Visual Thinking Strategies at TNSM

The New School Montessori Looks at Art in a New Way.

Since its inception, 44 years ago, The New School Montessori has been doing things a little differently. Founded by a group of progressive parents looking for an alternative to the traditional form of education that was being offered in local public schools, The New School Montessori began a journey that has kept them experimenting and asking new questions about how best to teach children. So it should come as no surprise to hear that The New School’s professional development day for its teachers on November 7 is dedicated to looking at art…in new ways.

Visual Thinking Strategies (VTS) has been shown to have cascading positive effects on both teachers and students. It was developed by Abigail Housen and Philip Yenawine in the 1980s, and uses observation of art to increase students’ critical thinking, communication and visual literacy skills.

In a five-year study in the Bryon, Minnesota school district, it was found that using VTS helped students to develop critical-thinking skills that transferred to multiple situations. Students were able to use these new skills  in many subject areas and from group discussions to individual writing. In 1998, when the first class of VTS veterans took the state’s eighth-grade achievement test, Bryon scores jumped 23 points over the previous year, two and a half times the average state increase.

And it works for adults too: A study conducted by the Harvard Medical School demonstrated that medical students, who studied using the VTS method, were 38 percent more accurate in diagnosing unknown conditions than their peers.

When Jeff Groh, Director at The New School Montessori, attended a workshop at Harvard’s Graduate School of Education and met Dabney Hailey, founder of the Hailey Consulting Group which uses VTS for staff development, they formed a fast friendship and quickly saw similarities between Montessori and VTS methods. Both Montessori and VTS focus on creative and critical thinking skills, collaboration, social skills and both embrace the search for multiple solutions to complex problems.

Teaching methods like VTS and Montessori don’t focus on problem-solving questions that ask what is “right” or “wrong,” nor do they ask questions where there is only one answer that’s in the teacher’s edition of the textbook. Rather, VTS and Montessori methods ask: What do you want? How did you get there? What is possible?

Hailey explained how she uses VTS as a managerial tool within commercial enterprises and nonprofit organizations. She has led VTS discussions and trained facilitators in a range of contexts (businesses, museums, universities, schools, and the medical world) since 2001. She explained that highly educated and successful professionals often need to learn, or re-learn, the art of observation. Rather than relying solely on past experiences to draw conclusions about new challenges, students can use VTS methods to observe closely without preconceptions and can unlock fresh approaches to addressing complex issues.

After hearing more about the VTS method, Groh invited Hailey to facilitate a VTS workshop for the staff at The New School Montessori. The staff is looking forward to learning about VTS methods and about the insights that open-minded observations can reveal.

After 44 years of serving children ages 3 to grade 6, The New School Montessori continues to keep its finger on what’s “new” in education.