ABSTRACT
The Effect of Montessori Method and the free activity methods of teaching was investigated among children to discover their artistic development in some schools in Zaria, Nigeria. Five objectives were raised which included to: 1. examine the effects of the Montessori Method of Teaching on Children?s creative arts performance at the Pre-schematic, Schematic and Gang stages of their artistic development 2. examine the effects of Free Activity Method of Teaching on Children? Creative Arts performance at the Pre-schematic, Schematic and Gang stages of their artistic development 3. determine the effect of Montessori and Free Activity Methods on the Creative Art performance of Children at the different stages of artistic development 4. compare the Creative Arts performance of the Children at the various stages of their artistic development using Montessori with those of the Free Activity Method of Teaching and 5. evaluate at what stage the Montessori Method of Teaching has effect on Children?s performance. Quasi experimental design was used for analysing the instruments. A drawing test was administrated to the children using the Montessori and the free activity methods of teaching; a semi-structured interview was also administered to the teachers. Total of 1,030 pupils (boys and girls) in primary schools from randomly selected schools were involved in the study. The data collected was analysed using simple t-test, ANOVA and chi-square. The methods of teaching were assessed on children?s developmental stages in creative artistic development between pre-schematic stage, schematic stage and gang stage. The findings revealed that the Montessori Method of Teaching had a positive effect on the performance of the Children?s artistic development in the primary schools in Zaria. The pupils had a general positive and enthusiastic attitude towards creative arts; this shows that when children were given the opportunity and enough art materials to express vii themselves, they would be able to display their different characteristics. The Free Activity Method of teaching also had effect on the Children, being the conventional way of teaching art in primary Schools in Zaria, even though there were no art materials found in the schools and no art studios was available. Each of the children used whatever material was provided for the art test. Comparatively, the Montessori Method of teaching was better adopted than the Free Activity Method of teaching on the development of the creative artistic abilities of Children in the primary Schools. It was discovered that the performance of children from different transitional stages were not the same and the creative artistic abilities vary from the pre-schematic, schematics and gang stage among primary Schools. From the findings, it was discovered that all the developmental stages were related in terms of Creative Arts development using the Montessori Method of teaching among primary School pupils in Zaria.