Montessori Primary Program
(3 - 6 Years)

Practical Life

Skills of Daily Living Practical Life in the Montessori Casa Program teaches skills for everyday living. This area provides a link between home and school. Children are encouraged to master care of person and environment.

Child-sized tools in the classroom let students accomplish similar activities to those at home. Completing meaningful tasks helps children learn good work habits. They finish each task and put away their materials before beginning another activity. They also learn manners through lessons of grace and courtesy.

Practical Life activities serve multiple purposes including fostering independence, learning about self-care, lengthening of the concentration span, gaining conscious control of movement, establishing a sense of order, encouraging attention to detail and task completion. Children develop problem solving skills, coordinate and refine their movements, concentrate on increasingly complex tasks, build a positive self-image and take on new challenges.

Language

This area includes oral language development, written expression, grammar and reading. Students are introduced to the language area with the letters of the alphabet made from sandpaper. They learn the phoenetic sounds by touching the letters and repeating the sound of each one, and then learn the alphabetical names in sequence. Through exercises, games and activities, students progress to learning to read three letter phonetic words, then four or more letter phonetic words and later non- phonetic words. Dr. Montessori considered reading one of the most important keys to future learning. Subsequent research indicates that phonetics is the best way to teach reading, and that it is best taught before Grade 2. While many students leave the public school system without having learned to read well, many graduates of a Montessori preschool enter public school Kindergarten reading at an advanced level.

Sensorial

Children entering the program already have sensorial experiences from the environment. Sensorial exercises help them to organize their chaotic impressions by devel oping an awareness, understanding and refinement of their five senses. The material is designed to give knowledge systematically along with the vocabulary to go with each sensation. When they apply their intelligence to the impressions given by their senses, the students learn to observe, co-ordinate, control, distinguish, categorize, and relate new information to what they already know. These materials create a foundation which makes all future learning easier.

Cultural Studies

Children gain an awareness of the world around them by exploring other countries, their customs, food, music, language and animals.

The Montessori classroom includes children of different ages. By placing a child in such a classroom, they are exposed to a wide range of possibilities. When they first begin school they will have the benefit of learning from older and more experienced children. Later on, they will be able to help others with the learning skills they have already mastered. Your child will thus develop social skills and cultural sensitivity which are essential in today's world.

Mathematics

These activities have to do with counting and number relationships, including an overview of the function of the decimal system. Careful design of materials in the mathematics area and in the sensorial area lays the groundwork for future learning in algebra and geometry.