Montessori Center of Nyack

Our Classes

The Montessori Center of Nyack offers a wide array of classes, including a Summer Program

Art

Creative Art is introduced through a variety of media including easel painting, drawing, and collage. Special projects coincide with holidays or seasonal events.

Art history and appreciation are discussed as relevant to literature and cultural studies. Reproductions of art masterpieces are used as part of classroom décor. Sensory training in color and design is encouraged using Montessori materials.

Cultural Studies

The observation of different cultures form an important part of classroom activities. When children examine a new country or continent, they discuss representative music, national costume/dress, games, food, and art.

They are greeted and dismissed in the language of the country and learn to recognize major landmarks from the displays of books and photographs. Part of this study involves the celebration of holidays such as Thanksgiving, Hanukkah, Christmas, Duvali, Id, Chinese New Year, and St. Patrick’s Day, among other festive occasions.

All holidays are discussed in a cultural rather than religious context. Geographical studies employ special Montessori equipment including maps, and land/water formations.

Language

Recognizing that children of preprimary age are unusually sensitive to nuances of language, the Center focuses on presenting language in a rich and precise way. Teachers speak respectfully and correctly to children in a careful and loving manner, and children are encouraged to express themselves in this fashion both individually and to the group.

Specially designed Montessori language materials, such as sandpaper letters and the moveable alphabet, prepare your child for the eventuality of reading and writing. Stories, poems, and dramatic pieces are presented and enjoyed daily.

Vocabulary development with prepared materials and spontaneous games encourages language growth.

Science

A rotating science curriculum allows children to explore everything from the life cycle of animals, with classroom demonstrations such as the metamorphosis of butterflies, to the fundamentals of magnetism and the ecology of seashores.

Botanical studies involve the examination of plant parts, leaf shapes, and year-round planting and caring for indoor and outdoor flowers.

Our proximity to the Hudson River provides a wealth of opportunities for scientific explorations. Below is a short film of our field trip to the Kathryn Davis RiverWalk Center in Tarrytown, New York.

Music & Movement

Montessori students engage in a variety of creative movement and fitness training, using balance beam, parachute, tumble logs, bean bags, and hula hoops.

The goal of the program is to present dance as a joyous means of expression and help develop self-awareness, strength, stamina, flexibility, and balance while improving concentration, focus, and relaxation. Our classes also offer students the opportunity to explore music as a universal language as well as a means of artistic expression.

The curriculum centers on refinement of listening skills as well as the study of rhythms, tones, and families of instruments. Class participation is encouraged through the use of instruments and singing.

Math

Using a combined method of concrete mathematical manipulatives (amount) and abstract materials (symbols), Montessori mathematical equipment helps your child travel from basic exercises to the operations of addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division.

Children do not learn these concepts by rote, but through real comprehension—recognizing, for example, that multiplication is a series of additions.

Practical Life

Montessori Practical life exercises reflect many of the everyday tasks children see as part of the daily routine in their homes. Students learn to work on an activity from beginning to end, thus developing their powers of concentration and control.

Examples of the Montessori approach to practical life are:

Care and Respect of Self: Clothing management, which includes buttoning, buckling, zippering, shoe tying, and personal hygiene, such as, hand washing and good nutritional practices.
Care and Respect of the Environment: Pouring, sweeping, table setting, dishwashing.
Grace and Courtesy: Please, thank you, greeting of visitors.
Elementary movement: Carrying of chairs, trays, walking properly.

Sensoral

Maria Montessori agreed with Aristotle's philosophy that there is nothing in the intellect that does not first exist in the senses.

In addition, she felt that children experience special blocks of time from birth to the age of six when they are particularly attuned to absorbing academic concepts through their senses.

To make the most of these "sensitive periods," Dr. Montessori created special classroom equipment to develop and refine the five senses. Your child explores these materials and absorbs the educational purpose behind them, thus building a solid foundation for intellectual activity.

Spanish

The Spanish program at the Center reflects our belief that second language acquisition should begin at an early age. Research supports the positive link between second language proficiency and cognitive and academic ability.

The goal of the Spanish program is to have the children become aware of different languages and develop confidence in their ability to learn them.

Summer Program

Our Summer Program is a blend of Montessori learning and specially planned summer activities. In the mornings, we continue our educational studies so children retain the information they have studied over the course of the school year. After lunch, the children enjoy arts and crafts, sprinkler fun, and free play. We also have special instructors for music and movement and visitors, such as Outragehiss Pets. The summer days seem to fly by!

For more program information please enquire below.

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