Montessori or Reggio Emilia?

Montessori and Reggio Emilia differ most on mixed ages, what the family can put in and technology at school. They agree, more than most people expect, on who else is there, measuring it and what a teacher is. Neither is the correct one. What follows is what each asks of a parent, and where the difference actually shows up on a Tuesday.

Montessori

Children choose their own work from carefully designed materials, in mixed-age classes, across a long uninterrupted morning. The structure is in the environment rather than in the timetable: what is available is tightly controlled, and what a child does with it is not. Adults observe far more than they instruct.

What it asks of you

Accepting a school where nobody will tell you what your child did at 10am
Trusting a long ramp — the method front-loads independence and back-loads visible output
Checking the school rather than the name, which anyone may use
Usually fees, since state Montessori is rare outside a few systems

Reggio Emilia

There is no curriculum set in advance. Teachers watch what a group of children is drawn to, document it obsessively, and build long projects out of it — which may run for months. The environment is treated as a third teacher, expression takes a hundred forms, and the documentation on the walls is the record of the thinking rather than display work.

What it asks of you

Tolerating genuine uncertainty about what your child will study this term
A school with the staffing to do it, since the method is expensive in adult attention
Reading the documentation, which is where the learning is visible and is easy to walk past
Accepting it is an early-years approach; few Reggio schools run past six

Side by side

Where they differ

Montessori is the filled marker, Reggio Emilia the hollow one. Widest difference first.

E1Mixed ages

classes of the same agemixed-age groups

Montessori sits firmly toward mixed-age groups; Reggio Emilia sits between the two.

C1What the family can put inwhat your life allows

school has to run without the parentsbeing in it, daily

Montessori sits between the two; Reggio Emilia sits toward being in it, daily.

E3Technology at school

kept out until latebuilt in from the start

Montessori sits toward kept out until late; Reggio Emilia sits between the two.

L4Where the curriculum comes from

it emerges from the childrena fixed body of knowledge, set in advance

Montessori sits toward it emerges from the children; Reggio Emilia sits firmly toward it emerges from the children.

L2When formal academics start

when the child is ready, and late is fineearly, and ambitiously

Montessori sits between the two; Reggio Emilia sits toward when the child is ready, and late is fine.

Where they agree

Usually more than the argument between them suggests.

Who else is there. Both sit between the two.
Measuring it. Both sit firmly toward no grades, no tests.
What a teacher is. Both sit toward a guide who steps back.
A view of the world. Both sit a little toward school should stay neutral.
Money and distance. Both sit toward we can pay, and we can travel.

Neither of these is the correct one

Which fits depends on what you value and on what your week actually allows — and the second of those is the half nobody writes about. The questionnaire scores both.

See which one you are already doing