Don't Stifle My Creativity, Mommy

I was just having an interesting conversation with a friend of mine about Reggio versus Montessori versus Standard curriculums for toddlers and preschoolers. Before I had Hailey, I was always a big proponent of Montessori, which gives kids the opportunity to direct their learning in a more unstructured way than the standard "we have story from 10-10:30 then art from 10:30-11:00, etc" type of curriculum. I'm not as familiar with Reggio, but she tells me that it's even less structured than Montessori. Now, as I said, I was a big proponent of Montessori before I had kids, but when I went to look at a Montessori school again a few months ago, I was shocked by how turned off I was by the sheer chaos of it all. I truly feel that at her age, Hailey needs structure. She needs someone to help direct her to activities and encourage her learning around a few key areas. Of course, I want her to develop critical thinking skills, but I don't think that being in a more structured preschool is going to translate into her NOT asking me how Santa can fly around to everyone's house in one 12 hour period (more on the Santa debate at a later date). Now, on the weekends, she often has unstructured time, and she is certainly capable of playing by herself. However, after a certain amount of time, she's bored and wants some direction. It makes for a much easier day for all of us if I can say, we are going to do 2 activities today and whatever happens in between is free time. Luckily, she's at the age where I can say...do you want to play games or do you want to color? (more on game playing later too) All of that is to say that I'm still happy with Hailey's preschool. She seems to be really learning her letters and, more importantly, the sounds that the letters make. Luke swears that she'll be reading by the fall. I'm not so sure about that, but she's a smart cookie so I won't bet against her.