How closely do you adhere to the true Montessori philosophy? Do
you consider your school a highly structured or a “relaxed”
Montessori environment?
We are neither "highly structured" nor "relaxed." In our opinion, a good Montessori environment prepares children to become successful, self-directed learners with respect for others. It also provides a rich foundation of sensorial knowledge from which the child may develop many interests. We endeavor to realize a perfect balance between structure and spontaneity in our program through careful observation of the children's needs. We believe in the ideals of Maria Montessori with respect to nurturing the spirit of the child. A child who works with true concentration often emerges from activity in a relaxed and pleasantly fulfilled frame of mind. This is our goal, and because it is often realized, our school community has a calm, centered and peaceful feeling most of the time. We are most delighted in the learning of children when they are secure enough in the structure that they can handle themselves responsibly with others. We like to see children conversing with and enjoying one another as they apply themselves to meaningful activity. Children often consolidate and enrich their learning through sharing it with others and collaborating on meaningful projects. Therefore we strive for a quietly busy and playful environment where each child is engaged and challenging him- or herself while developing socially as well. While we do not over-emphasize academics, we know that our children are generally exceptionally well prepared to enter any number of public or private schools when they have spent two or more years with us. Most of our directresses are trained in the American Montessori Society tradition, and our school’s director has trained AMS teachers through St. Mary’s College. AMS teachers tend to enrich the traditional Montessori curriculum with extensions into areas with contemporary relevance to children. Our school’s director emphasizes having the staff create their own learning activities for the children each year, having discovered that handmade works tend to inspire enthusiasm and interest among the children and staff as well. It is, simply speaking, much more fun to teach with something you have had a hand in creating!
What is your student/teacher ratio?
Our student/teacher ratio is 22:3. During the noontime period, (11:15 a.m. to 1:30 p.m.), we often have 5 or even 6 teachers performing various tasks since our afternoon staff and morning staff overlap. Unless she is functioning as a substitute teacher, our school director is not counted in our student/teacher ratio.
What is the educational background of your teachers?
The educational backgrounds of each of our teachers and of our director are described with their pictures under "School" on this website. Most of our staff have B.A. degrees, and many have Montessori training as well. Several have backgrounds in psychology. Our assistant teachers receive formal Montessori “assistant” training. All staff are expected to maintain up-to-date CPR and first aide training. Montessori training to direct a preschool class, held by at least one and often more than one teacher per class, is a lengthy course involving study of child development, each of the areas of the Montessori curriculum, Montessori philosophy, classroom management, positive discipline, and health and safety issues affecting young children in a school environment. Montessori training also involves a year-long supervised internship experience in a Montessori classroom.
How long do your teachers usually remain in your school?
Our director has been with our school(s) for 31 years. Our morning directress has been with our school for 21 years. Other teachers’ average lengths of stay range from 1 to 5 years. Because we hire well-educated women (and sometimes men) who have interesting life goals, they often view their time in our school as a transitional/learning experience before going on to graduate school, childrearing or other related careers. We are also an internship site for directresses/ors-in-training for local Montessori teacher training programs (in particular, St. Mary’s College in Moraga and The Montessori Teacher Education Center of the Bay Area in San Leandro). Unless we have a directress position become available in our school, our interns tend to move on to positions elsewhere. It is quite unusual for our school to experience mid-year staff changes, but nonetheless these do sometimes occur.
What criteria do you use when admitting children to your program?
We admit children between the ages of 2-years-9-months and 5-years without discriminating on the basis of race, religious preference, country of origin or sex. Because the prepared Montessori environment depends upon a mixed age grouping, we try to balance the classes as much as possible with children of either sex in each general age group over a 3-year span in each class, morning and afternoon. An incoming child needs to be ready to separate from his or her primary caregiver, completely potty trained or nearly so, and able to respond to verbal directions. Most important, however, is that the child show an affinity for the Montessori environment. The latter criteria appears over and over again to be the easiest one for most children to meet! The most common reason for a child not to be accepted into the school is timing. Our formal registration period begins in the late fall of each year and applications are handled on a first-come/first-served basis as much as possible.
How do you handle discipline?
We know that children who are properly engaged in constructing themselves rarely have serious discipline problems because they feel happy and fulfilled. Children are highly capable of developing "inner discipline" when an environment fully meets their needs for learning and self-development. If needed, however, we use a positive approach to discipline and offer redirection to children who are having difficulties. We teach socially appropriate behavior through modeling, exercises of grace and courtesy, and lots of talking about problem situations. We encourage children to resolve conflicts verbally and thoughtfully with one another in meaningful conversation. We endeavor to be clear and consistent about basic ground rules and the importance of respectful encounter with others. If a child is having significant and ongoing difficulty with our classroom structure or positive social development, we work with his or her parents to solve the problem as quickly as possible. Occasionally we enlist the support of outside professional help.
