Written by Anna (P ‘28, P’30)
Kerry and I recently had a conversation about education in the time of AI — what does education look like on the cusp of what feels like the biggest technological shift any of us has lived through? I suspect many of us are spending a lot of time thinking about this very thing, so I wanted to share the thoughts that keep me grounded when my worry about the future begins to spiral. The conclusion I keep landing on is this: whatever it means to be Montessori educated, it is more relevant now than ever.
For those who don’t know me or my family, we are by no means “A Montessori Family.” My girls — ages nine and twelve — came to Washington Montessori School just three years ago, and, if I’m being honest, we didn’t arrive with any particular understanding of what Montessori actually was. What we did have was a vague but persistent observation that we tended to like Montessori adults. They seemed thoughtful, grounded, and unique. So what follows isn’t coming from a place of deep Montessori scholarship: it’s coming from a parent who happens to be a Montessori parent and who also happens to work at an AI lab — a place where I spend a lot of time thinking about the future of technology, the future of work, and the future of learning. I think the upside of AI is enormous — and the risks are just as real, just as important. Which is why, when it comes to raising these two girls in a world that feels like it’s changing faster than any of us can keep up with, I find myself thinking constantly about what I want them to learn most.
Living with Uncertainty
One of the things that strikes me daily is how little certainty anyone actually has about the future of AI. What we do know is that this is the worst AI will ever be. It’s going to get a lot better, and in all probability, very quickly. Beyond that, nobody knows what jobs our children will hold, what tools they’ll use, or what problems they’ll be asked to solve five, ten, fifteen years from now. What the internet, and then social media, have taught us over the last two decades is that how we introduce powerful technology into our lives matters enormously. But the question that keeps me up at night isn’t about how we introduce AI or whether our kids will learn to use it. In a world where AI can do more and more, what’s left? What can’t it do?
The answer is deceptively simple. AI cannot be a human. It can sound like us. It can make pictures and write stories. It can write code and solve hard problems. But it cannot feel. It cannot make eye contact. It cannot choose kindness because it understands what cruelty feels like. It cannot make art because it is moved by something. And the more I sit with that, the more I believe that what education should look like right now is the thing that has always mattered most, and that technology will never replace: learning what it means to be a genuinely good human being. Of course, I want my girls to know their math facts, read great books, and figure out how amazing a protein is. But when I think about what I actually want them to learn — not just know, but learn — the list looks a little different:
- How to look someone in the eye and say “good morning.”
- How to disagree respectfully.
- How to think critically about what’s in front of them, even when it’s presented as fact.
- How to make thoughtful choices about what they put out into the world.
- How to love reading.
- How to appreciate art.
- How to sit with a hard problem.
- How to be wrong.
- How to ask for help.
That is what I see at WMS. Not just an education in the academic sense, but an education in living — in working alongside other people, in respecting the process of learning even when it’s slow, in developing the kind of character that no algorithm can manufacture. In a world that increasingly values speed and efficiency and polished outcomes, Montessori asks a quieter, harder thing of us. It asks us to slow down. And right now, in this strange and thrilling and slightly terrifying moment in history, slowing down might be the most radical thing we can do.
