SPECIALS
In addition to our strong Montessori core, Prime Foundation Montessori offers its students a variety of classes and resources in specific areas that augment their education here. We call these classes Specials.
Art
The Visual Arts play an important part in the curriculum at Prime Foundation Montessori. At the Elementary level, we offer weekly Studio Art and Art History classes. Prime also provides guidance and material information for Primary and Toddler levels.
Art History classes encourage students to look at and think about art from a variety of cultures, periods, and artistic movements. Classes discuss how and why a given work of art is made and look for elements that will influence their art-making. Students are encouraged to explore the artwork in-depth and share their opinions and feelings about the art.
Studio Art classes cover a variety of media, processes, and tools. Students learn the elements and principles of art as building blocks for the development of their skills. Projects are designed to encourage students to think like artists, make connections to their world, and develop their artistic voices.
french
Prime's French Program touches many children at the school, with Toddlers exposed through songs and play and instruction beginning at the Primary level.
The French curriculum is based on Montessori's educational philosophy as well as on the Montessori approach to the individual child, language development, group management, teaching and learning styles, and specific techniques such as the Three-Period lesson.
Prime's Primary students work on French once a week, in small groups - singing songs, playing games, dancing, counting, reading, and working on basic conversational forms like greetings and simple questions, all in French.
Elementary French meets four times a week and includes reading, writing sentences, translating French into English, learning increasingly complex songs and poems, simple role plays, and eventually learning irregular conjugations and doing research projects.
etiquette and decorum
Young children’s community
Toddlers are at their most impressionable stage during these early years. These are ideal introductory-level lessons for this age group to learn the foundations for proper etiquette, social skills, and table manners. These lessons are implemented to foster children’s growth using an engaging combination of instruction, music, and movement.
Sample topics include:
Greeting & friendship
Sharing & caring
Magic words & acts of kindness
The importance of “please” and “thank you”
How to politely interrupt
Elementary
This is a comprehensive curriculum for elementary children that focuses on modern-day manners and social graces that are based on self-awareness and respect for others. In addition to building confidence levels in social settings, this confidence-building lessons are a well-balanced blend of traditional etiquette standards and contemporary manners for the 21st Century. When tweens/teens understand how to handle themselves in a variety of situations, their confidence and self-esteem will soar!
Sample topics include:
Conversation staters
Sportsmanship
Manners at home and school
Presentation skills
Respecting other people’s cultures & beliefS
Peer pressure and sticky situations
primary
As parents, we see our children being bombarded daily with peer pressure and messages that do not always reflect the values that are important to us. These lessons with foundations of solid social skills activities to include exercises and hands-on instruction are implemented for primary children. It also introduces primary students to the essential communication and socialization skills necessary to progress into the young tween years!
Sample topics include:
The meaning & importance of manners
Magical words for getting along with others
Proper grooming and posture
Teasing and bullying avoidance
Etiquette in public settings.
Dining & table manners
health and safety
Prime’s Health and Safety program spirals from PreK to 6th grade providing the curriculum for students to acquire and build the knowledge and skills to manage their health to build healthy lives. Students will be taught how to avoid germs and how to stay clean and healthy. The health and safety curriculum also implements teachings to promote body awareness, healthy habits and overall well-being.
This program is designed to teach students safety skills in various situations as well. Students will learn about fire safety, water safety, environmental safety, travel safety, online safety and emotional safety.
Sample topic includes:
Safety Signs
Personal Hygiene
Proper Oral Hygiene
Consequences of Secondhand Smoke
Candy or Medicine?
Staying Safe from Strangers
Responding Appropriately to Emergency Situations
food AND NUTRITION
One cannot exist without a relationship to food. However, food topics are often excluded from or considered ancillary to students’ educational development. By weaving Food and Nutrition into every day classroom learning, we can simultaneously support parents and bring vitally important information to students across a variety of ages and academic levels.
Food and Nutrition is a comprehensive educational approach that brings the power of food into the classroom. Food is personal, cultural, political, and nutritional to both the mind and the body. Therefore, we believe in a non-prescriptive Food and Nutrition model that does not dictate which food choices are “best.” This is key to our equity-based, student-led approach. Prime’s food education views the social, cultural, nutritional, and environmental aspects of food as equally important components of the human experience.
