Elementary Class   (6 to 9 years)

Admission into the elementary program requires that children are 6 years old on or before September 1.

 In an exciting research style of learning, elementary children work in small groups on a variety of projects, which spark the imagination and engage the intellect.  Lessons given by trained Montessori teachers direct the children toward activities which help them to develop reasoning abilities and life skills.  The appetite of children, at this age, to understand the universe and their place in it, directs the elementary work toward all aspects of culture.

 Elementary studies include geography, biology, history, language, mathematics, science, music and art.  Exploration of each area is encouraged through trips outside the classroom to community resources, such as a library, planetarium, botanical garden, science center, factory or hospital.  This inclusive approach to education fosters a feeling of connectedness to all humanity, and encourages their natural desire to make contributions to the world.

 Goals For The Elementary Montessori Classroom

 ·        To strike the imagination of the child

·        To enable children to internalize concepts by the use of concrete materials

·        To give children the joy of discovering rules for themselves

·        To allow children to learn from the logic of the materials

·        To ensure success by progressing in small steps

·        To allow independent work by the use of self-correcting materials

·        To tap into the child’s own learning style through multisensory material

·        To give the child a sense of responsibility for his/her own education

·        To interrelate subject area

·        To teach tolerance and appreciation for our many differences

·        To teach through history the importance of each of our lives

·        To teach children the skills to solve social problems for a win/win solution

 Learning Expectation

Math

Master all operations abstractly and apply them throughout the curriculum.

Language

Identify, construct and analyze nine parts of speech and sentence elements.

Write creative stories. 

Cultural

 Able to select a topic, use various resources, analyze data, write a paragraph on that topic and present it.

Social/Emotional

Functioning member of a class meeting, able to identify problems, contribute solutions, and negotiate a resolution that is practical, respectful, reasonable, responsible and relevant.

 Reading

 On level or above, with comprehension and understanding of sequencing and predicting.

 Problem Solving 

1. Ignore it
2. Talk it over respectfully with the other person
3. Work together on a win/win solution
4. Write it in the concern book

 The Materials We Use 

·        Move from concrete to abstract

·        Move from simple to complex

·        Show the whole, the parts and the whole again

·        Strike the child’s imagination

·        Allow a return to material on a higher level

·        Allow a continually higher level of ordering and classifying

·        Are self-correcting

·        Are multisensory

·        Follow a logical progression in small steps

Our 2005 elementary class learns how to milk a cow named Lily.

“Our care of the child should be governed, not by the desire to ‘make him learn things’, but by the endeavor always to keep burning within him that light which is called intelligence.”

 The Work Record

 The work record, or what we call a “work plan”, is a tool that helps the children plan their day and manage their time.  Each child has a personal work plan.  It is designed to be simple and straightforward, so that the child can use it either as a guide to help decide what piece of work may be done next, or as a reference to see what work has been accomplished.

The work plan is utilized in different ways according to the individual needs of the child as well as the child’s grade level.  It is important to note that teachers and parents have definite expectations for each child, but it is impossible to set a uniform goal for the number of pieces of work a child should accomplish at a certain grade level.  The amount of work done in a day differs from child to child.  Once the child has made teachers and parents aware of certain capabilities, those capabilities are then used as a guideline for what our expectations of the child should be.  The work plan allows us, along with the children, to see what areas the child is focusing on the most, and what the child needs to do to create a balanced academic situation.

First Level

The first level child uses the work plan to record each piece of work as it is done.  At the beginning of the year, the teacher writes the names of the finished pieces of work in the work plan for the child.  As the year progresses, the child may choose to write down finished work without the teacher’s help.  A teacher checks all of the finished work.  By the end of the year, the first level child will be moving towards planning a day of work in advance.

 Second Level

The second level child uses the work plan in the morning to plan the entire day of work.  The child also writes each piece of work down as it is finished and brings the work plan along with any completed work to the teacher for checking.  The goal for the second level child is to try to fill as many boxes as is individually possible.  By the end of the year, the second level child will be moving towards planning an entire week of work in advance.

 Third Level

The third level child uses the work plan on Monday morning to plan the entire week of work.  The child also writes each piece of work down as it is finished and brings the work plan along with any completed work to the teacher for checking.  The goal for the third level child is to try to fill as many boxes as is individually possible.  However, most third level pieces of work are much longer than second level pieces, so the emphasis on filling in all of the boxes is not as strong.  By the end of the year, the third level child will often have a personalized system of using the work plan within the general framework already set up by the teachers.  The teacher’s role simply to initial the work has been completed.

 The important thing to keep in mind about the work plan is that the quality of a child’s work along with a child’s level of understanding of a piece of work is far more important than the quantity of work that a child does on any given day.

 Parents of our elementary students are issued an elementary parent handbook during the Annual Back to School Night.

MONTESSORI:  TWO PLANES OF DEVELOPMENT

FUNDAMENTAL DIFFERENCES BETWEEN MONTESSORI ELEMENTARY

AND TRADITIONAL ELEMENTARY EDUCATION