Helping Children With Differences Learn To Read In A Montessori Classroom

by Amanda Riccetti

The many different philosophies of childhood education foster children’s learning in their own unique ways. The Montessori philosophy nurtures independence, confidence, selfregulation, and learning in children from doing and experiencing, offering and actively involving them in direct learning experiences. In a Montessori environment, students are encouraged to follow their curiosity and learn at their own pace. They are exposed to lessons, activities, and materials that build upon their skill set and help them develop as an individual.

The teacher in a Montessori classroom does not give class lectures, but instead spends time with individual students guiding their learning experiences. This allows the children to take the time they need to fully understand a concept and meet individualized learning goals. Although this concept makes for a stimulating learning environment for most children, some may struggle, especially when faced with learning differences and other similar challenges. The Montessori reading curriculum has three essential components: a strong foundation in phonics; comprehension based on visualization; and a whole-language approach of learning to read for meaning using context clues. Montessori reading is based on the first of these components, a strong foundation in phonics so that children can sound out or “decode” words. This approach is unique in that children first learn how words are constructed through phonemes, or letter sounds. Once they are aware that words can be broken down into smaller units of sound, children can then independently learn to decode new words. They can read what they see and enjoy what they read. Why, then, might a child struggle with learning to read in a Montessori classroom?

When I was three years old, my mother enrolled me in a Montessori school. In the 1960s, neither my Montessori teachers nor my parents were aware that I had a learning difference. I was a well-behaved little girl who kept very busy learning from the environment.

My school was very relaxed, with inviting small tables, rows of shelves filled with activities, and warm lunches of soup and crackers. I remember exploring and discovering things entirely on my own. One of the things I loved most were the Metal Insets—flat metal squares with different shapes inside. I enjoyed tracing and coloring the shapes inside with colored pencils. By the time I was ready to move on to the next level, I had full confidence in myself.

When I entered the first grade (lower elementary), I understood a great deal, but when the reading lessons started, I felt confused and alone. I am sure others felt this way, but all I could see were my classmates who understood the lessons and could read out loud with no effort.

During the summer between first and second grade, my mother enrolled in a Montessori teacher education program. The Montessori teacher training center was in Palo Alto, and since we were living in San Francisco, I had to change schools.

My second-grade experience was a more positive one, as I had a lovely teacher who had wonderful and creative ways to teach and never asked any student to read out loud. Instead, we were put in smaller groups of children who were learning at the same level. Observing my reading challenges, she asked my mom to have me tested. After a series of tests at UCSF, it was finally discovered that I had a high IQ as well as dyslexia, a common learning difference. I couldn’t understand sound components the way it was traditionally taught; visually, I wasn’t able to memorize which letters produced which sounds. My mother and I realized that we would have to do extra work outside of school to help me learn how to read.

After sharing what she learned about me with her Montessori trainer, she simply suggested that Mom should teach me in the same way she taught her students in her class. Each night, my mother would give me a reading lesson from materials she brought home from her Montessori classroom. At first it was slow, but we pushed on day by day, lesson by lesson. At the end of second grade, I could read at a first-grade level. Although I still struggled in school, I could at least keep up. When my mom used the Montessori reading curriculum to tutor me, she spent the time to break down the components of language into smaller parts, eventually I learned how to decode words. This experience not only helped me learn to read, but it also showed me how to teach others. Comprehension can still be difficult for me at times and I tire easily, especially if the topic is not terribly interesting to me.

In a traditional Montessori class, most children simply absorb reading skills as easily as they learn to walk. However, children and adults who have dyslexia struggle with visual memory tasks such as learning letter sounds. Often teachers overlook these children in early childhood programs (3-6 years old). This can happen even in a Montessori classroom because not all Montessori teachers have the experience or knowledge to recognize a child who may later be diagnosed with a learning difference.

These children require a great deal of repetition and time to get a breakthrough just to recall a few letter sounds, but they want to learn, can learn, and need to learn during those early years during the sensitive period for language development, when their minds are most open to learn reading skills. These children cannot afford to wait and see, an approach that often leaves them struggling with learning to read later in their elementary years. My first-hand experience led me down the path to becoming a Montessori teacher, reading tutor, and later creating the Reading with Miss Amanda Book Series.

