Desert Montessori Academy

I’m not sure I can sum up just how wonderful DMA has been for our family. We are military and they provide a quick and sound settling place among the many moves and changes our children are faced with. My son started in T-K and will finish kindergarten here. All of the teachers are supportive and encouraging, lending a hand when needed but letting children discover and expand their intellect. Our family’s philosophy is that childhood and early education is about so much more than sight words and test scores and we knew our shy boy would fade away and be lost in a class of 30+ children. We’ve found all that we could have asked for at DMA. Small class sizes, two teachers per class, lots of outdoor play time, no toys but instead educational development tools, a huge focus and emphasis on care of self and care for others. Our son has blossomed, matured, become even more kind and has made friends he’ll keep for life. He entered t-k reciting his abc’s orally and not writing at all and is leaving kinder doing intermediate addition, subtraction, and understanding number relationships, almost reading fluently, reciting sight words, writing all of his letters and knowing all of his sounds of letters. He has a huge understanding for his age of the planet, spatial awareness, connectivity of systems and problem solving. We absolutely adore the Montessori method and at least one teacher per room is Montessori certified-which is HUGE for any school, let alone one in the AV. I taught yoga to the kids as my volunteer activity so I spent a lot of time in each class and seeing and hearing lessons in action. Love this place, please reach out and take a tour!

Our family has been a part of Desert Montessori for the past three years. I fell in love with the Montessori method during our walk through and really appreciated the Principal Sharla's energy and commitment to the kids. The community usually has a good mix of ex-pat families and Edwards Air Force base folks. The new Bambino Room for babies is phenomenal. A great place for really small kids to grow up! My favorite is the Birthday Circle a Montessori Tradition that celebrates each child by having them do a ceremony that involves them walking around the sun once for each year of their life. I also really enjoy the very tactile and hands-on nature of the work and the use of a lot of wood in the materials.   The teachers also teach the kids tools to resolve conflict and work through their upsets. Some kids were doing multiplication in kindergarden of their own volition. Montessori is about student directed learning- helping them find their own spark and following it. Great stuff.

I teach English at a community college, and I place a high value on early childhood education. I researched several schools in the AV and Desert Montessori Academy is hands down the best. My daughter has been attending for three years; she is one year ahead in her academic studies. Because of my daughter's late November birthday, she would have languished in between preschool and kindergarten for an additional year. However, at Desert Montessori the children are given the work they are ready to do. Kindergartners work next to first, second, and third  graders so they are encouraged to learn from each other and set higher goals. My daughter will be in first grade in the fall, and thanks to Desert Montessori, I know she is well on her way to becoming a life-long self-motivated learner.

We love this school. Very low student to teacher ratios. Dependable, caring teachers. Unique subject areas in addition to the traditional core curriculum (chess, jujutsu, Spanish, classical art and music, etc). Both my children are performing 1 year head of their grades. My kids love going to school there, and often ask to stay longer when I come to pick them up. Definitely fosters a love of learning!

At best, this is an overpriced day care center.  In addition to the steep cost of tuition, parents are required to perform duties like doing the school's laundry (I swear I'm not making this up) and contribute several hundred dollars to each of the school's fundraising events, which are mandatory.  The teachers leave the children unattended to talk on their cell phones and the administrators are blatant in their favoritism of students who will be returning next year.  Don't worry about a waiting list.  There are far more children leaving this school than enrolling.

The Antelope Valley is a relatively low socioeconomic part of Los Angeles county, so some parents enroll their children here due to fear of violence in public schools, or simply for the bragging rights of sending their children to a Montessori academy.  These parents should plan on keeping their children in private schools through high school.  Desert Montessori only goes through the 3rd grade, and will leave the children ill-prepared for public school.

The Montessori system is based on letting children do their own thing at their own pace, and the teachers are either unwilling or unable to provide assistance to children who may require special attention.  The only accreditation required to be a Montessori "teaching associate" are a high school diploma and completion of the short Montessori accreditation course (state accreditation is not required for private schools).  We have several friends who are California state accredited instructors and administrators at the elementary, high school, and college levels.  All of them warned us that Montessori would probably be a bad choice for our child, with whom they are all acquainted or related.  Against their advice, we bought the school's sales pitch, and it proved to be a big mistake.

The facility is located in an old house in a residential part of town most people wouldn't want their children in after dark, and the staff frequently arrives late, causing parents to wait until someone shows up to let their children in.  Ditto for the end of the day, when teachers are in a hurry to get home and try to rush the parents to pick up their children.

In more affluent areas, Montessori academies may be able to attract qualified administrators and instructors.  Unfortunately, the staff at this facility is under-qualified to provide quality instruction, and most of them aren't qualified to be good babysitters.  Our child's teacher told us she was "overwhelmed" because she had 7 children in her class.

If you're set on private school, Desert Christian will provide better structure and education than Desert Montessori, which is the reason Desert Christian's enrollment is significantly higher than Desert Montessori's.

We deeply regret the time, money and energy we invested in Desert Montessori.  In my opinion, it is more of a cult than a school.  Education is always expensive, but we had no idea what a bad investment we were making by enrolling our child here.

I can&#39;t say enough how about this wonderful this place is and how much we enjoyed our time there! Parents and students were so special and such a United group. It was a great experience and I cherish our memories here as we have now moved out of state. My son grew as a little person and it gave him a wonderful foundation and love of learning.

When I began looking for a pre-school I went to several that had good curriculums but when I visited DMA I felt like I was being accepted into a family.  My daughter has learned so many lessons about how to interact with kids in larger groups from all different family cultures.  As an only child I wanted her to have a broad experience and she got that.  I also liked how the teachers worked until they found the best way to encourage her to learn.  Lucinda was very patient with her and got her to interact with other kids in a productive way.  When the pandemic hit we continued with Zoom school as best as we could with a four year old and she was excited for our Zoom sessions.  Now that DMA has secured a new building my daughter is very excited to go back to in person learning.  I am grateful that Lucinda will again be her teacher.  My daughter learned a lot from her.

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