We are introducing a unique curriculum by integrating different well known early childhood instructional approaches to enrich the social, physical, emotional and intellectual development of each child. It is based on five basic principles. These principles include respect for the child, the absorbent mind, sensitive periods, the prepared environment and self-education. It is from these basic principles that the individual curriculum and activities are constructed
Montessori Program:
Our program incorporates the century old, time tested and proven Montessori teaching philosophy which serves as a backbone of our program. Montessori philosophy emphasizes learning through all five senses, not just through listening, watching, or reading. Children learn at their own pace and according to their own choice of activities. In this way learning becomes an exciting process of discovery, leading to concentration, motivation, self-discipline, and a love of learning. We believe that learning comes from within the child and the role of the teacher is to direct the child’s activities towards that goal. By allowing the child to lead, one is able to tap into his potential for learning.
An important aspect of Montessori philosophy is the recognition of “sensitive periods??? during a child’s development (periods of a few weeks or even months during which a child’s mind is particularly open to learning specific skills or knowledge such as crawling, sitting, walking, talking, reading, counting, and various levels of social interaction.) There are “windows of opportunities??? in your child’s mental developments where his brain is particularly efficient at specific types of learning. There are critical periods where your child readily absorbs specific skills. This optimal window occurs when the connections of the brain develop at the most rapid rate. The next optimal window is when the wiring of the brain is strengthened. Rewiring is when the brain makes further adaptations to the existing wiring. Various skills are learned effortlessly and joyfully during that sensitive period. Learning one of these skills outside of its corresponding sensitive period is certainly possible, but can be difficult and frustrating. Our teachers are trained to recognize these sensitive periods and present appropriate materials to facilitate the learning process during this critical period. We introduce different languages to our children during this sensitive period.
Culinary Program:
Our unique culinary program provides a great opportunity for our children and promotes healthy eating habits and creativity while building and reinforcing basic life skills. This program also allows our children to explore and learn about all five senses (sight, hearing, touch, smell and taste.) Basic knowledge gained in relation to math and language is reinforced during these culinary activities. This program will help improve a child’s attention span and memory.
Brain Building Program:
There has been a major revolution in understanding a child’s brain during the past decade. Your child’s brain grows at an explosive rate during the first three years of life. At the age of three, your child’s brain is two and a half times more active than an adult. During these critical brain-growth periods, long, thin nerve pathways grow inside the brain. This wiring within the brain connects and carries electrical impulses from brain cell to brain cell. The resulting network, which grows daily in the brain, forms the neurological foundation of skills that your child uses for the rest of his life. Your child is biologically prepared to learn. Your child’s brain absorbs information like a super sponge. This is the time when the quality, quantity and consistency of stimulating experiences contribute the most in laying the foundation of future development. During this time the existing connections eagerly await new experiences that shape the neural network for language, reasoning, problem solving, and moral values. Developing the brain is all about wiring it in the most efficient way. New experiences build upon established patterns and create new patterns and network for more learning. Connections that are used repeatedly will become permanent. Those that are not used get discarded.
Our whole program is geared towards making the most use of this sensitive stage of learning by providing a rich stimulating environment full of brain-building activities.
Music Program:
We fully recognize the important role music plays in the child’s development and will be introducing age appropriated music programs to our children. An overwhelming number of research publications have highlighted the beneficial effects of child’s introduction to music in early childhood education. Exposure to music offers many benefits. Music promotes creativity, memory, logical thinking, understanding scientific concepts, math skills (proportional reasoning – ratios, fractions, proportions and thinking in space and time), spatial-temporal reasoning (once ability to see disassembled parts and ability to mentally put it together), language acquisition, listening and motor skills. Musical experiences integrate these different skills simultaneously, resulting in developing multiple brain neural connections. When a child learns to play a musical instrument, not only does he learn how to make music, but also enhances other capabilities of his brain as well.
Math Program:
Our math program is based on a very basic principal that is very elegantly stated by Einstein in a simple sentence – “If I can’t picture it, I can’t understand it???. True learning tends to come much more easily when children have hands on experiences with concrete educational materials that show what is taking place in a given mathematical process. Only after a child has a strong storehouse of direct experiences, which includes the ability to visualize, can he or she readily grasp more abstract mathematical concepts.
Latest research done in this field has revealed that babies as young as five months old exhibit a strong understanding of basic mathematical principles. Their comprehension continues to grow mainly through hand-on experiences. They learn math first through play, music, arts, dancing, eating and various other everyday activities. Later on they are introduced to Montessori’s famous hands-on learning math materials which make abstract concepts clear and concrete. Using this Montessori material’s a child can literally see and explore what is going on in math. They could see, touch and hold, units of 1, 10, 100, 1000 and so on, reinforcing the idea of – “if I could picture it, I will understand it???. Our approach offers a clear and logical strategy of helping students understand and develop a sound foundation of math and geometry.
Sensible use of Technology:
The latest technology has provided a lot of good learning tools to children which were not available to earlier generations. We should recognize that we are now living in a high-tech, sophisticated world. Sensible use of technology has various benefits. It actually teaches kids high-level of thinking skills that they will need in the future. They give a real workout to your brain. The powerful combination of concentration and rewarding surges of neurotransmitters like dopamine strengthen neural circuits that can build the brain. They help our children with their – eye-hand coordination, fine motor and spatial skills, problem solving and logic, planning and resource management, multitasking, quick thinking and making fast analysis and decisions, developing reading and math skills, memory and concentration, teamwork and cooperation – to name a few.
Identification, recognition and promotion of gifted child:
A very important aspect of our program is to identify and promote special talents of gifted children in collaboration with their parents. Some children exhibit extraordinary talents at an early age. Some even show their talent as early as the age of one. These unique intellectual skills when identified early and nurtured properly will enable the child to do astonishing feats and achievements. Without proper nurturing, that talent will regress. Brain development is a dynamic process. Your child’s intellectual skills progresses or regresses, it doesn’t stand still. If your child’s intellectual skills are ignores, they will stay undeveloped, and eventually disappear. Our teachers are trained to identify those children who exhibit these extraordinary talents, make the parents aware of those special talents and work together with the parents to nurture those talents.
