Video Rewind! Parent Education Workshop – Journey through Primary: A deeper dive into the Montessori Curriculum

Our Primary Lead Teachers presented the first Parent Education Workshop of the year! Giving a detailed and entertaining overview of the areas of curriculum in the Montessori classroom along with the social/emotional development that children experience during this pivotal time, the teachers share many nuggets of wisdom:

Patrick Sutch on the Practical Life curriculum: “Practical life is a love of mine. I think of it as a foundation of it as a foundation of so many things the children are going to be exposed to in this classroom and in life beyond it. It’s really building so many skills that they will need to be able to succeed in tasks here and beyond.”

Katie Brown on the Sensorial curriculum: “On thing that’s really important to know about the Sensorial area is that Maria Montessori designed them with a concept call Isolation of Stimulus. So the Pink Tower for example, is pink, it’s one color…so that the idea is clear. This is all about the largest and the smallest.”

Jen Bonwell on the language curriculum: “The teacher gets down to eye level. The child gets to see your mouth move, the way you are making the sounds, the way your lips are moving. You are speaking clearly and slowly, you’re using intelligent vocabulary, you’re not using baby talk, and language is developing right then and there.”

Anne Ascherio on the Math curriculum: “We are able to absorb patterns within our environment around us and that is essentially what math is. It’s really just observing patterns that can be in nature, it can be in shapes, geometrical shapes…that kind of experience…helps to build what Maria Montessori called the Mathematical Mind.”

Amanda Cunningham on the Cultural curriculum: “Whether it be making food, reading books, working with materials or maintaining our school garden, each activity is an opportunity to learn about the world, themselves, and how they fit together. In other words, their place in human culture.”

Maggie McCaffrey on Social/Emotional Development: “In Maria Montessori’s infinite wisdom and deep respect for the child, she observed that children could exhibit the qualities of grace and courtesy. We can define that as grace being the outward expression of inner harmony and courtesy is the extension of that grace to your community and your environment.”

Please enjoy and be sure to rsvp to our next Parent Education Workshop, “Help me to do it myself!”: Unpacking Independence on Tuesday, November 28, 2023 at 6pm here at Greene Towne.