What kind of food is served at snack time?
We pride ourselves on serving healthy and, for the most part, non-trans-fat snacks. Usually snacks consist of crackers or homemade bread, cheese, nut-butter(s) (if no children have severe nut allergies), spreads of various kinds, popcorn, quesadillas, fruit, vegetables and juice or herbal tea. Children have both snacks and food preparation available each school session. One parent a week is expected to bring a shopping bag full of fresh fruit and vegetables. One day a week a family brings a special “culturally interesting” food from their “country of origin” or a favorite family recipe. These contributions from families keep our school eating experiences enlivened and varied by challenging our teachers to come up with novel cooking and eating experiences for the children. In addition to snack time, every school session the children have a “food preparation” exercise where they may make a simple treat to serve around the classroom to their friends, practicing various grace and courtesy exercises as they do so. At the end of the school day, childcare participants have a special protein-enriched snack to tide them over until dinnertime with their families.
Do you serve meals or do children bring lunches from home?
Morning and full-time children bring bag lunches from home. Refrigerated lunch boxes are recommended. We expect parents to send healthy food to school and to avoid rich desserts, since we will not legislate when children eat which foods. Candy and gum are not allowed. For reasons of safety, we do not microwave lunches. Warm foods are sent to school in thermoses.
How does your staff handle children’s food allergies?
Children’s food allergies are posted for reference by all staff. Foods to which any child is HIGHLY allergic are not served. Parents should, however, send special food for children with unusual eating needs. Children with life-threatening food allergies must have an antidote on site and the parents must give all staff written permission and instructions on how to administer it.
How much time do the children spend outside each day?
Morning children are outside from 8:30 to 8:50 or 9 a.m. and again from 11:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. and from 12:45 to 1 p.m. Afternoon children play outside from 1:30 to 2:00 p.m. and again at 4:15. Daycare children are usually outside until 5 or 5:15 p.m. We modify the schedule slightly if needed during inclement weather so that the children have opportunity daily for active outside play. Occasionally we take wonderful walking field trips to the nearby Montclair Park for a little extra outdoor time and a change in routine.
How much parent involvement occurs in your school?
Our school hosts a great deal of parent involvement. Parents are often our best substitutes when a teacher becomes ill. Parents also help out in numerous areas as part of their “school development” contract with our school. A “parent workday” is held twice a year for yard clean-up and various other projects on the premises such as roof clean-up, shelf painting, library organization, etc. These are enjoyable community-building events.
How do you communicate with parents about what their children are doing at school?
We believe it is essential to have close and ongoing communication with our parents about their child's development and any parental concerns or issues that are arising in school. We try to conduct these discussion at times when they do not interfere with our work with the children and in a way that is respectful of the children. Our staff give a minimum of two parent conferences to each family every year. One of these conferences is always preceded by a 45-minute classroom observation. In addition to informal daily communication, our directresses write newsletters every other week about classroom events and projects, called "Appleseeds." The school's director also puts out a monthly newsletter entitled, "The Apple Core," which reminds parents of administrative and calendar issues. She also communicates with parents through internet "ePeels" sent whenever there is a need. Parents are welcome to email our teachers and staff with questions about their child or the school at any time.
Do you have regular parent meetings?
We hold at least six all-school evening parent meetings each year. These meetings generally focus on some aspect of the Montessori philosophy and/or curriculum so that parents gain an understanding of how and what their children learn here. One of these meetings is a "Dad's Night" where fathers come to school with their children to experience preschool time together. In addition to these meetings, we are developing a Round Table Parenting Alliance series where parents can meet on a regular basis to share strategies for supporting their children's development in the home. This promises to be a very fruitful source of support for our families.
How do you handle the child’s first days at school and separation
from parent(s)?
We encourage parents to be as familiar and comfortable with the school as possible before enrolling their child. We carefully screen children for readiness. Then the child’s directress spends one-on-one time with the child before the first day of school in a get-acquainted interview. Either parent is also invited to remain with the child as long as necessary for him or her to feel comfortable in the new setting. We do not allow the children to experience separation trauma at school, but we are skilled at helping parents say good-bye to their children in ways that work. Parents or caregivers are generally summoned back if a child cries more than 10 minutes after departure or acts out in other ways to show his or her distress. We have found that careful bonding with teacher and peers as well as parental trust in our program and child readiness are the essential keys to a positive separation experience.
Do you teach environmental awareness to your children?
