Adolescence: Time of Transformation

Adolescents have such power and potential. They can achieve so much when they have a supportive space that helps them develop their incredible abilities and ultimately realize their possibilities.

The book, The Teenage Brain: A Neuroscientist’s Survival Guide to Raising Adolescents and Young Adults, shares a helpful analogy for understanding adolescence: “...the teenage brain is almost like a brand-new Ferrari: it’s primed and pumped, but it hasn’t been road tested yet. In other words, it’s all revved up but doesn’t quite know where to go.” 

To best support adolescents who are all primed to go but don’t yet know where, we can work to better understand their developmental characteristics and needs. 

Time of Transformation

The first three years (ages twelve to fifteen) of adolescence are comparable to the physical and cognitive transformation that happens from zero to three. Adolescents are forming themselves, physically and psychologically, into the adults they will become.

This is a transition from childhood into adulthood, evidenced by dramatic bodily changes. The relative calm and stability of the previous years shifts to a more tumultuous time. During this period of intense change, adolescents’ health becomes more fragile. They require more sleep and are more prone to acne, depression, bulimia, anorexia, mono, etc. As Frances E. Jenson, MD, and Amy Ellis Nutt explain in The Teenage Brain: A Neuroscientist’s Survival Guide to Raising Adolescents and Young Adults: “Adolescence is a time of increased response to stress, which may in part be why anxiety disorders, including panic disorder, typically arise during puberty. Teens simply don’t have the same tolerance for stress that we see in adults. Teens are much more likely to exhibit stress-induced illnesses and physical problems, such as colds, headaches, and upset stomachs. There is also an epidemic of symptoms ranging from nail biting to eating disorders that are commonplace in today’s teens.” 

Adolescents need a special kind of care and protection during this time of transformation. Like caterpillars that need a chrysalis in order to metamorphose into a butterfly, adolescents need a protective space for reconstruction.

Neural Changes and Emotional Needs

The adolescent brain is also undergoing dramatic changes, from neural pruning when unneeded neural synapses are removed, to an increase in myelination which allows for faster neural transmission. 

Due to these dramatic physical and cognitive changes taking place, adolescents can have difficulty concentrating and staying focused. This also leads to a decrease in their organizational skills and judgment, as well as a reduction in their executive functioning abilities like working memory, flexible thinking, and self-control. Because of this diminished executive functioning ability, adolescents often make decisions based on emotion. Their brains are relying upon the limbic system rather than their developing prefrontal cortex. 

Thus, adolescents can experience strong and tumultuous emotions and it can be a struggle for them to gain mastery over these emotions. As such, adolescents need time for personal self-reflection, and yet this need exists in the midst of an intense desire to be within and accepted by a group. 

Rational and logical expression can be challenging during this time, thus adolescents also need creative outlets for releasing and exploring emotions, thoughts, and any conflicting experiences. Creative outlets can include dance, writing, art, music, sports, etc. In addition to providing an expressive outlet, physical activities also release endorphins and help regulate hormonal balance. 

Finding Equilibrium

Because adolescents are working to integrate their new physical and emotional selves, they need as many opportunities as possible to integrate manual work (work of the hand) and academic work (work of the head). In addition to experiencing an equilibrium in mental and physical activities, adolescents need opportunities to explore their personal identity in the context of their social identity. 

Like younger children, adolescents are somewhat ego-centric. After leaving the elementary years of calm and confidence, early teens become self-conscious and are highly sensitive to peer acceptance. This results in a sensitivity to the looks, comments, or actions of others, which is further complicated by adolescents having difficulty reading facial expressions. It’s no surprise, then, that our teens often imagine that someone is upset with them or thinking negatively of them. Close relationships and feeling accepted by their peer group become extremely important to balance these feelings. 

Being Valued

Because this is a time of extreme vulnerability, adolescents need to be treated with understanding and respect. They want to know their value, their role, their contributions, and their worth. Adolescents benefit greatly from opportunities to contribute to their community in meaningful ways. This is best achieved through adult-level work. When this contribution is acknowledged by their peers, adolescents feel valorized, or recognized, which leads to a bolstering of their self-confidence.

Having choices is also a vital component of adolescents’ work. This opportunity to make a choice about what to do and when to do it provides teens with a strong sense of empowerment and allows them to practice making constructive choices. 

