Our child is happy in a Montessori environment and we are deciding whether to continue through the full early-years cycle. Parents who shifted later to CBSE/ICSE, was the classroom structure a big adjustment or did children adapt quickly?
Talk to parents with children already in the grade you are entering, not only parents from preschool. Homework and communication style can change a lot in primary classes. The commute piece changed our final shortlist more than expected. In our house, the practical routine mattered more than the ideal plan.
We asked what happens when a child is struggling, not just what happens to top performers. The answer told us more about the school culture than the brochure did. The commute piece changed our final shortlist more than expected. We only reached that conclusion after trying the other approach first.
Did your child take time to adjust, or was the improvement fairly quick? For us, the admission office answer and the parent answer were not always the same. We made the change gradually rather than all at once.
Ask specifically how often teachers change. We focused on infrastructure the first time and later realised teacher stability mattered much more to our child. Our child reacted better once we explained the change in advance instead of announcing it on the day. We found this out only after doing a second school visit. We only reached that conclusion after trying the other approach first.