SOCIAL & EXECUTIVE SKILLS
Montessori elementary purposefully builds in more responsibility for the child. Each week, our elementary students work with a teacher, one-on-one, to draft a weekly work plan that they can collaborate with others. They negotiate with friends on the work time they need to complete with a partner. They choose where in the room to work and over time, they learn that their choices have consequences. Work that doesn’t get done doesn’t just disappear. Instead, it is carried forward to the next week. If it’s still not completed, a teacher may direct a child to start it first thing in the morning or send it home.
Our Montessori elementary program recognizes that the elementary child is a social being! We don’t just allow children to collaborate on an occasional project, we build social interaction right into the core of our program! You’ll see small-group instruction, as well as all-class lessons, often seated in a circle on the floor, the teacher one of the group. At recess, you’ll see children interacting regularly across age cohorts, learning many valuable social skills in the process.
By combining autonomy with clear limits, our Montessori students acquire many important intra- and inter-personal skills that will serve them well throughout life:
Persistence to finish an activity, even if it is not pleasant.
Time management— to complete projects in accordance with a plan.
Sustained attention—an ability to focus on their work, even as others move about them.
Organizational skills, as they repeatedly collect the materials they need for their activities, and keep in-progress work together.
An active mindset and an ability to find resources to help when stuck—whether research materials, an older peer, or a teacher.