Excellent Montessori’s Toddler Program
At Excellent Montessori, the class size is small and inviting to make it feel like a home for the youngest children. It is a period of self-development, learning self-help skills, and preparation for the Primary program. Our program is designed to assist the child towards independence, social awareness, respect, and the development of motor skills and language.
The children have access to a variety of large muscle activities that offer them opportunities to jump, climb, balance, crawl, and skip. These exercises, as well as song, dance, and creative art activities, are offered to each child to choose. Creating freedom in a safe place is crucial to the toddler program. It is tempered, however, by two important limits that will be beneficial for a lifetime: respect for others and respect for the environment.
The curriculum for toddlers includes practical life, sensorial, language, math, cultural disciplines, plus the virtue program. In addition, we are joined by specialty teachers who lend their expertise in teaching the children music, Spanish, sign language, and gardening.
In practical life, attention is paid to developing large muscle groups, walking, and carrying exercises, dancing, etc. The small muscle groups are developed through hand-eye coordination exercises such as bead-stringing, pegs, gluing, puzzles, folding, pouring, spooning, and grasping. Care of self is emphasized with dressing frames, hand washing, combing the hair, and wiping the face. Grace and courtesy are foremost in the training, including setting the table, table manners, wiping, sweeping, and using kind words such as “please” and “thank you.”
In the sensorial area, we are concerned with a refinement of the senses: size, shape, color, texture, smell, and taste.
Building vocabulary with calendar activities, storybooks, music, fingerplays, and felt storyboard fun is a natural progression at this age level.
Math is presented with calendar and counting games and associating quantity to a symbol.
In the cultural area of the curriculum, great artists and composers are introduced with the exposure to their works. Even a brief introduction to the continents can be seen through the use of songs, games, pictures, and artwork.
Like our Primary classes, the children enjoy special lessons in Spanish, sign language, gardening, and music. Some of the extra-curricular activities are also made available for parents to choose to sign their children up for individually.