Montessori Classrooms
shaping future generations

One of the major problems facing hilltribe children is the language barrier when they start school age 6. At home the children of hilltribe families speak one of the many hill tribe languages (unrelated to Thai), while at school they must speak, read and write  Thai. In addition, some of the hilltribe languages do not have a written form, so the children are unused to writing or reading. The Montessori Programme helps hilltribe children prepare for Thai schooling by converting existing Child Care Centres and nursery schools into centres which teaching children Thai (as well as other disciplines and social skills) using a system based on the work of Dr Mari Montessori.

History of the project

In 2003, Paul Hancock and Patricia Solar visited a nearby project for hilltribes where they saw Montessori child-centred teaching techniques being used with considerable success to teach pre-school hilltribe children to read and write Thai, as well as elementary maths and other useful subjects.  (Learm more about the Montessori method )

They thought this was an idea which could be introduced with advantage to other areas, so they arranged a study tour for some interested teachers from the Sahasat School, Chiang Rai, (which has 1,800 hilltribe pupils).

In May 2004, Khom Loy offered to sponsor an instructor/teacher, a teacher training course, and the purchase of teaching equipment for one year at the school. Each year, new schoolrooms have been converted and more trainers recruited and trained.

Current news

Five years on (as of early 2009) 19 school rooms/child daycare centres have been converted (with a further 8 schools in the course of  conversion), and a total of approximately 650 children are benefitting each year. A further 8 rooms will be converted later in 2009.  We now have 8 teacher trainers, one volunteer (a trained Montessori teacher from Kenya) and as well as a project manager to oversee operations. Measurement of the outcomes show that children are developing not only academically but also socially as a result of the child-centred learning methods. 

Innovative teaching materials

Over the years Khom Loy has also designed a range of low-cost Montessori equipment which will allow the programme to be rolled out more generally. (Our first classrooms at Sahasat cost about US$3,000 to fully renovate and equip, the cost at Huay Khom, our second location, was nearly halved. We have since been able to develop low-cost equipment to the point that the three most recent Child Development Centers were opened for under $500 per classroom. Our aim is to reduce this to less than US$200 with the continued use of local materials and laminated paper/cardboard materials made by teachers and other volunteers.)

Future plans

In addition to expanding the program to other village schools, Khom Loy would like to start an academy for teachers as well as a workshop to make the equipment, so that the program can expand over a larger area.

Another pilot program is using Montessori methods to teach English to grades 1 and 2 (aged 6-8). Early results show that children learn Englsih as well as Thai very fast when they can play with Montessori-like toys involving associating pictures and words.  

Thanks to our Donors

We are grateful to Dr. Richard Haugland, The Kenoli Foundation, Aiutare i Bambini (Help the Children, an Italian foundation), the Planet Wheeler Foundation, the Canada Fund, the Mudita Trust, Tom Winsor, Pieter-Maarten Feenstra, Elisabeth and Conor Kehoe, Andrew and Liz Johnson, together with many other private donors for their support of this programme since its inception.