Prime believes that Food and Nutrition for PreK to 6th-grade students is vitally important to creating a better food systems future. Our comprehensive model incorporates learning about food, sources of food, nutrition, nutrients, food groups, and the role that food plays in one’s life, environment, culture and society. Elementary Students will also learn how to read Nutrition Facts labels, the difference between portion size and serving size, calories, and others. Through this framework, Prime inspires students to become active and informed members of the food system.
Sample topic includes:
Food Production
Micronutrients and Macronutrients
Benefits of Nuts and Seeds
Junk Foods Facts
Get to Know Nutrition Facts Labels
Healthy Snack Strategies
library media center
The Library Media Center has several moving parts and serves several purposes here at Prime.
The Library Media Center has a great nonfiction collection that supports the research that Primary and Elementary students do throughout the year, individually and in groups of two or more (student research is prominent in Montessori starting at a young age).
We also have a wonderful nonfiction collection of big books that support our toddlers, who can’t yet read but can learn visually through pictures!
The library Media Center has a fiction collection from which Elementary and Primary students can check out books.
Full-Day Young Children’s Community and Primary students are read to weekly, helping to instill in them, a love of reading! There are also non-fiction books in the library media center for toddlers.
Children are free during school days to browse the book display, other themed displays of books, and the collection!
There are chairs, tables, a couch, and a rug where they can comfortably read for a while if they would like.
oUTDOOR LEARNING
Dr, Maria Montessori believed strongly in letting children experience nature and the great outdoors as an extension of their classrooms. At our school, children have the opportunity to move freely between the indoor and outdoor classroom environments, with ample time to work and learn in nature. On our premises, we have the luxury of many different types of outdoor learning and play environments, from our outdoor classroom to our playground/play area, to tending to garden beds as available, and creating products for their student-run business once a year. Students also have access to the extended environment around us through “Going Out" and field trips to various parks and more.
“The land is where our roots are. The children must be taught to feel and live in harmony with the Earth.” - Dr. Maria Montessori.See below children enjoying our outdoor classroom on our Pyjama Day and others!
young children’s community
Starting at the Toddler level, the outdoor environment is close by to the classroom. With the oversight/guidance of a classroom Guide or Assistant, children can move freely between the outdoor environment and the indoor classroom. Outdoor exploration is an important part of the sensorial curriculum at this age.
Students are able to:
Explore planting seeds after tasting new fruits and vegetables
Grow vegetables and flowers in classroom garden beds as available
Harvest what they have planted to use in recipes in the classroom as available
Play in our playground.
Gain an appreciation for and connection to nature.
Experience changing weather patterns
Observe the clouds, wind, rain, and snow
Students also have opportunities for gross motor development in meaningful ways such as:
Carrying heavy objects.
Using a wheelbarrow.
Balancing, running, jumping.
PRimary
During the work cycle, children are free to move about between the outdoor classroom environment and the indoor classroom with the guidance of the assistant.
Students are able to:
Practice gross motor skills such as digging, carrying wooden blocks, using a wheelbarrow,
balancing, running, jumping, throwing, and catching a ball
Care for flowers, vegetables, and fruits in classroom garden beds as available and in the classroom.
Plant seeds after tasting new fruits and vegetables.
Harvest and prepare their own food as available.
Play area for playing, exploring, and learning.
Guided nature walks through the premises and neighborhood
Sensorial experiences incorporated into the science curriculum.
Appreciation and connection to nature
Large muscle/motor movement.
Outdoor Trips - Primary
There are also field trips throughout the year for the third year Primary students such as: visiting Gardens and Parks.
ELEMENTARY
In Elementary, children have opportunities throughout the day to move about the premises.
Students are able to:
Plant and tend garden beds as available
Harvest food they have planted as available
Monitor weather stations
Observe plants and animals
Collect specimens to study
Identify plants, animals, and fungi
Experiment with rocks and minerals
Build river models to demonstrate erosion
Extend geography lessons to the outdoors
Plan, build, and maintain structures
Care for animals as available
Outdoor Trips - Elementary
Each fall, the Lower Elementary classes embark on a day-long hike at a nearby park. While there, the children engage in stewardship activities (e.g. pulling invasive weeds). In the spring, they visit a different park for a day-long exploration of flora and fauna.