Role of Adults

Adolescents need the guidance and support of adults. They also rely upon and appreciate the opportunity for side-by-side work. We can shift into more of a supportive, coaching role with our adolescents, which can more easily be achieved when we are working alongside each other. Adolescents relish this opportunity to collaborate in what it means to be an adult by engaging in adult-level work.

This side-by-side work also offers us, as adults, the opportunity to respectfully share information and teach skills, without risking offending our adolescents. In “Three Ways to Change Your Parenting in the Teenage Years,” Christine Carter explains: “When we give our adolescents a lot of information, especially when it is information that they don’t really want or that they think they already have, it can feel infantilizing to them. Even if we deliver the information as we would to another adult, teenagers will often feel disrespected by the mere fact of our instruction.”

Respectful treatment connects to adolescents’ need to feel a sense of justice and personal dignity. While elementary-aged children focus on distributive justice (e.g. fairness), adolescence is a time when young people begin to grapple with and understand restorative justice, social justice, and economic justice.

Adolescence is a period of dramatic growth and change. Although the dramatic physical changes that accompany the onset of puberty can rock the stable foundation of elementary years, if we understand adolescents’ needs, we can help our teenagers emerge as empowered and full of creative energies.  

Shakespeare Dinner Theater: Behind the Scenes of an Adolescent Program Event

It is really hard to describe the incredible growth and learning that happens through putting together a big event in the Adolescent Program. Adolescents thrive on real, big, creative work that happens in community with others. When I say “real work,” I mean work that has a purpose besides one’s own learning, work that affects other people, work so complex that if you don’t pull your own weight other people and the quality of the whole will suffer. The recent Shakespeare Dinner Theater, our classroom Gala project, was one of these events.

I was reflecting on the skills and qualities I observed students developing throughout the two months or so of preparation for the event, including: organizing, delegating, communicating, grit and perseverance, problem-solving, critical thinking, follow-through, a sense of personal responsibility, a sense of responsibility to one’s community, time management, leadership (including when to step back), risk-taking, receiving and implementing feedback, offering constructive feedback. Do these sound familiar? Look up any list of “traits of successful people,” “top desired qualities of college graduates,” “15 traits of successful people that all business leaders should cultivate,” and so on, and these qualities are on the top of the lists.

The beautiful thing that can be so hard to make transparent is how a Montessori adolescent program helps students to develop these qualities and skills. It comes back to Dr. Montessori’s vision of the Prepared Environment. The prepared environment of our Adolescent Program, by design, provides opportunities and support for students to have experiences in which to practice these skills on a regular basis. The prepared environment includes both the physical (materials, buildings and grounds, schedules, lessons, etc.) and social environment (guides, students, administration, customers, adult experts; expectations for grace and courtesy, civility, kindness, etc.).

Here’s a peek behind the scenes at how the experiences of creating the Shakespeare Dinner Theater event unfolded:

The Script

Critical thinking, compromise, creativity, communicating, writing, flexibility

In the winter term, students read either A Midsummer Night’s Dream or Romeo and Juliet. Somewhere along the way the idea was floated and voted on to create an original mashup of the two and perform it as our Gala project. When it came time to write it, a group of about 6 or 7 students, a Guide, and our guest director (a parent in the program), sat together and brainstormed a general storyline. Pairs or small groups of students then went off and wrote scenes by abridging and combining scenes from the original Shakespeare. Pulling out the lines that would keep the essence of the stories and the language intact while also creating a new story, was no small feat. These 7th, 8th, and 9th year students showed incredible understanding of the plays to feature key scenes from the original and to create original transitions to give the new plot continuity. The students also had to be adaptable as we went through rehearsals and had to add, cut, or change lines to better fit the actor or the staging.

Blocking / Choreography

giving, receiving, and implementing feedback, discipline, grit, patience, flexibility

“Let’s take it from the top!” “One more time, from Puck’s line.” “We are going to do the sword fighting dance again, but slightly faster this time.” “Yes, we need you for running this scene, even if you only have one line.” Creating the play took many iterations and a huge amount of patience from everyone.

Memorizing Lines

Follow-through, personal responsibility, helping one another, honoring different learning styles

Shakespeare in the park! Students worked on memorizing lines in New York City on the spring trip (and in the van, and at home, and at school…).

Acting

risk-taking, self-confidence, trust, receiving feedback

The growth in each student from the beginning of this project to performance night was incredible to witness. Some of the students who said at first “I don’t want to have speaking lines” ended up as powerful forces on stage with long scenes. Others knew they wanted a big part from the beginning but may have ended up taking on a role that was quite different than they had first imagined. Each person made incredible leaps throughout.  

