SHORT REVIEWS

30 Questions, 30 Answers: a Montessori Education Reference Guide, by Connie S. Redwine, National Writers Press, 2005, 44 pages $5.95.

A guide written to answer quickly all those questions every Montessori teacher or school head faces regularly: What is the Montessori Method? How does it differ from other methods? What happens on a typical day? How are Montessori teachers trained? What about discipline?

Most Montessori educators could probably guess most of the other 25 questions.

The answers are brief and steer clear of controversy. The target market is probably schools that want to have a handy reference ready for parents.

The Mommy Manual: Planting Roots that Give Your Children Wings, by Barbara Curtis, Revell, 2005, 247 pages, $12.95.

A mother of 12 shares a firm, warm, evangelical Christian approach to motherhood with some clear influences from-and a few pages of acknowledgment of-Montessori's writings.

The Way of the Teacher, J. M. Haile, Macatea Productions, 2005, 116 pages. $19.95.

As our state and federal governments mindlessly seek to turn teachers into technicians who can elicit from students the correct bubble-sheet answers by a given date, this set of meditations by an engineering professor is a glorious breath of air.

Halle describes the purpose of the book as not to convince but to stimulate, not a road map but a sign post. In 96 brief, Zen-like "threads" Halle offers thoughts-provocative, profound, simple, challenging and occasionally contradictory-that celebrate the quest to be a true master teacher.