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Special Needs
Amy and Jay
member
Montessori for PDD-NOS?
Amy and Jay
member
My DD was recently dx with PDD-NOS. Right now she's in a regular church preschool 5 half-days a week but I have to go back to work soon and I'm trying to find a good full-day preschool program.
I've heard great things about Montessori but I'm not sure how well that approach works with kids on the spectrum.
Do any of you have experience or feedback about this type of curriculum for ASD kids?
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Re: Montessori for PDD-NOS?
This is my main concern. She's the type that can easily fade into the background and sit reading the same book over and over or play with the same toy repetitively.
To be honest I'm hoping she qualifies for the special needs preschool class for our county but they said she might not. We're supposed to have our next IEP meeting soon so I'll know more after that. Thanks for your feedback.
I was told from DS' first diagnosis to avoid Montessori for the reasons you stated. We actually just toured a Montessori elementary school and frankly, I loved it. Ambient lighting, couches, earth science focus, hands-on learning. Sadly, after talking to the social worker, it's still not going to be a good fit for DS. She specifically noted that while some kids with ASD do well in the school, it's the required cooperation with other kids that really throws a lot of them through a loop. Also they are taught to be independent workers. DS needs a lot of prompts to stay on task, so we're not going to risk it.
Years ago Montessori was explained to me like this: in Montessori they might hand a kid a toy and ask him "What do you think this does?" and the kid will get all kinds of creative juices flowing thinking up a response. My child needs the opposite- "Here's a toy truck. You run it along the ground and say "vroom vroom". Now you try it."
I can tell you that just in curriculum research before we knew DD1 had autism, I knew Montessori would not be a good fit for many of the reasons already stated.
We lucked out in that regard a lot, I think. Our local district preschools use the Tools of the Mind curriculum, which is focused on structured play, self-regulation and planning. It's greatly beneficial for preparing typical kids for school, but it also happens to be based on a lot of the same child psych principals as the autism therapy approach of RDI, which we used for about a year.
So playtime at DD1's preschool involves all the kids choosing one of half a dozen play centers (a kitchen, restaurant, factory, vehicle repair shop, mail center, etc. -- they change them up several times a year) and choosing a role for themselves (customer, server, worker, etc.). Then they draw a picture of themselves doing what they plan to do, and write as many words/letters as they can about what they're going to do, and then they go and do it. So the kids are encouraged to do a lot of peer interactions, but within certain parameters, where a kid who struggles socially can learn a script or begin to understand a certain type of pretty predictable interaction (customer/clerk). And if DD1 gets too stuck in always going to the same center, her teachers know to push back on that rather than let it be.
I don't think I could've picked a better approach for her, and they continue Tools in kindy around here, thank goodness. She was in a class last year that was more SpEd focused with a higher mix of kids with IEPs, but this year she's in a regular, mainstream class and is doing great. I highly recommend looking into whether any schools in your area offer that curriculum.
DD1, 1/5/2008 ~~~ DD2, 3/17/2010
I honestly don't think Montessori would have been. I don't think he would be self motivated enough to be successful. He would also fall apart with out a fairly high level of structure.
DS 09/2008
This is very interesting- thanks for clarifying. The person who explained the Montessori approach to me was not an expert by any means, and the example has always stuck with me. I have a neighbor whose three kids attend Montessori and she is lobbying me pretty hard to get DS to attend there. She has raved about the academic records, as you mentioned, and said the teachers are so flexible about teaching to different needs. I probably would be considering them if the social worker wasn't so hesitant- she said kids with "behavioral difficulties" do not typically do well at her school. I guess I wished she had something like "we can work with all types of kids" or whatnot. Anyway, thanks for the clarification!