Primary

List of 7 items.

• Practical Life

  The Practical Life lessons allow the child to learn to navigate the world through activities of daily living. This area is prepared with activities that provide the child with real-life opportunities and experiences to take care of himself, others, and the environment.
  
  Lessons include:
  

  Grace & Courtesy
  Examples include:
  

  • Greetings
  • Waiting for a Turn
  • Using Please and Thank you
  • How to Ask for Something
  • Table Manners

  Care of Self and Others
  Examples include:
  

  • Learning to fasten and unfasten snaps, buttons, buckles, zippers.
  • Food preparation - preparing, serving, baking and cooking, slicing with a knife, table setting.
  • Tying and lacing. 
  • Dressing/Undressing
  • Washing hands

  Care of Environment
  Examples include:
  

  • Gardening
  • Sweeping
  • Flower Arranging
  • Picking up Trash
  • Washing A Table
    

  Movement
  Examples include:
  

  • Carrying a chair, tray, table, large items
    
  • Catching a Ball
  • Vestibular Activities
  • Skipping
  • Walking on the Line

• Sensorial

  Sensorial materials serve as an aid to refining the senses. Montessori called these materials, “the keys to the world.” They each represent a universal truth about the physical world - the idea of sweetness, brightness, roughness - giving the child a greater connection and understanding of their world. 
  
  The materials in this area are particularly beautiful, inviting the children to look at them closely with their eyes, touch them with their fingers, wonder how they work, and discover what they can do with them. Materials respond to a child’s inclination to classify and the materials lead the child to finer distinctions, becoming very precise in orderly concepts. From these concrete materials, children are then aided in the process of abstracting.
  
  

  Working with the materials requires children to use language, math, and problem- solving skills. Each lesson provides the child with a new concept to master, which is then built upon with each lesson that follows. 
  
  

  Numerous beautiful materials such as the pink tower, binomial cube and color tables, and geometric solids guide children as they explore their:
  

  • Visual Sense:
    

  • • Discrimination of length, width, height, color,
    • Geometric figures and solids
    • Geometry and algebra concepts with triangles and cubes

  • Tactile Sense: Weight, temperature, textures with various tablets and fabrics.
  • Gustatory and Olfactory Senses: Matching activities through tasting and smelling jars.
  • Auditory Sense: Matching, grading, and developing pitch with the bells.
  • Stereognostic Sense: The work of identifying objects through touch alone using the geometric solids, and sorting activities.

• Language

  In the classroom, language is seen as the means of communication between two or more people. With that in mind, materials and lessons are prepared for speaking, writing, and reading. Teachers prepare classroom environments rich with a variety of materials and meaningful objects so there is plenty of opportunity for rich, meaningful language to occur. Spoken language is the foundation for writing and reading, for without it, children won’t have things to write about. Without understanding the thoughts of others, children won’t be able to comprehend what they are reading. 

• Math

  Montessori found a way to make math intelligible to the young child through concrete materials which appeal to the child’s desire to explore things sensorially. The materials are presented to the children for them to manipulate a mathematical concept. The earlier lessons that students have had with the Sensorial materials as well as language and practical life work have prepared them for work with the math materials.  Concrete materials are presented before students move to more abstract understandings. Lessons are presented in a specific sequence, building on one another and moving from simple to more complex presentations.
  
  Lessons Include:
  

  • Concepts of Numbers 1 - 10
    Examples of lessons/materials:
    
    • Number Rods
    • Sandpaper Numbers
    • Cards and Counters
      
      
  • The Decimal System
    Examples of lessons/materials:
    
    • Golden Bead
    • Addition, Subtraction, Multiplication and Division
    • Story Problems
      
      
  • Teens and Tens
    Examples of lessons/materials:
    
    • Boards with Beads
    • Linear Counting with Bead Chains
    • Skip Counting with Bead Chains
      
  • Memorization
    Examples of lessons/materials:
    • Addition Snake Game
    • Multiplication Bead Bars
    • Unit Division Board
      
      
  • Passage to Abstraction
    Examples of lessons/materials:
    
    • Small Bead Frame
    • Wooden Hierarchical Material
    • Short Division with Racks and Tubes

  • Additional Concepts
    • Fractions
    • Time
    • Money

• Cultural

  Children develop cultural understanding through exposure to music, art, literature, zoology, botany, American and global landmarks, cultural sharing, and sensorial experiences. These first-hand experiences are crucial in creating lasting impressions for the children about life around the world. Teachers endeavor to make connections between other cultures and that of the student, demonstrating through the beauty of differences and similarities the idea of the world as one group of people who are related and interdependent.
  
  The Primary classroom offers immense opportunities for students to learn about various science topics, learn about the Earth’s geography, and learn about the various world traditions celebrated in our diverse community.
  
  Lesson Examples:
  

  • Land and Water Forms
  • Map Making
  • Introduction to the Scientific Method
  • Astronomy
  • Animal Classification

• Art, Music, & Spanish

  Art materials are set up in the classroom similarly to the practical life activities. Students are able to explore through cutting, drawing with various mediums, painting, printing, pasting, sculpting and sewing. Lessons in various techniques as well as different artists are introduced through the three year cycle. 

  
  

  Music is part of the classroom everyday with songs as a group, and instrument exploration. In addition the primary students have a group music class once a week. Students engage with music through rhythm games, movement, singing, stories, keeping the beat, and listening to different pitches and tonalities.

  
  

  Spanish is a weekly lesson for the primary students where they learn songs and fingerplays and learn vocabulary words about their day including numbers, colors, clothes, weather and family.

• Field Trips & Community Service

  Students in Primary go on numerous field trips during their three years in each program level. Classes will venture out into our wider community to broaden classroom experiences. These may include trips to local nature centers, theaters, museums and a fun outing to a waterpark. In addition the primary students participate in community service projects such as baking snacks to bring to a local fire station.