Our Academics and Life Skills
Academics in the Montessori classroom are individualized for each child as they are led to explore their own interests while, at the same time, seeing that they meet the educational benchmarks for their plane of development. The diverse age group in the classroom is a benefit because the children learn from and encourage each other.
Reading
Writing
Arithmetic
Reading is paramount to education. It is the door that opens up all the knowledge and information that a child will encounter for life. It sparks imagination and takes them on journeys to far away places.
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We work with each child on their level to make sure that their reading fluency and comprehension are at grade level or above.
Science
Life is fascinating. Biology, Chemistry, and Physics are learned in an experiential way in our outdoor classroom. Observation, communication, classification, inferring, measuring and predicting are learned each day as the students choose a topic that interests them and they investigate with the leading of the directress in the learning environment.
It is important that children can express their thoughts clearly on paper. Communication in written form is almost a lost art in this "tweetable" society.
Our students learn how to communicate what they have learned in many different forms, but it begins in the writing phase.
Geography
Maps, physical geography and political geography are studied in the Montessori classroom. We study the land first and then learn about the people. The physical characteristics of the land affect the way its people live.
Montessori math is a hands-on, concrete to abstract style of learning. The students visually process the math using didactic materials until they grasp the concept and move to the abstraction.
History
Where we have been, affects where we will go. The students learn history from the dawn of man. We begin our study with time and seasons.
Practical Life skills and real life experiences are a large part of our program. Cooking, cleaning, serving, ironing, sewing, and problem solving help our students prepare for life outside the classroom.
Animal husbandry, gardening, hiking, outdoors and nature skills are important skills that our students learn to be independent and self-sufficient. The farm school model along with forest school elements teaches these skills on a micro level that is manageable for children.