Joel. Our preschool teacher, Kate, joined in on guitar for a few songs. Joel is a luthier who specializes in building ukuleles, so he brought a few models to show us how ukuleles can vary in shape and size. The...

In our quest to be loving, kind and respectful with toddlers, there are lots of bumps in the road. How do you respond when a child ISN’T listening? There are so many parenting books that get into the philosophical reasons for taking a loving and collaborative approach to communicating with young children. Reading these books make teachers and parents feel good, but when the real world hits we wish for a tool box of strategies, not a...