Young Children's Community

Many parents who come to our school have the same question: Why do you only have a five-day option for the youngest children? It’s a reasonable query. Your baby has just become a terrific toddler. He walks around the house, playing games and trying out new words. He finally stopped napping all day so now he can go to music class, the park, museums, and accompany you on your errands. He is good company, and you may enjoy teaching him new activities at home. All of this leads you to ask the common question: Why do you only have a five-day option for the youngest children?

We have several reasons for scheduling our school this way for all the children, from the oldest to the very youngest. First of all, Maria Montessori herself said, “Repetitions awaken [a child’s] interest. To create a cycle of relationship, it is advisable to take the child regularly [to the same environment]” (Montessori, 1961). To this end, we find that children thrive when they know what to expect each day. Coming to school five days a week allows children to fully engage with all that they find there because they trust their schedule and they know what to expect. The order that this predictable routine establishes is paramount. Montessori’s beliefs about order were firm: “The tiny child’s basic need for order takes priority over all other social claims that the world may make of him” (Montessori, 1967).

It is tempting to want to send a child to school three days a week, interspersed with days a home. But, children do not know how to make sense of this. They wake up each day wondering, “Will I go to school after breakfast?” And when we tell them, “You will go to school tomorrow,” they think, “What is tomorrow?!” A realistic concept of time does not even begin to develop until the child is six. A three-year-old at our school, two weeks before her fourth birthday, finally melted down to her mother: “You keep telling me my birthday is ‘soon’! I don’t know what ‘soon’ is!” Having school five days a week saves the child from the stress of not knowing what to expect from their days.

Secondly, there was a reason that Montessori developed the classroom environment for one-and-a-half to three-year-olds. She saw in the tiny child an irrepressible drive to work productively and have a purpose in a community. The Young Children’s Community in our school meets these needs for the full three hours the children are in the classroom. Everything in the environment is designed so that the children can participate fully and purposefully--the shelves are at their height, every chair and table is sized to them, the sink and toilet are both so low that they do not require stools, the pictures are hung in their line of vision, all the materials and tools they work with are appropriately sized, among many other considerations.

Furthermore, the activities that the children engage in are meaningful and perfectly appropriate to their development. There is an abundance of realistic and interesting language materials, there is appealing manipulative work to develop the use of their hands, and, perhaps most significantly, there is a large area of the classroom known as “Practical Life” where the children can choose among various activities that help them care for the classroom, themselves, and each other. Examples of this are: Hand-washing, window-washing, flower-arranging, banana-cutting, avocado-scooping, lemon-squeezing. At a later time in the day all the children gather to eat the food they have prepared together. It is beautiful to see tiny children sharing in a meal that they helped prepare for each other. This meaningful work gives them a sense of dignity and develops their confidence in their own abilities.

This drive to work and contribute to a community does not take days off during the week. Children have this need every day. By coming into the classroom five days a week, they are able to put their energies to productive use. It is satisfying for them, and it is important for their sense of self to do this kind of work each day during the week.

Thirdly, starting at eighteen-months, the child’s will is blossoming. He is growing away from his precious parents, and he is defining himself as a separate being from his primary caregiver. The Montessori training calls this time period, “The Crisis of Self-Affirmation.” The use of crisis in this instance is meant to refer to the great change that the child undergoes in this time. It begins at eighteen months old with the word, “No,” and ends at three years old with the word, “I.” During this period, the child is affirming himself as an individual. This is an intense time in a child’s life where he is seeking to be independent. Coming to the classroom five mornings a week allows him to assert himself as a unique human being. It gives him a consistent opportunity to grow into an independent three-year-old who knows who he is and what he can do.

Our Young Children’s Community, for eighteen-month-olds to three-year-olds, is a beautiful, peaceful, safe, homelike environment for your precious toddler. We treasure the time we get to spend with your children and believe that spending time with them five mornings a week is optimal for all elements of their development. We love each child who comes into the classroom and enjoy watching them grow from toddlers into capable, confident three-year-olds, dignified in their work and sure of their sense of self.