Toddler Community

Our Toddler Community is a gathering of children from 18-months to 3-years who have established independent walking and some speech. Maximum enrollment in this program is 12 children.

Within this small and nurturing environment, a specially trained Montessori teacher and an assistant gently guide and support the toddlers in their innate sense of independence, order and love of learning.

Toddlers are given the time and opportunity to engage in purposeful work to explore language, music, movement, art, practical life activities, and fine and gross motor activities that meet their individual developmental needs. They practice skills such as buttoning, tying and zipping, preparing meals, caring for themselves (including toileting) and their environment.

The toddler develops his attention span, coordination, and feelings of security and independence daily while participating in individual and group games, world music, story time, and arts and crafts. They spend time outside each day, weather permitting, and they have a snack. The toddler environment is prepared for the awesome work of creating the self – feeling one’s own edges and finding one’s own core.

Learners are moved to the 3 to 6 environment at their point of readiness, which could be at any point of the year. The move is determined by our observations of the child and is always done in conjunction with input from the parents. Learners will be given a period where they visit the next class once or twice a week for about a month before they move up. This helps the learner to adjust to the new environment at his / her own pace.

Our program for the toddler class offers an environment that contains the following:

• Safe, closely supervised, clean physical space that includes an abundance of developmental appropriate material for the children to manipulate
• Staff that offers each child a total feeling of love, security and acceptance through consistent daily nurturing and personal interactions.
• Staff that speaks with respect and clarity of vocabulary to all ages to further the development of each child’s use of language.
• Daily scheduled routine which allows each child to have maximum freedom of movement no manner what their level of physical development.
• Carefully organized opportunities which allow a toddler to learn discipline through consideration and respect towards others.
• Continuous opportunities for a toddler to solely observe, choose and interact with any material and/or activity during the day which satisfies the need for independence from the adult.