The Montessori Curriculum

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In order to access the Montessori curriculum, you will need to firstly enable it on your account, a manager can do this by following this tutorial.

Then you simply begin by composing an observation and the Montessori curriculum will appear in the assessments section. If you'd like more guidance about adding an observation on Tapestry, please take a look at this tutorial. 

 

In this tutorial we'll look at adding Montessori assessments in depth. To navigate to a particular section, please use the links below.

1. Variants
2. Descriptors
3. Refinements
4. Selecting Refinements
5. Age Band and EYFS Suggestions
6. Linking EYFS Development Matters Statements to Montessori
7. Learning Journal

 

You can see when adding a Montessori assessment this is broken down by the 5 areas of learning which are: Practical Life/AEL, Sensorial, Literacy, Mathematics and Cultural/KUW (1). When you select an area you can then see this is divided by sub-areas (2). 

After choosing a sub-area you will then get a list of activities pertaining to that category (3). There is also a very helpful search box included for you to be able to simply type in keywords to locate a specific activity, instead of searching through the lists (4).

For each activity you can refine it (5) and view a description of it by clicking on the 'i' icon (6). 

If an activity can be collapsed further with more options, you will see a down arrow for it (7). 

 

Variants

A lot of the Montessori activities involve a Three-Period Lesson (3PL) or learning new terminology. For these activities you will have the ability to choose which specific variants (that appear as tick boxes) you have introduced to the child during the activity (1).

 

Other activities may have a drop down list of variants as only one is introduced at one time.

 

 

Descriptors

Each activity also provides a thorough descriptor to further elaborate on the activity which can be found by clicking on the icon next to the title of each activity (1).

The descriptor enables more efficient use of practitioner time when writing an observation, as they can simply add notes of what they observe the child doing, rather than spending time explaining the Montessori activity (2).

The option of whether or not to include this descriptor in the full observation is at your discretion and can be changed via your control panel on Tapestry (see below).

 

 

Refinements

The activities also include the option to add ‘refinements’ (1) which can be renamed according to preference (via the assessment picker screen in the control panel) or alternatively you can use the Tapestry defaults as follows;

Introduced or Spontaneous Use
Working with guidance or Repeated
Completed independently

On this screen you also be able to select the option to 'Show descriptors when viewing obs'. If selected, the full descriptors of activities will appear in observations of children when complete (2).

 

 

Selecting Refinements

The refinements will enable selected analysis and snapshot screens on Tapestry to view children’s progress and overviews of individual and group progress across the Montessori areas of learning (1).

 

Age Band and EYFS Suggestions

There are also age band (1) and EYFS area link suggestions (2) for the Montessori activities included in the descriptors of the activity for practitioner guidance. These age band suggestions/EYFS links will not appear in the final observation that is viewable by relatives.

 

 

Linking EYFS Development Matters Statements to Montessori

You now have the ability to directly link each Montessori activity to related statements from the EYFS. The statements have been selected according to the recommended age for the activity and/or which statements we feel best suited the activity.

We do also recommend that you select your own age bands and refinements as required. Each child may achieve something different from the activity and carry it out at a different age than the pre-selected age band and statement (in which case the statement may not be applicable at all). This may also result in the child appearing above or below their age related expectations.

You can find more information about how to link Montessori observations directly to the EYFS DM Statements at this tutorial.

 

Learning Journal

You also have the option to include specific Montessori observations in the child's Learning Journal when exporting all observations as a PDF.

These can be selected by area (1) and/or further refined by sub-area (2).

 

 

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