u/Fit_Specialist_5978

I had the opportunity to observe my kid's Montessori classroom for about 1.5 hours this morning. It was surprisingly calm for a bunch of 3-6 year olds - about 8 kids and 2 teachers. I did my best to write down my observations of what all the kids and teachers were doing during my observation, as I thought this might be interesting to other parents with kids in Montessori classrooms: Link to observations

If anyone has experience observing classrooms, I'd love to know if what I saw is fairly typical of a work cycle.

My specific concerns as a parent (not necessarily from this observation, but from other comments and hearsay):

• It seems like most kids who aren't in a lesson with a teacher are off-task, like they may have materials but it's not clear if they are actually doing the thing (e.g. two kids with a number work are getting out beads, but it doesn't seem like they are talking about numbers or doing anything specific?). OTOH maybe it's already pretty cool that they are doing this without any supervision?
• It seems like the kids gravitate to snacks, practical life works, and art. I don't see kids choosing number or reading works without prompting from the teachers. Is that normal?
• It seems that the teachers are pretty gentle in their approach and they ask the kids for behavior changes rather than commanding them. Is that normal? I guess it sounds slightly passive-aggressive to me.

Edit: I anonymized the names of everyone and did some other things to try to make sure this isn't identifiable.