Teaching Journals
As you teach your child, record each presentation in your teaching journal. Your journal allows you to track your child’s progress as well as your own. Below, I have transcribed entries from a real journal to show you what I mean. Gift pages are towards the bottom of this post.
You must not use standard report cards, especially not the cheap forms with “Presented, Working, Mastered” (or some other foolishness) check boxes. These forms are not only useless, but they teach you a number of bad habits.
Bad teaching habits include not observing a child properly, thinking the number of lessons equals good teaching, and waiting impatiently for “the next” lesson.
School administrators take heed: No one cares about the report card when your students make poor progress at the end of the year.
In the entry below, you can see the problem is not the bells.
To become a Montessori teacher, we require a minimum of 200 hours of observation. For a teacher-training student, this can be difficult because they have no access to children. For parents? It is quite easy.
Start observing. Make notes. Review everything to learn from your own work.
Beware that the food problems are common now. They are also behind many teacher meltdowns. If your pediatrician or doctor does not recognize this, it is time to upgrade your medical care.
Children frequently pick up more than we realize. In the classroom, many children learn from watching other children. Seriously, half the children in my classes excel in work that I never presented. By the time one has been teaching for a few decades, it gets really easy. I am missing the creation of a new Zen saying somewhere here.
Practical life at home should be practical.
The next three pages are gifts for you to download and print!
Sending love!
I love these cards!!! All of this points to paying more attention to your child instead of teaching as a task you have to get through. Isn't that what most parents would like to be doing? I wonder if these journals are great for the children to read twenty or thirty years later.