[eclarkso]

I went to a private Montessori school grades 3K-5, and my children have been or are in Montessori school grades 3K-6. As you might have guessed, I am a fan.

As most Montessori schools are private, my impression is that the variance in the quality of Montessori implementation varies considerably, but at a high level I have positive views of many of the same method characteristics as other comments:

  - mixed-age classes
  - learner-driven scheduling/work
  - non-test-centric evaluation
  - etc.

I would guess that most Montessori schools are smaller than schools kids transition into, which might make transitioning to other schools hard socially (it was for me, but not for my kids), but that also is highly dependent on the individual I think. Other than that, I think the method tends to yield:

  - independence in both learning/working and life in general
  - love of learning
  - kindness towards others

Things I would ask about before choosing a school:

  - are you accredited by AMS, AMI and/or SAIS?
  - are your teachers trained primarily through AMS or AMI?
  - how long have your teachers been with the school, on average?
  - where do students go after this school, and what are their outcomes (what colleges, high school honor graduates, etc.)?
  - does the school do standardized testing that is accepted by the local school district or otherwise make it easy to transition to other schools after they age out?

[eclarkso]

FWIW I just realized that my AMS/SAIS references are US-specific, so substitute relevant accrediting bodies for Montessori/private schools... AMI is international, though.

In the US, AMS vs AMI is a salient difference that is worth understanding... it's a bit of a which-linux-distro-is-best type holy war.

[perlgeek]

> As most Montessori schools are private, my impression is that the variance in the quality of Montessori implementation varies considerably

Having gone to a different kind of "alternative" school (Waldorf / Steiner), I agree 100%.

Variance in quality among teachers was pretty high, higher than my children's public schools.

Sadly my school was also used a bit as dumping ground for children who failed in the public school system, so at least in the later classes most of the newer students were below-average in performance, making progress slower and classes more boring.

Switching from an "alternative" to a public school (after 9 years for me) was a pretty big culture shock.

[gmnash]

I have two children in Montessori and agree wholeheartedly with the above.

I would like to emphasize the check for AMS or AMI. Any school can all themselves a Montessori school, so I'd make sure it's at least certified in one of those two (not familiar with SAIS so cannot comment on that).

[boringg]

Thanks those are very helpful considerations and experience.

Thinking about which program to put my children in has opened a whole host of other questions such as one of your last one about what are their outcomes - which is how do I want to define the outcomes/expectations from the program aka my children going through the education system.