Preschool / Junior / Senior Kindergarten
Practical Life. The exercises of practical life instill independence and confidence through learning to take care of oneself, others and the surrounding environment. Through doing up zippers, sewing and preparing a snack, along with other activities, children naturally develop and fine tune muscular coordination and motor skills. Through their work, the children build their sense of order, understanding of the work cycle and ability to concentrate, all of which are important skills needed for academic work. Sensorial. The sensorial materials are the tools Dr. Montessori devised for development and refinement of the senses. The children develop cognitively and through exploration learn to order and classify concepts. The classification, contrast and comparison of colour, shape, smell, feel, temperature, weight and texture are all explored. This work indirectly prepares the students for later work in Mathematics, Algebra and Geometry. Language. Our students are presented with a wealth of opportunity to enrich their language through exploration while being encouraged to express themselves intelligently, with precision. Through work with Montessori language materials, children will learn at their own pace to write and as a result, to read. Mathematics Through work with tangible Montessori materials children develop an understanding of mathematical concepts. We introduce the children to numeric symbols, their quantities and the decimal system. We present the operations of addition, multiplication, subtraction and division, as well as place value. The concepts of fractions and measurements are also explored. Ultimately children aspire to abstractly understand these operations. Culture. The children study plants, animals and their parts, the life cycles of living creatures, metamorphosis and the physical sciences. Seasons and temperature are also explored. Specific biology activities include the study and classification of living things, including plants, animals, and more specifically: vertebrates and invertebrates. Geography, history, calendar, time, holidays, maps and various cultural traditions make up aspects of the culture curriculum. Art. Children are introduced to an assortment of art mediums. This introduction includes studying pictures by famous artists and visits to local galleries. In the classroom, the children will learn the specific skills of drawing, painting, cutting and pasting. Music During Circle Time, the children sing songs, repeat rhymes and act out finger plays. Exercises with the Sound Bells introduce the children to scales and help them perceive high and low notes and match sounds. Our listening centre enables the children to gain exposure to different types of music. Physical Education / Community Work The human personality is essentially one during the successive stages of its development. Yet, whatever human being we consider, and at whatever age, whether children in the primary school, adolescents, youths or adults, all start by being children, all then grow from childhood to manhood or womanhood without changing the unity of their persons. If the human personality is one at all stages of its development, we must conceive of a principle of education which has regard to all stages. The Montessori preschool classroom is a "living room" for children. Children choose their work from among the self-correcting materials displayed on open shelves, and they work in specific work areas. Over a period of time, the children develop into a "normalized community," working with high concentration and few interruptions. Normalization is the process whereby a child moves from being undisciplined to self-disciplined, from disordered to ordered, from distracted to focused, through work in the environment. The process occurs through repeated work with materials that captivate the child's attention. For some children this inner change may take place quite suddenly, leading to deep concentration. In the Montessori preschool, academic competency is a means to an end, and the manipulatives are viewed as "materials for development." Practical life enhances the development of task organization and cognitive order through care of self, care of the environment, exercises of grace and courtesy, and coordination of physical movement. The sensorial area enables the child to order, classify, and describe sensory impressions in relation to length, width, temperature, mass, color, pitch, etc. Mathematics makes use of manipulative materials to enable the child to internalize concepts of number, symbol, sequence, operations, and memorization of basic facts. Language arts includes oral language development, written expression, reading, and the study of grammar, creative dramatics, and children's literature. Basic skills in writing and reading are developed through the use of sandpaper letters, alphabet cut-outs, and various presentations allowing children to link sounds and letter symbols effortlessly and to express their thoughts through writing. Cultural activities expose the child to basics in geography, history, and life sciences. Music, art, and movement education are part of the integrated cultural curriculum. The preschool environment unifies the psycho-social, physical, and academic functioning of the child. Its important task is to provide students with an early and general foundation that includes a positive attitude toward school, inner security and a sense of order, pride in the physical environment, abiding curiosity, a habit of concentration, habits of initiative and persistence, the ability to make decisions, self-discipline, and a sense of responsibility to other members of the class, school, and community. This foundation will enable them to acquire more specialized knowledge and skills throughout their school career. |
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