Giving Compass' Take:

• Montessori schools and other early learning programs are providing public schools with their materials, curriculum, and guidance so that every student can have access to high quality, effective learning. 

• Why are partnerships in personalized learning so important? How can these learning styles be adopted in public school settings? 

• Learn about the models already in place at public schools that focus on teacher improvement and student achievement. 

All children need a very personalized approach to develop into well-rounded individuals ready for success in school and life. Unfortunately, all children don’t have equal access to this ideal education, and those who don’t are quickly left behind in the American competition for upward mobility.

We don’t have to live with this social Darwinism, especially when states like Connecticut, South Carolina, and Massachusetts show that we can bring these highly effective learning programs into free public schools and achieve great results.

Many know Montessori as a preferred educational approach among families who can afford to send their children to expensive private schools. What they don’t know is that Montessori was originally developed to elevate the lives of low-income children — and that it is being embraced in the public sector.

Montessori is by no means the only early learning approach that works. Teachers and staff at Boston Public Schools created Focus on Early Learning, a model that combines the best elements of child-centric, highly developmental, brain-building early childhood education programs.

Best of all, Boston is making Focus on Early Learning available to all public schools — complete with an infrastructure, high-quality materials, and guidance on how to build collaborative environments, evaluation mechanisms, and continuous quality improvement.

There are important lessons here. High-quality early learning programs can be brought to scale in very diverse public settings to produce the outcomes we want to see in all children. We can be more successful by focusing on developing the whole child, not just academic skills.

Read the full article about providing successful programs to public schools by Iheoma Iruka at The 74