After 35 plus years of coaching and lending materials to the parents at my school, I began to search for another solution. That is when I set a goal to create my own solution to this problem. Along the way, I recruited some wonderful and talented people who supported my vision. They are Steven Gomez, my illustrator; Kimberly Lopez, an alumnus from my school, who became my proofreader and editor; and two parents from my school, Jessica Lam and Maya Bourdeau, who gave me their professional support and parent perspectives. After five years of hard work, the Reading with Miss Amanda Book Series was completed.

The series adapts the Montessori reading curriculum into a simpleto-use book format that provides children with the ability to practice sounds and make words. Then they will begin to decode words and gain the confidence to read at their own pace. This approach makes it a fun and accessible tool for parents and teachers to use when working with young children on their reading skills. Children receive intuitive step-by-step lessons simply by following the dialogue of the teacher in the books. Each of the five levels in this color-coded series offers books for all levels of readers, including: pre-readers (3 years and up); beginning readers (4 years and up); and advanced readers (5 years and up). Each level offers a set of lessons that shows young children the skills required to reach the next level.

These books teach reading phonetically over the course of 32 books, each of which is about 75 pages. The curriculum mirrors the lessons a Montessori teacher would present to a student in their class. The classroom materials have been masterfully adapted into engaging and intuitive lessons with simple dialogue for the adult to follow as they assist their child. Through the child’s imagination, they are transported into a Montessori classroom with their very own Montessori teacher to guide them. The books also offer tips for the adults and are designed to be read over and over until the child masters the lesson. When the child successfully completes a book, they will encounter a page that offers its congratulations and shows children their progress

Level one focuses on using basic letter sounds through the use of Sandpaper Letters. The lessons in this level are broken down into three parts in order to teach children the phonetic sound associated with each printed letter. Each book within this level focuses on three letters, two consonants and one vowel. Over the course of the five books in the ‘Yellow Level,’ a total of fifteen letter sounds are taught and learned.

Level two moves on from practicing singleletter sounds to bridging the sounds together to form three-letter words using the Moveable Alphabet. Each of the five books in this level isolates the task of understanding the sound of one vowel in a word, in the order of a, e, i, o, u.

Level three focuses on sounding out three-letter words and reading them individually as well as other words. Each book offers lessons in the following sequence: matching words to pictures; flashcards; three-letter word lists; short sentences; and a short story.

Level four focuses on four- and five-letter short-vowel words as well as simple sight words and blends. This level offers the same curriculum as the previous level in order to adapt children to reading and identifying larger words.

Level five is the longest of the series, with twelve books instead of five books in each of the previous levels. This level focuses on phonograms, long-vowel words, silent vowels, and more. The children are introduced to a more advanced vocabulary, additional English language rules, and the knowledge of how to decipher words. Each of the twelve books offers flashcards, a list of words, short sentences and a short story.

Early intervention is the key during the sensitive period of learning to read. Children are traditionally taught to read between first and third grade, but with the use of this series, children form a solid foundation for reading at an early age. Children may not show immediate progress, but that is completely normal. They often forget how to do something new, and it may take a child anywhere from one week to as long as a month to master a new book. Follow the child, and if you feel that your child is not engaging with the book, stop for a little while and reintroduce it at another time. Remember, children who are not learning with ease will require a great deal of support and patience. These children want to learn to read but may tire more easily and need baby steps. Once these children feel safe and start to feel success, they will pick up the lessons more rapidly. Keep it fun, always encouraging your child’s effort and progress. The lessons are designed to offer information, so always give your child the answer when they can’t retrieve it themselves.

Be patient and remember: “practice makes permanent.” Children love repetition, and it drives learning the more the child practices. For example, the popular book Goodnight Moon by Margaret Wise Brown might seem so repetitious to an adult, but children love the repetition of phrases. So, if you use these books and think, “that’s repetitive,” remember—it has been designed that way. Only move to the next book when your child can recall the information easily.

Amanda Riccetti is the Director and Owner of Big City Montessori School in San Francisco. She has been a teacher, reading tutor, and mentor for over 40 years. Founded by her mother, the school gave Amanda the opportunity to observe from an early age the benefi ts of a strong and connected educational journey. As a child, she struggled with the traditional learning process, and later discovered it was because she had a learning diff erence, dyslexia. Amanda learned to identify a pattern among children who struggled to visually recognize lower case letters and who did not understand the relationship between the letter and the sound that the letter made. This led her to develop the Montessori-based reading series described in this article. Contact Amanda at: amanda.riccetti@gmail.com Visit Amanda’s website to learn more. www.readingwithmissamanda.com