Visitors

 When I first  began my teacher training with Karen Tyler  I  felt overwhelmed with the Practical Life album. Every presentation was very well explained, but I was confused in many areas like; presenting lessons on how to say excuse me or thank you. I just  took for granted the montessori method and kept the mentality that o.k. you don't need to present how to say thank you, or excuse me that is just something you just do. As I begin to experience the montessori methods hands on, it became very clear that everything has already been proven, follow the method step by step, follow the child. When I finally reached this conclusion I noticed life was much easier and the kids were getting closer to "normalization". My first visitor that I had to check out the "daycare"  when I first started the method with the children was almost a nightmare. The children were engaged in work until they saw the visitor. They begin to lose focus, and I lost control of the group. The art easel became a obstacle course, the pouring rice work was a disaster area, and the children were running around with their heads cut off. Luckily the parent was at least impressed with the appearance of the enviroment compared with others that they still decided to enroll their child. Today I have a different story. A visitor came today, and I was impressed. The children stayed focus and when  any one of them needed me while I was attending to the visitor they said  "please", "excuse me", " thank you", and  one child invited the new child to join him in their work". I was proud, the parent was impressed.  The visitor wasn't familiar with the montessori method. Thanks to Karen Tyler she provided her students with a lovely  parent handbook that explains it very well. The parent said that she was going to check out other places and she would give me a call. As she was preparing to leave she saw one of the children getting their own water to drink she said " Self serve water? Then looked over and saw another preparing their own snack she said "They get their own food" ? I said yes they learn independence and how to care for themselves. The visitor said how much do you charge? I told her the price. She then asked me if I had a contract ready because that's all she needed to see. I felt very blessed and humbled the children are making great progress in every way.