Music & Dancing

risk-taking, communication, personal responsibility, follow-through

Why not add live music and a dance while we’re at it? Many students, and guides, drew on their skills as musicians and dancers to add to the festivities. Others performed in a court dance even though they may never have danced before. Some students tried it and were able to advocate for themselves that it was just too far outside of their comfort zone. In all of these cases, students found their areas of challenge and worked through them to contribute to the whole.

Costumes & Set

organizing, asking for help, delegating, communicating, time management, leadership, perseverance, problem solving

After many trips to resale stores, generous loans of costumes from school families, sewing by both students and guides, and a lot of creativity, we created costumes for everyone (some students had more than one as they played multiple roles) and turned the side of the AP building into a beautiful setting for the play and the dinner. We battled with the wind and problem-solved our way through many different ways to secure an outdoor set. Thank you to our parents and other community members for your generous support!

Logistics & Set-up

high level executive functioning, willingness to pitch in, grit, organization, delegation

During this event, students and adults were on stage, cooking,  serving food, plating food, cleaning up, washing dishes, and more. They had to know when to stop plating and get in their places back stage for their next scene, then immediately move on to their next task, whether it was clearing the next course or changing costumes to play a different character.

This was incredibly complex. Our student kitchen manager for the event spent many hours creating diagrams and grids of how this would be organized. We wrote one grid on the kitchen white board of what needed to be prepped, who was outside on stage, and who was in the kitchen. The white board in the project room, which served as our backstage and plating area, was a detailed grid of who was serving, prepping, clearing, acting, playing music, checking in with guests, and cooking for every scene. This was a huge organization challenge and all of the students stepped up to do their part.

Cooking & Cleaning

organization, delegating, communicating, follow-through, perseverance, problem solving, time management, leadership, offering support

We prepared and served a four-course meal. What this means behind the scenes is weeks of brainstorming courses, cooking and revising meals through community lunches (lunches prepared by students for our community of 20 people), offering feedback on what worked and how dishes could be improved, pairs of students finalizing recipes, scaling the recipes for the 14 guests we would be serving, creating shopping lists, going to the grocery store, prepping ingredients ahead of time, cooking the food, having each course ready at the correct time, and plating the food in the most appealing way. This involved seeking advice from adults experienced in the restaurant business and a lot of trial and error. We also did lots and lots of dishes!

Serving & Welcoming Guests

presentation skills, poise, grace and courtesy, organization, delegation, communication

While all of these pieces going on simultaneously behind the scenes, each individual had to take a steadying breath and calmly greet our guests and then interact politely and graciously with them to serve and clear their meals. In some ways this dinner theater was more difficult than just being an actor in a play, because it required students to be in character on stage, remembering their blocking, choreography, lines, inflections, etc. and then switch into server and chef mode. As if being a young actor wasn’t already a challenge! These students found new depths within themselves and honed a multitude of skills along the way.

Celebrating!

And finally, everyone departed for a good night’s sleep to start to consolidate all of that development!

Pandemic Impacts on Older Kids and Teens

While there has been a certain amount of awareness of how COVID has impacted young children, we thought it would be helpful to shift our attention toward those in their elementary and adolescent years. While the impacts may manifest differently, those in the middle of their school years also experienced considerable disruptions from COVID. From increased anxiety and physicality to challenges in social interactions and work engagement, elementary-aged children and adolescents are facing their own share of struggles.

Social Development

Those who experienced the start of the pandemic during their elementary and early adolescent years were at home during a time when developmentally they needed to connect with peers and figure out their social identity. It’s during this time that our kids develop their own sense of individuality within the context of community. This interplay amongst peers allows older children to both develop their ability to communicate with others while processing how their individual actions impact those around them. The result? Our young people begin to learn how to practice empathy for others while also advocating for themselves.

During the locks-downs and distancing from COVID, many children missed out on key formative experiences, like how to join a group, how to invite others into a group, and even how to have positive conversations. Without some of these skills, navigating social situations, especially those that involve more than one other person, can be trickier. 

Even children’s awareness of others’ physical space has been impacted, perhaps due to maintaining six feet of distance or even having more time in close proximity to screens. As children have been able to be together again, the boundary line of what is too close or what is too physical is something they are having to discover. 

