- These activities in daily living help
the children become independent in the environment, in
personal care and in social skills. Many of the
activities are familiar to the children at home and
therefore bridge the gap between home and school. They
develop an ability to concentrate, to become independent
and give a sense of enjoyment and achievement.
- These materials are concerned with the refinement and
development of the senses. Through exploration and
discovery with the sensorial materials the children
learn about the qualities of things in the world around
them such as colour, size, shape, texture, sound and
- Children are introduced to the numbers 1-10, the
decimal system, and the operations in mathematics.
Through use of concrete materials the children are
involved in activities that guide them in mathematical
concepts. Working with concrete materials the children
are led to abstract thinking.
- Language development is fostered through continuous
encouragement of self-expression and communication. The
emphasis initially is on vocabulary enrichment. The
phonetic alphabet sounds are learned individually by
sight and touch and are then combined to make words
leading to writing and total reading. Irish and other
languages are introduced because of the young child's
particular sensitivity to language.
- Children are introduced to activities and exploration
in areas that will enrich and enhance their learning experience including
arts, crafts, drama and music, history,
geography an science.
The children learn about other cultures, the natural
society we must turn our attention to childhood. Out of this truth
comes the importance of Nursery Schools, for it is the little ones who
are building our future, and they can work only on the materials we give
gives students a picture of the whole
curriculum, as a frame
of reference, before introducing individual subjects. For example,
students learn about the creation of the universe before going onto
study topics such as the solar system, the physical features of the
earth, weather patterns, the countries of the world and their
inhabitants, their customs, flags and so on.
Elementary subjects include:
- the world
of elementary mathematics opens with the story of why humans need
mathematics and how we learned to calculate. This leads on to the
reinforcement of skills gained in primary in addition, subtraction,
multiplication and division. Fractions and decimal fractions, laws
of arithmetic squaring, square root, multiples and factors,
divisibility, cubing, cube root, velocity, simple interest and
problem solving are all basic to the mathematics programme.
(English and Irish)
- this is studied in a wide variety of contexts such as novels,
stories, poetry, drama, letters, articles and debates. The programme
includes a comprehensive study of grammar and because of the unique
method Montessori uses to teach grammar, students are genuinely
- having been introduced to the origins of the earth,
students go on to study how the earth is made up and to
examine its elements - with a major study on the physical
features of the earth.
- Montessori curriculum
covers natural history and cultural history studying areas
such as prehistory, the concept of time and civilizations.
- this subject is divided into four main categories: Botany,
zoology, the human body and ecology.
- includes music history, literature, instruments and work with the
- this is studied through a variety of processes such as hand
development, beginning tools, advanced tools, painting techniques,
and design, history of art
and aesthetic awareness.
- the aim is to acquire both fine and gross motor skills. Games
selected in the sports programme are designed to develop locomotor
and non-locomotor skills, hand-eye and foot-eye skills.