The Little Room
The pride and joy of The Children’s Academy is our very special 2 ½ to 3 ½ year old room. This is the beginning of wonder and experimentation, sharing and emotional development, and care of self and others.
The Little Room was established to serve the needs of children 2½ to 3½ years old. Concentrating on this sensitive period of life, our goal is to fulfill the physical and emotional needs of each child.
The Little Room develops both social and academic skills by teaching the whole child in an orderly and peaceful environment. Our Montessori classroom allows the child to explore the many activities that are introduced weekly.
Our program is a three step process. In order to learn, one must be able to FOCUS on the task at hand. By encouraging concentration and independence, this is achieved. The natural progression of this process is ORDER. As a child focuses he automatically puts order into his thought process. Therefore, the achievement of listening is simplified. Lastly, and again in a natural progression, the skills of LISTENING are achieved. If a child truly listens with concentration and understanding, he can rise to the highest level of academic and emotional achievement.
The optimum Montessori advantage can be fulfilled if your child begins in this room and continues through the entire program. This uniquely special educational foundation is a wonderful start for our newest students.
We leave you with this quote by Dr. Maria Montessori in her book The Absorbent Mind:
“And so we discover that education is not something which the teacher does, but that it is a natural process which develops spontaneously in the human being. It is not acquired by listening to work, but in virtue of experience in which the child acts on his environment. The teacher’s task is not to talk, but to prepare and arrange a series of motives for cultural activity in a special environment made for the child.”
Little Room Enrichment Lunch Program
The Little Room Lunch Program is an extension of the normal academic day. Students remain with their Little Room friends for lunch. This will be a supervised learning experience for our little ones. Opening lunch boxes, turning lids, using proper utensils and more will help foster confidence and independence. Good manners and proper behavior will also be an important part of our time. After lunch we will enjoy activities which might include classroom work, story time or art projects and opportunities for fitness with playground time or yoga. Dismissal of the Enrichment Program is 1PM. We know that many of our Little Room students would like to stay and enjoy lunch but we understand the 3PM dismissal may be too long of a day for some of our youngest friends.
The lunch program is limited in capacity so while drop-ins are welcome, pre-registration is recommended. This program is open to Little Room students only and does not replace lunch for children who stay for after school programs or Little Room all-day students. The cost is $20 per session or $90 per week.