Direct instruction and guided practice can help. Elementary-age children love to role-play, so even acting out different scenarios can be beneficial. To foster developing friendships and healthy peer interactions, have conversations with your children and teens about the qualities of a good friend and how to be a good friend to others.

Regulating Emotions & Managing Anxiety

During the elementary time period, our children are developing their emotional skills, which provide an important base before young people enter their more tumultuous adolescent years. Major emotional skills mastered during this stage include how to adjust to different rules and social norms for behavior, understand others’ feelings, acquire more control and management of emotions, and develop strategies for patience and general adaptability.

In addition to not having as much opportunity to flex these social-emotional muscles, so much was outside of our children’s control during the early COVID years. As a result, more young people have developed increased anxiety, which can manifest in a multitude of ways.

For some children, just the transition into the school building and away from parents or caregivers can cause anxiety to flare up. For others, trying to figure out how to interact with peers in-person can be anxiety-provoking. 

To help, we can focus on communication and collaboration. This can range from recognizing and discussing emotions when children are calm, to remaining open and empathetic when strong emotions surface. It’s essential that, as adults, we model emotional regulation so our young people can see how we use coping strategies, like taking deep breaths or stepping away from a situation, rather than just reacting.

We can also be sure to address our kids’ behavior rather than their emotions. This helps young people understand the distinction between their feelings and their actions. For example, if someone feels angry, that is just a feeling, which is neither good nor bad. However, if someone acts on that feeling by hitting another person, the behavior of hitting is unacceptable. When we handle disciplinary situations, our responses can help our kids begin to internalize that it is okay to experience a range of emotions and that they have choices and limits in terms of how they behave. 

Involving our children in the conversation is essential. They might need help voicing or expressing their emotions and anxieties so worries don’t stay hidden inside where they can easily proliferate. Most importantly, we need to help ensure that children don’t keep avoiding whatever is causing them stress or anxiety.

Getting Back Into the Rhythm

Healthy routines are important for older children and teens, who need structure and predictability to offset the stress associated with the changes they begin to experience in their social lives, their bodies, and even their emotional experiences. With all the disruptions of the pandemic, we need to be especially sensitive to the importance of following through and following up. Our children need us, as adults, to hold consistent, firm, and kind boundaries, so that they can feel secure and settled. 

From regular sleep and predictable mornings to completing chores and finishing assignments, routines can be the guide. With older children and teens, we also need to engage in respectful, curious conversations about what causes them to feel stressed, tired, or overwhelmed. Ideally, we are encouraging our young people to take an active role in planning routines that will help them manage themselves better. If we brainstorm with our kids and write down the plan together, we can more easily revisit what is going well and what might need to be modified. Also be sure to celebrate the wins and compassionately communicate if something isn’t working well.

Above all, our young people need our patience and understanding. This requires us, as adults, to practice our own mindfulness and grounding so we can be present and supportive. If concerns arise, we can work in harmony to compassionately identify possible problems and strategize practical solutions. 

To see how we support students' emotional regulation, social development, and intellectual engagement, come visit our school. We love to share what we do!

Meeting Adolescent Needs

As we adapt, learn, and exist in the world, we rely upon unconscious, innate drives that help us orient, explore, work, order, calculate, imagine, abstract, communicate, repeat, and self-perfect. In Montessori we call these “human tendencies” and we take care to observe how these tendencies show up in different ways at different stages of development.

As young people enter adolescence, it becomes even more critical for us to consider how these aspects of being human show up. When we recognize these internal drives, we can better ensure that we are effectively supporting adolescents’ process of self-construction during a vulnerable and dynamic time in their lives.

So, let’s take a look at each human tendency and consider how to support adolescents’ characteristics and needs.

Orientation

During adolescence, young people need to orient themselves to their new bodies and the new ways their brains are functioning. Sometimes adolescents don’t even quite know who they are from one moment to the next. This can be easily seen in those times when adolescents swing from child-like behavior to adult-like behavior. They also need to orient to a different learning environment, including understanding the new adults in their lives, as well as a new social/peer community. They are trying to figure out boundaries: of their space, their body, and their minds.

As a result, adolescents need orientation to rules and responsibilities. In Montessori adolescent programs, adults support this orientation by providing time and space for training and introduction. When starting a new skill, introducing a new concept, or even starting a new school year, adolescent guides are sensitive to the orientation process that needs to happen and also to the fact that adolescents’ executive function skills are still developing.

