562-682-3492
THE PRESCHOOL METHOD
Our Pre School program is based on Piaget's Theory - Learning Through Play with an emphasis on allowing children to start at their own level of development and then progress at their own natural pace.
Each of the activities are designed to encourage the development of one or more specific skills and concepts. For example, Dramatic Play can teach Math skills when a child counts pennies in a "Play Store". The Language Arts are developed when a child asks for help to make a grocery list.
Early childhood classroom learning is integrated. For example, counting songs provide an opportunity to learn both Math and Music. Nature walks provide an opportunity to collect leaves, branches and other items that might be used in a collage. (Science and Art).
The Purpose of Art in the early childhood curriculum is to allow children to explore artistic media and expand the creative expression of each child. Art is a process not a product. A variety of materials appropriate for the child's developmental level brings out the creative abilities that all children possess.
Our Preschool curriculum is designed to enable the children from the ages of two through five learn and develop language and to begin to think symbolically and logically. These help the child to observe, investigate and engage with their physical and social environments in many ways.
The preschool aged child will develop their gross and fine motor skills, enabling the child to move confidently through space. As they begin to learn and manage their fine motor skills they can move on to more complex tasks such as toileting and getting dressed.
930 Elm Ave, Long Beach, CA 90813
Located at the former St. Mary's Child Care Center
License #'s: 198011974 - Preschool • 198011975 - Infant Care
THE MONTESSORI METHOD
The Montessori Method of teaching was developed by Dr. Maria Montessori, the first female medical doctor in Italy. Dr. Montessori's philosophy is based upon her careful observations of children and it was from these observations that Dr. Montessori concluded that the most important period of life is from birth to 6 years. She believed that every child carries unseen within himself the person that he will become.
OUR MISSION
We seek to provide a stimulating, age-appropriate academic program for infants and children up to 6 years of age in a warm, loving, caring and safe environment…
…an environment that instills in each child the confidence to believe in themselves.
A specially prepared environment was created to meet the needs of children which in turn would cultivate their natural desire to learn. This prepared environment already predisposes the child to develop according to his own speed , according to his own capacities in a non-competitive atmosphere in the first years of school. Dr. Maria Montessori always said, "never let a child risk failure, until he has a reasonable chance of success,..."; understanding the necessity for the acquisition of a basic skill before it's use in a competitive learning situation. The minds of children between the ages of 3-6 are like sponges. Dr. Maria Montessori called this period, the absorbent mind, where children don't question what they are learning, they just absorb it.
Dr. Montessori recognized that the only valid impulse to learning is the self-motivation of the child. Children move themselves toward learning. The teacher prepares the environment, functions as the reference person and offers the child stimulation's: but it is the child who learns, who is motivated-through the work itself-to persist in his chosen task. If the Montessori child is free to learn, it is because he has acquired from exposure to both physical & mental order, an "inner discipline". This is the core of Dr. Montessori's educational philosophy. Patterns of concentration, motivation and thoroughness established in early childhood, produces a confident and competent learner in later years.
