How often should I check children's work?

Montessori education. Working with the Montessori English language box. How often should I check children’s work?

We have been using the Montessori English language box at school for about eighteen months now.  It has been a learning process for us all. So many questions have arisen - how often should we check the children’s work, should we give spelling tests, how often should the children work alone or with someone else? We have wondered about so many things and had interesting insights and learnings along the way.

One question kept arising. How often was it necessary to check the children’s work books and how could we keep track of what they were doing? The children are all producing work in different formats, some of it is on the computer, some is films, or posters, presentations, or even the school shop – all of which can be quite intangible to measure.

Just as I was wrestling with the question of checking work and how often to do it I received a pile of notebooks from some of the children. It made fascinating reading, as the books were a record of progress over time. Looking through them I could see the visible changes that had occurred in what the children were learning and how.

I saw practical things, such as improved handwriting. The children became more adept at remembering to write the date and title of their work in their books. However, beyond this something much more interesting than mere practicalities happened too. I noticed that without any prompting from me the children gradually chose to do more and more difficult work.

Those that had started with translating the word boxes, and maybe adding a picture or two, soon progressed to creating word search puzzles, writing sentences, and trying out the cards rather than just matching pictures and words. Some of them moved on to inventing their own games and now one class has an English game lesson every week made up of games the children have made. Generally the children seemed curious to find out more and alternative ways of using the words they were learning in the boxes, and this was reflected in their work and their interest to explore further and try out more ways of using their English.

Some children quickly found that illustrating their work was not enough, and they started to write little stories between the pictures they drew.  Other notebooks had photos of posters, pictures of slides from presentations or copies of work that had been made on the computer. 

What amazed me, and further deepened my respect for the Montessori approach, was that I had never asked the children to do more difficult work. They had chosen the work when they felt ready, when the time was right for them. Nor did I ever have to ask them to be on time, or to hurry up or to keep to a schedule. In their own natural rhythm these children all did their work and learnt in the process.

The notebooks I saw seem to mirror the beauty of the Montessori English material. The children are not being dragged through a method, regardless of whether they can keep up, or whether it is boring for them. The box supports the children to discover their own learning needs at their own pace, and this was reflected in the work I saw from the children.

They had chosen their topics. They were committed, and this was reflected in the quality and care of the work they had done. Their growing confidence in themselves was also reflected in their work. From starting out as small acorns translating words over time these children grew into more confident users of English.

Coming back to the question about how often I should check notebooks and how I can control what children are doing I learnt something by looking at these notebooks. I realise that the only thing I need to do is check the English grammar and spelling of the work the children are doing!! I do not need to invent a complicated Excel spreadsheet about the quantity of work being done, when it was handed in and how good it was. 

I learnt that when I trust the process, trust the Montessori way of working, the children will be all right, and do what needs to be done and get on with their work.

I can hear some of you saying,” ahh but what about child x or y? They have trouble getting started or choosing. How is this going to work with those sorts of children? How will it work with children who have trouble concentrating, or who get distracted?”. And of course, we have these children in our classes too.  I have had a couple of children whose notebooks were empty after four months in class. Even though they appeared to be busy every lesson, their visible output was zero. My experience has been that because the majority of children can quickly settle to work and need little instruction from me, this gives me the time to help the children who need it, and I can keep more of an eye on children who might need more guidance.