Exploration

Adolescents are also navigating issues of their own identity and exploring how they feel comfortable in their world. This normal, developmentally appropriate process can lead to a great deal of creative exploration. They will often want to try on new kinds of self-expression, sometimes through physical presentations such as the fashions and hairstyles they choose or create for themselves.

During adolescence, young people may also explore (or continue exploration of) where they are on the gender spectrum. They seek safe, judgment-free settings in which to see how it feels to be identified in different ways. As a result, they need supportive adults through this dynamic process of identity development.

Adolescents are also exploring new capabilities and their own bodies. They want (and neurologically need) to take risks. Adolescent guides provide opportunities for healthy risk-taking, perhaps through a ropes course, a backpacking trip, or even through big physical expressions, while also being sensitive to the physical and psychological disequilibrium that can happen when adolescents are re-orienting and exploring who they are and what is possible.

Work

This exploration of what is possible connects to adolescents’ ability to engage in really hard work. If they feel connected to the purpose of the work, if it has personal or social value, they can take on big incredible tasks. When they feel this connection, adolescents will easily take on a challenge, even something as monumental as moving a whole building, and do so with vigor. If they have an investment in the activity, they will work relentlessly to see that it happens.

Adolescent guides support these experiences of purposeful work that has a real impact. This often means working side-by-side with adolescents to get the work started and to help them find a connection to why the work is important. Sharing their own passion for the work is another way adults can support adolescents’ engagement. Likewise, adolescents can dig into hard intellectual work, again if it has meaning and purpose for them and their social group.

Imagination & Abstraction

Often adolescents’ imagination will aid them in the process of big work. Undaunted by limits, they can imagine better, more innovative ways to get something done. To support this, adolescent guides allow room for failure and mistakes, so that adolescents can experiment and learn from the process. Adults can also allow adolescents room for putting what they imagine into action, rather than focusing on an adult agenda or needing to move things along more efficiently. Adolescents’ ability to think abstractly can help in this process of creating new possibilities.

Adolescents are abstracting patterns and social norms. They are able to start thinking about their own thinking (metacognition). Adolescent guides offer opportunities to connect these new abilities to intellectual pursuits. This can also be an amazing time for adolescents to explore forms of self-expression and appreciate the abstractions that can be found in forms of art. Often adolescents are even creating their own form of language or social norms with their peers.

Adolescents’ imagination can also manifest itself in their focus on what others may think of them. This tendency to think there is an “imaginary audience” watching them all the time or to imagine that they are center stage in an experience, can be challenging for young adolescents. Adolescent guides offer opportunities for adolescents to experience and understand different perspectives, while also considering how sensitive adolescents can be in moments of feeling like the spotlight is on them or that they are misunderstood.

Order

Although adolescents may not seem like they need order, they still need the consistency of routines and order in their environment. They benefit from having all the tools back where they belong at the end of their work: the kitchen utensils back in the correct drawer and school items back in their storage space. How that space or drawer looks may not be completely ordered, but adolescents will experience the value of being able to access kitchen tongs when they need tongs!

Similar to how toddlers need the comfort and order of a regular routine, adolescents also need to rely on an ordered schedule, especially when so much is changing for them internally. It’s worth noting that adolescents might have a completely messy and disorderly room, but then will go through a period of redefining themselves and creating a space that matches a new persona they want to convey.

Repetition, Self-Perfection, & Calculation

The tendency for repetition or exactness can often be seen in adolescents’ desire to play the same guitar chord over and over or to jump up and touch the door frame each time they pass through. They are experiencing new abilities and being able to repeat and make those

abilities more precise can really appeal to them. This also relates to the tendency to self-perfect. Adolescents want to perfect that one move to sink the basketball into the net. They want to get the drawing of a character or a face just right. They may also need to repeat or perfect a way of connecting to their social group–a joke that the group bonds over, a funny dance move, a line from a movie–and this repetition reinforces that they belong to the group. They are also calculating constantly: where do I fit in, how do the connections through social media accounts show my status in the social hierarchy, how can I fine-tune my appearance to convey changes in my identity?

Association & Communication

The need for association and communication is paramount for adolescents. They want and need to learn in association and communication with their peers. They work things out together and need to debate and discuss. Adolescent guides provide healthy opportunities for this through seminars or Socratic dialogue, so adolescents can learn how to listen respectfully, hear others’ perspectives, and communicate their own thoughts. Adolescent guides also honor adolescents’ need to connect with others, being sensitive to the constant talking that often needs to happen for adolescents to work through ideas or feel connected to their peers.

