Montessori Pre-School

Our Montessori program was opened in 1974 and provides a warm, caring environment for students ages three to five.  Classes are organized with no more than ten students for each teacher.  Our highly trained and carefully selected teachers are certified in the Montessori method, which teaches children to manage their own community, so they develop leadership skills and independence.  It emphasizes learning through hands-on experience, investigation, and research, resulting in self-discipline and an internal sense of purpose and motivation.  Students learn not to be afraid of making mistakes, and instead consider them a natural step in the learning process.  

Dr. Maria Montessori recognized the importance of the "sensitive periods" for early learning.  These are periods of intense fascination for learning a particular characteristic or skill, such as going up and down steps, putting things in order, counting or reading.  She recognized that it is easier for a child to learn a particular skill during the corresponding sensitive period than at any other time in her life.  Our Montessori classrooms are organized into several curriculum areas, allowing each student the freedom to select individual activities which correspond to his or her own periods of interest.  These learning areas include language arts, mathematics and geometry, everyday living skills, sensory awareness exercises and puzzles, geography, science, art, music, and movement.   

The Montessori classroom abounds with activities which are fun and interesting to children.  Activities are designed to develop eye-hand coordination, concentration, manual dexterity and self-reliance.  Pre-reading and writing skills and basic math concepts are introduced to students at a pace which is developmentally appropriate for each child.