The Montessori Message

The Montessori Message

Tag Archives: TED Talks

The Power of Stories

24 Thursday Jan 2019

Posted by Wilmington Montessori in Teachers

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Chimamanda Adichie, stories, story-telling, storytelling, TED Talk, TED Talks

Today I happened to step into a classroom in which students were watching novelist Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s TED Talk. It was the starting point for a writing lesson about stories. If you don’t know it, it’s worth 18 minutes of your time. We all tell stories, and of course try to make them interesting for the listener or reader. What makes a story interesting? What makes a story balanced? Why do we have a need to tell stories?

Most of us probably don’t remember the first story we heard or the first one we told. We are surrounded with stories from the beginning of our lives, probably shared with us by loving family members. Some are the stories in beloved books. Others are stories handed down through our families, perhaps through generations. Through this sharing, the stories may have evolved to be somewhat different from the original. However, they are shared over time and become part of the way we define our lives. They provide comfort and add to our identity as we grow from childhood to adulthood and often repeat the same stories and share the same books with the next generation of little ones in our families.

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More than an Athlete

15 Thursday Sep 2016

Posted by Lisa Lalama in Montessori Education, Teachers, Wilmington Montessori School

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athletes, Chicago Bears, community, culture, diversity, football, Maria Montessori, martellus bennett, montessori, Montessori education, professional development, teachers, TED Talk, TED Talks

world-map-made-up-of-peopleAt the beginning of each school year, the Wilmington Montessori School staff has the opportunity to spend one day together. We are not setting up classrooms, ordering supplies or making name tags for the students who will soon appear. Instead, we are nurturing our community and sharing common experiences. This year, we spent part of that day learning more about cultural awareness and our sensitivity to those from cultures different from our own. It was nothing short of enlightening. Continue reading →

Who are you?

05 Thursday May 2016

Posted by Lisa Lalama in Learning, Montessori Education, Research, Wilmington Montessori School

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Anita Foeman, culture, curiosity, DNA, family tree, genealogy, genes, genetics, genome, montessori, Montessori education, questions, science, TED Talk, TED Talks, Wilmington Montessori, Wilmington Montessori School, wonder

blog DNAYou might think of WMS as a small independent Montessori school. You might think that, because we end in sixth grade, our students don’t have access to the same breadth of knowledge of those schools that end in eighth or 12th grades. You might think we are only thinking of “little kid” concerns. You might be wrong. Continue reading →

Finding a Community of Learners

26 Sunday Jul 2015

Posted by Lisa Lalama in Learning, Montessori Education, Wilmington Montessori School

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community, curiosity, John Green, montessori, Montessori education, TED Talks, Wilmington Montessori, Wilmington Montessori School

This TED Talk shares New York Times bestselling author John Green’s struggles with school, his love of learning and his suggestion that perhaps learning today looks different than ours did when we were in school. He speaks of his attendance at a new school as a sophomore in high school:

“And all at once I became a learner. And I became a learner because I found myself in a community of learners. I found myself surrounded by people who celebrated intellectualism and engagements, and who thought that my oh-so-cool disengagement wasn’t clever or funny, but, like it was a simple and unspectacular response to very complicated and compelling problems. And I started to learn, because learning was cool.”

At WMS our students don’t have to wait to locate their community of learners. They are surrounded by them. John Green’s talk reminds us of what is important, what feeds our curiosity, our intellect and ignites our passions.

Keeping Curiosity Alive – “Why?”

06 Thursday Nov 2014

Posted by Lisa Lalama in Learning, Wilmington Montessori School

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curiosity, education, Fabien Cousteau, teachers, TED Talks, video, why, Wilmington Montessori

We are all born with questions. Babies make sense of their world initially through sound and tracking objects with their eyes. Quickly they reach and explore their world with their hands and their mouths. As children grow, they begin to ask questions, and anyone who spends even a little time with a 2-year-old has heard that ever-present question, “Why?” Children are wired for curiosity.

In schools, curiosity can be moved to the side for “learning.” Schools are charged with many things. The push to learn all of the academic subjects and be the very best at each of them can displace the curious nature of children. The focus on skills that are on the “test” can get in the way of questions that do not yet have answers. This TED talk by Fabien Cousteau begins with his reflection on his sense of curiosity, which he describes as “…our connection with the world, with the universe. It’s about seeing what’s around that next coral head or what’s around that next tree, and learning more not only about our environment but about ourselves.”

Cousteau talks about his years in school, his propensity to stare out the window and let his mind wander; he didn’t pay attention. One of the toughest things in a classroom is a student who does just what Cousteau describes. One of the most wonderful things is that same student. Children teach us each day to do our best and to try harder. They help us to ask questions, be curious and find solutions to problems we have not thought of previously. They make us all better as a result. All of us will learn and continue to learn if we are given the freedom to explore our curiosities and to wonder. At Wilmington Montessori School, our goal is to keep that curiosity alive and to never stop asking, “Why?”

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