Ultimately, adolescent guides are observing for these tendencies so they can make sure the learning environment matches adolescents’ social, emotional, moral, and physical needs and characteristics during this critical time in their development.

Let us know if you’d like to learn more about how our program helps young people on their journey to adulthood!

Achieving Economic Independence

Adolescents exist between two worlds: they are no longer children but they aren’t yet adults. On this bridge to adulthood, adolescents need opportunities to develop real, meaningful, adult-level skills. They aspire to do what adults do. They are curious about how to make their own way in the adult world.

As adults, we are part of an economic system. Even if we aren't using money to buy something, through our work or our hobbies we produce or consume aspects of culture. In this way, economics is about the web of interdependence we have with other people. We all depend upon the work and activity of others.

Economics and Interactions

If we look at economics as how people offer value in their interactions, as well as the production, distribution, and consumption of services and goods, we can really think about economics as how we organize ourselves in society. Because adolescents are building the skills for stepping into the adult world, it’s important to consider how they are developing their ability to navigate this economic aspect of adult life.

How many of us had the opportunity, as adolescents, to develop the skills necessary for economic independence? How would our lives be different if, as adolescents, we had a support system so we could figure out a fair and reasonable cost for goods we produced, faced the reality of a profit and loss statement, or found our way in navigating the paths of spending, saving, and sharing?

Road to Achieving Economic Independence

Dr. Maria Montessori realized the importance of adolescents developing these kinds of skills. In From Childhood to Adolescence, Dr. Montessori made a bold statement about our approach to education and its impact on the greater society. She stated it clearly: “The essential reform is this: to put the adolescent on the road to achieving economic independence.”

So in Montessori adolescent programs, we offer our emerging young adults the opportunity to learn key skills of production and exchange. We sometimes call this “microeconomy.” The basic idea is that adolescents need opportunities to produce goods and services, and work with money and monetary systems, so they can develop an understanding and appreciation for how economies work and their own role in economic systems.

Real, Meaningful, and Purposeful Work

This experience can take many different forms depending upon the community. Whether running a farm stand or a holiday marketplace, adolescents get to learn key skills. They learn to balance profit and loss. They discuss and determine how much money should be reinvested into the business to help it grow or how much money should be reinvested in the greater community. They respectfully listen to their customers’ needs and concerns and incorporate that feedback in useful ways.

In order to have these learning experiences, adolescents need real, meaningful, and purposeful work. Just like young children need to actually prepare food rather than play with a pretend kitchen set, adolescents need actual experiences in creating a business plan, keeping track of income on a spreadsheet, and balancing a budget. They need to practice accounting work so they can build the skills for their own economic independence. They need to have the thrill of handfuls of cash and then face the responsibility of keeping track of those earnings. They need the experience of paying for replacement materials when they have overused key supplies. If they have developed some savings and want to invest the money, they need to find opportunities that align with their values.

Preparing for Adult Life

Too many of our young people enter the world of adult lives without having experienced their role in an economy (perhaps other than being consumers!). Economic independence is a key part of preparing for adult life. We want our adolescents to step into maturity with confidence that they can independently navigate their new responsibilities and roles. If we give adolescents the opportunity to learn how to have a sound basis for their economic decisions, imagine where they will be when they are adults and making decisions that affect broader aspects of society!

Montessori and Adolescence: What Does the Research Say?

Montessori programs for adolescents are on the rise. There is a strong interest among parents, and for good reason! Montessori adolescents experience a rich educational setting that is unlike anything found in conventional education today.

The best news? Montessori adolescent programs are backed by research. Read more to find out how.

Montessori programs lead the way in supporting adolescent autonomy, competence, and self-determination.

Based on past research that has shown strong correlations between self-determination and achievement, this study sought to measure the former in seventh-grade students. Data collection relied on student voice, a measure that researchers and others state to be the most valuable in making decisions regarding education. A guiding question of the study, which examined how these seventh graders acclimated to their new environment, was, “How would a learning environment designed to support students’ development of autonomy, competence, and relatedness affect their sense of self-determination during their seventh-grade year?” 

