Sensory Integration/Orton-Gillingham/Montessori

Children need experiences. Real, true experiences that they can remember and can make connections to. Experiences where they touch, hear, see, smell, and even taste things. We as teachers need to spend more time planning lessons that require our students to get up and move and use their senses and less time planning lessons where they sit in their desk quietly and complete a task. Children need to go outside and explore. They need to spend less time staring at a screen and more time experiencing the world. Sensory rooms have become popular in some areas yet in other areas we rarely see schools incorporating sensory rooms, walls, activities, etc. into children's everyday routines. Sensory rooms are beneficial for every student but especially for students with autism, sensory processing disorder, and even ADHD. Sensory rooms can have various items in them from exercise balls to obstacle courses to a calming corner. It is very important that teachers provide opportunities for students to use these types of things. Even if the school does not provide an entire sensory room, these items can easily be incorporated in a regular classroom to benefit the entire class. Children need to be using their senses all throughout the school day!

The Orton-Gillingham Approach is action-based learning. In this approach, students are using multiple senses which reinforces whatever skill is being taught. This approach includes strategies like students tapping words out on their arm as they are spelling them and writing those words with a screen under their paper so that when they take the paper away they can feel the textured word and they can make a connection with their senses to that word and how it is spelt. This approach also includes students writing in sand trays. I have seen this first-hand and students LOVE it. This is an awesome small group activity that can be using for spelling words, writing letters, writing sounds, and so much more. This can be used in various grade levels. Orton-Gillingham is a phenomenal approach and I encourage all teachers to use it in their classroom to meet the needs of every learner!

Montessori education is a child centered approach where students have the freedom to move around the classroom to work independently or with other students on a task. Lessons not only include how to complete a task but also how to get the materials out and how to put them away. This is teaching students how to be independent so that they are prepared for the real world. Montessori stressed the importance of having reality and nature in the classroom. This means having live animals and plants in the classroom that the students study and learn about. They are given responsibilities like watering the plants and feeding the animals. Montessori stressed how there should be realistic items in the classroom that mimic the real world such as child sized brooms, furniture, kitchen items, etc. This creates an environment where students are able to learn important everyday tasks that they will use in their future. 

I learned a lot about these three topics. I learned that providing students with several opportunities to use their senses in vital in the classroom and in every lesson. I learned that the Orton-Gillingham approach aids in using those senses in a way to teach things such as phonics, letter formation, spelling, etc. I also learned a lot about Montessori education and how very important it is to teach our students life skills that may not be in the state standards but will assure that our students will be successful in their future. I plan to use all of these methods/approaches in my future classroom to prepare my students not just for standardized testing but for the real world. I want to prepare my students for the first day they are moved out of their parents house and living on their own. I want them to have the foundational life skills to be a successful adult. Be the teacher students remember 20 years later!

One example of how a Montessori classroom might look below

Montessori education explained in the video below...