Our school is committed to becoming a "green" environment. We serve organic foods as much as possible, recycle, use earth-friendly products, email newsletters, grow some of our own food, and encourage environmental awareness in our students.
Do you teach foreign languages?
While we sometimes offer the children opportunities to learn songs in sign language or a given foreign language as we study different cultures and peoples of the world, we do not offer comprehensive study of a foreign language or a bilingual learning environment. However, we frequently have non-English speaking children join our school community and they tend to do very well here integrating a knowledge of English with their first language.
What is "kindergroup" and how does it differ from the preschool
program?
Kindergroup is a program for children in at least their second year of Montessori education who turn 4-and-a-half by September of any given school year. It is a special group lesson sandwiched between the morning and afternoon preschool program which is attended by the oldest children in each preschool class, from 4 to 10 children a year. A presentation from a different curriculum area is made each day: practical life or sensorial, math, language, art or cultural subjects. The children engage in "project" learning in which they create visual representations of things they are learning: booklets, models, drawings, graphs, stories, sculptures, etc. Their projects carry over and are completed during the preschool sessions where younger children become interested in what they are doing and seek to emulate them. Kindergroupers also have special responsibilities, "chores" so to speak, within the school at large, which they tend to perform with joy. The enhanced responsibilities for their own learning and for the environment combined with well-formulated learning and behavioral expectations stimulate the self-esteem and motivation for learning in this age group and accelerate their preparation for kindergarten or first grade. By being encouraged to teach what they are learning or have learned in the past to younger children and developing projects with their immediate peers, kindergroupers consolidate and make conscious through verbal output the wide ranging sensorial repertoire to which they have been exposed.
Do the children have music, art and dancing experiences on a regular basis?
Children enjoy activities in these three areas daily. Art activities are always available both inside and outside. We put on children’s art exhibits once or twice a year. Daily circle times always involve singing and/or dancing. We try to have on staff each year one teacher who specializes in art and another who specializes in science projects, so that new activities are always available to the children in these areas. All of our teachers sing and dance with the children.
How frequently do you change the activities available to children in your prepared environment?
Our environment is continually revised in accordance wih the learning needs of the children. New practical life and food preparation activities are introduced weekly as well as new science and art activities. Once a month the teachers have a "teacher workday" where they bring out new cultural subjects units to be explored with the children. Although the basic Montessori apparatus remains fairly constant, many extensions, puzzles and additional manipulatives are rotated through the school during a 3-year cycle so that a wide range of learning opportunities are available to the children over time. Continual revision helps us meet our goal of being just stimulating enough but not over-stimulating. A high priority in our ongoing design of the children's environment is that it not only be interesting. It must be beautiful and clean as well!
Are there children for whom Montessori is not a good fit?
Montessori education works for almost all children.We believe that it is important that children who enter a Montessori program have capabilities for creative play strongly established and other environments (home, playgroups) where this need can be met. We do not "teach" creative play, although our children do play "creatively" much of the time. Children who are very easily overstimulated sometimes have difficulty settling themselves, even in a small and nurturing environment such as ours, and may need even more structure than we can provide. We will let you know if we think our environment is a poor match for your child.
Do the children participate in gardening projects?
Our garden is a very important part of the school environment. The children plant and nurture seeds and harvest flowers and produce. They learn about the parts of plants and trees and participate actively in upkeep of our "garden" playground. Our "Peace Garden" is a special place where they can rake gravel into designs and sit quietly to contemplate nature.
What elementary schools do your graduates attend?
Our graduates have attended many of the local public as well as a wide range of private elementary schools. Among the schools in which our children have been successful are: Corpus Christi, St. Teresa’s, Piedmont and Montclair elementary schools, Redwood Heights elementary school, Glenview elementary school, Hillcrest elementary school, Aurora School, Park Day School, St. Paul’s Episcopal School, Black Pine Circle, Redwood Day School, Bentley School, Head Royce School, Berkwood Hedge School, The Academy, The Berkeley Montessori School, Saklan Valley School, Canyon School and the French American School.
What is the process for registering my child for your school?
The first step is to attend an Open House (see posted schedule) and/or to carefully read information available on this website. You are welcome to call the school office if you have any questions that are not answered here. If the school strongly interests you, please call the school office to arrange for an observation appointment. We will schedule you to visit the classroom without your child to observe it in action and to have a meeting with the school's director or her assistant to answer any further questions you may have. At this time (or earlier, should you wish) you may complete a registration form and submit it with the appropriate nonrefundable registration fee. After your registration has been received and when an opening becomes available, we will arrange to meet with you and your child to discuss enrollment issues. After your child is accepted for enrollment, you will owe a full school development fee to secure his or her place in an upcoming program.