The BNSW-S (the basic needs satisfaction at work scale) was modified so that the wording was applicable to students. Student volunteers then completed the survey and their scores were used to determine their various levels of self-determination (below, at, and above-expected levels). From there, one male and one female student at each of the levels were chosen to participate in the study.  

Students in the study were asked specific, open-ended questions that necessitated a narrative response. After transcribing and analyzing the interviews, some of the most commonly shared thoughts and themes were as follows:

• Choose type of work

• Choose order of tasks

• Scared at first...now I can

• Organize time

• More Social Confidence

• Capability to do well in high school

• Teacher care: help me stay on top of things

• Student care: community meeting 

Several interesting themes emerged. It was clear that all student participants had a strong sense of choice in their school experience. While students felt uneasy about their ability to complete their work at the start of the school year, by November all students felt confident in that area. Another interesting finding is that students overwhelmingly spoke about the support they received from their teachers.  

Researcher Casquejo Johnston suggests that conventional educators of middle school students who are interested in reform consider finding ways to implement personalized learning and community support, both of which are hallmarks of Montessori adolescent programs and can be attributed to the study’s positive findings.  

In Montessori adolescent programs, STEM is naturally cross-curricular and mirrors real-life scenarios.

The concept of STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) in education is theoretically meant to be taught in a cohesive, interdisciplinary, and authentic manner. Realistically, this is rarely the case, and “STEM disciplines are often implemented separately using contrived contexts”. 

The researchers of this study argue that Montessori, by design, meets the theoretical intentions of STEM while also mirroring the challenges faced locally and globally, giving students practical experience and meaningful learning. They felt that in Montessori adolescent environments, STEM occurs naturally and organically, because “In these spaces, interdisciplinary science, technology, engineering and mathematics learning is contextualized within the real work of running a farm.”

In a Montessori Erdkinder environment, students are required to meet the needs of the working farm. This allows them to face challenges and learn critical STEM skills that are required in doing so. The farm is a business, and the students must not only care for the farm itself, but successfully run the business. Working together with peers and adult guides to do so gives them the necessary skills to contribute as successful adults in their communities.

Researchers surveyed guides at Montessori adolescent programs across the United States asking a variety of questions, including both scaled and short-response open-ended questions. A total of 96 responses were collected.

Interestingly, most respondents hailed from programs that did not utilize the traditional Erdkinder farm program, but rather a different program more suited to their school, as well as strong implementation of other core Montessori principles.

Six important themes emerged as components of Montessori adolescent programs surveyed:

• Authentic & contextualized work

• Community & communities of practice

• Integrated STEM teaching & learning

• Holistic education

• Driven by student interests and funds of knowledge

• Socio Cultural & socio political connections

The researchers concluded that their assumptions regarding Montessori adolescent programs’ authentic and meaningful application of STEM were correct. They believe the model has much to offer students, as well as serving as a basis from which other educational settings should derive inspiration.

Montessori adolescents report higher intrinsic motivation, interest, energy, and more compared with peers in traditional settings.

In this study, 290 middle school students from both Montessori and traditional schools were surveyed. Analysis of the results indicated that the Montessori students displayed:

• Greater affect

• Potency (feeling energetic)

• Intrinsic motivation

• Flow experience

• Undivided attention (a combination of high intrinsic motivation and importance)

Researchers noted that many studies have revealed the struggles most adolescents face during this period in their lives, and the unfortunate fact that most adolescent educational programs are not designed to meet the specific needs of the children they are meant to serve. They note that while Montessori education is typically associated with early childhood, they believe there is important information to be learned about the model’s approach for older children.

When considering the ideas set forth by numerous researchers regarding adolescent’s needs for their educational settings, Montessori provides solutions to current problems in mainstream education. Young people need experiential learning, opportunities for metacognition, increased autonomy, and a model that honors their drive to work with peers.

Typical middle school environments enact strict and rigid policies; Montessori does not. Teens in Montessori environments are given structure and guidance, but also a good amount of freedom and choice.

The Montessori schools that were chosen for this study had the following characteristics in common: each had a built-in philosophy of intrinsic motivation, rather than block periods they allowed for extended periods for self-directed work, neither grades nor standardized tests were used for comparison or placement, students took a prominent role in daily decision-making, and small-group work was encouraged over whole-class lectures.

Researchers noted that Montessori students did, indeed, display significantly higher levels of intrinsic motivation. They suggest that Montessori adolescent environments might serve as excellent models for traditional middle school reform across the United States.

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