So Is It Effective or Not?

It depends on who you ask really. There are going to be people on both sides of the issue who have strong convictions that their opinion is absolute. On one side, Montessori schools have shown to be highly effective teaching methods in private, charter, magnet, and even in regular public schools. Children who have graduated from a Montessori school have been shown to score higher on cognitive tests, be more socially adaptive, and to have a stronger sense of community. It also helps that the method fosters independence in children and uses techniques that stimulates multiple senses, rather than the traditional visual and aural strategies, which should logically improve the education of students, especially younger ones.

Too bad the method isn't 100% consistent. There are cases of public schools having to terminate their Montessori programs because they just haven't delivered the elevated test results that are promised and needed to get government funding. And considering the cost of maintaing a Montessori program, which includes special training for teachers and specially made school materials, some people just don't think it's worth it. Another major critque of the method is that it actually represses creativity with strictly regimented materials and a lack of traditionally creative activities like painting, free play, and stories. And then of course there's NCLB. Because every public school that wants government funding needs to pass standardized tests, the Montessori method appears to be detrimental to a school's status. After all, incorporating tests into a Montessori classroom is like adding hot sauce to an ice cream sundae. It doesn't work

But NCLB is useless anyway. Thousands of schools have been forced to push their children through the educational system, whether they're ready or not and then lose their funding because their ill-prepared students can't pass the "standardized" tests that really don't matter. Evidence has shown that if implemented properly, and even if it is integrated with some traditional rote learning methods, Montessori style teaching is definitely the superior teaching method, at least when it comes to educating younger children.

And so in my opinion, all public schools should incorporate Montessori style teaching strategies to at least some degree. Schools should try to solely use this method for kindergarten (since pre-K isn't nationalized as of yet) and as students age up they should be introduced progressively to rote style teaching. The methods we use now barely work. Why continue producing more failuers and ruining more lives just because of standardized tests and an infatuation with tradition?