Mata Montessori School

A new logo for the proposed Mata Montessori School

Parents and children from roughly 70 families gathered into the Eduardo Mata auditorium last night wanting to learn about the school’s proposed Montessori curriculum. Most of them either live within Mata and Mount Auburn Elementary’s boundaries and are trying to decide between the two schools next fall, or are zoned to Robert E. Lee, William Lipscomb, Lakewood or Stonewall Jackson elementaries and are considering a transfer to Mata.

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The goal is for Mata to become Dallas ISD’s first “school of choice” Montessori that would be more of a neighborhood school than a magnet school for all of Dallas. George Bannerman Dealey Montessori Vanguard and Harry Stone Montessori are the two other DISD Montessori elementaries; both are open to students all over DISD and base enrollment on an interview process, whereas Mata Montessori would primarily serve students in the Woodrow Wilson High School feeder pattern and would not have entrance requirements.

Parents interested in their children attending Mata had questions about everything from how teachers would be Montessori-certified to how the Montessori and dual language curricula would mesh to how Mata would transform from a fourth- and fifth-grade school into a Montessori elementary.

primarily serving students in the Woodrow Wilson High School feeder pattern, – See more at: https://lakewood.advocatemag.com/2014/04/09/mata-montessori-next-fall-another-choice-east-dallas-parents/#sthash.rKHQ9Pp9.dpuf

And the big question is whether Mata will become a Montessori at all. Soon after the meeting began, Tracie Fraley, executive director of the Woodrow feeder pattern, let families know that the Dallas ISD board of trustees will be voting on the proposal to make Mata a Montessori this Thursday night, noting that “we are cautiously optimistic.”

Mata Principal Claudia Vega, who led the presentation and fielded most of parents’ questions, explained that Mata would launch in 2014-15 as a pre-kindergarten through second-grade Montessori, focusing on the primary and lower elementary years. Third-grade marks the start of upper elementary and also is the first year of state-mandated benchmark testing, so “we did not want to switch somebody in the middle of their schooling,” Vega said, and Fraley added that ” we want to have a great foundation with younger students.” Fourth-graders who are at Mata this year also would attend the school next fall as fifth-graders; after that, the school would be solely Montessori, with grades being added as next year’s students advance through the school.

Next fall, the school has 102 spots for pre-kindergartners, 114 for kindergartners, and 76 each for first- and second-graders. Families in the Mata/Mount Auburn boundaries have first dibs on the spots, then it opens up to families throughout the Woodrow feeder pattern, then the entire school district. “If any of those slots are oversubscribed, then what we do is go into a lottery,” Vega explained. (See below for visual breakdowns of this information). This process will remain the same each year, but once a student is enrolled, that student can stay at Mata for the entirety of elementary.

Teacher-to-student ratios at Mata would be a bit lower the initial year than the state-required 22 students to one teacher. The Montessori approach is to group children of different ages, so 3- and 4-year-old pre-kindergartners would be grouped with kindergartners, with up to 24 students, one teacher and one teacher’s assistant in each classroom. First- and second-graders also would be grouped together, with up to 16 students and one teacher in each classroom. Those classes would expand to 24 children the following year when third-graders are added.

“We’ve had a wealth of interest from candidates who are already Montessori-certified,” Vega said, and teachers as well as teacher assistants who aren’t would begin what Vega described as “very intense” Montessori training this summer, pre-kindergarten and kindergarten teachers with the Montessori Institute of North Texas and first- and second-grade teachers through a partnership with the Shelton School’s Montessori conference. Teachers of physical education, art, music and other specials also would be taught the Montessori methodology, Vega said.

Two-way dual language is the goal for all of Mata’s classes, so teachers would need to be not only Montessori-certified but also bilingual. Many of parents’ questions centered on how the Montessori approach, which fosters independent learning, and dual language teaching would conflate. Vega told them lesson materials had been ordered in both English and Spanish, and the plan is to group both native English and Spanish speakers in each classroom with teachers giving instruction in both languages and have “times when they pull students aside to do small group English and Spanish instruction.”

“I’m not saying it’s easy,” Vega said. “It would take some very purposeful planning with our teachers to decide what instructional blocks we would do in English and which in Spanish.”

Fraley said the school is “very comitted to making sure we do Montessori correctly” and that even after extensive conversations and travels to schools throughout the country, “we’ve had a difficult time finding a model we can replicate” that fully incorporates both Montessori and dual language. Mata’s curriculum will “pull best practices” from schools doing some form of both, she said. Fraley added that dual language is going to become an important component at all of the schools that feed into Woodrow because learning a second language is essential to the International Baccalaureate programs at both Woodrow and J.L. Long Middle School.

Another informational meeting is scheduled next Monday morning, April 28, at 9 a.m. Parents interested in sending their children to Mata can fill out forms at the meeting, or print forms and either mail them to or drop them off at the school.

Jennifer Wang, who lives in Lakewood, attended last night’s meeting in an attempt to decide whether to send her 6-year-old son to Mata as a first-grader. He is currently at Montessori Children’s House and School as a kindergartner after a failed attempt to enroll him at Dealey, she says. Wang said she felt better about Mata after the informational meeting, but “it’s a new, unproven school with teachers just beginning their Montessori training.”

“If we actually get in, we have a decision to make. Obviously Lakewood Elementary is a very well-regarded school; I’m just enamored with the Montessori system,” Wang said. “The research on the benefits of Montessori philosophy for education has been well-documented for 100 years.”

Whether or not her son attends Mata, Wang feels strongly that the district needs more Montessori campuses, and has emailed the three DISD trustees who represent Mata, Mount Auburn and Long/Woodrow telling them as much. She now plans to email all nine trustees before Thursday’s meeting. “I’m just angry they haven’t even voted yet,” Wang said.

Fraley said that “we’ve had numerous painful conversations with our board” about the $961,000 proposal to reconfigure Mata, and when parents asked how to show trustees their support for the changes, Fraley suggested they contact trustees directly or “make their wishes known to all of the board” by showing up to speak at Thursday’s meeting.

We’ve covered the DISD board vote on Mata and Mount Auburn and are continuing to reach out to trustees about these issues. We will have an update with their responses before Thursday’s meeting.

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