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Our Environment
Harewood Road Montessori has been architecturally designed to incorporate an indoor-outdoor flow that enables each child to explore the environment as a total sensorial experience.
Each area within the three learning centres are designed for all day sun and natural light.
The Nursery, Junior Room and Prep Room offer a range of spaces that enhance the child’s age/stage and developmental needs as prime focus both within the indoor and outdoor environments – which facilitate a variety of experiences for each and every child.
Wet play areas, gross and fine motor skill activities, quiet reading spaces, art/creativity areas, and individual and table spaces combine to make the total play area.
The Prep Room incorporates a discovery room/library/computer learning area and an Extended Day/Pre-Primary extension classroom.
Our Team
Our experienced kaiako are amazing people, with strong knowledge of the Montessori philosophy and child development to nurture tamariki. All of our teachers have an Early Childhood qualification or are working towards gaining one. Many of our teachers have a Montessori qualification and teaching experience from other countries around the world.
We have a multicultural team with teachers from China, Taiwan, Pakistan, South Africa, Netherlands, and Canada. We are also lucky to have three teachers who can speak Mandarin, our children thrive off the fantastic learning opportunities that come from this!
Each of our school’s three areas, Nursery, Junior Room and Prep Room has a Team Leader and supporting Teaching Team.
Food and Nutrition
We are extremely proud and excited to announce that we have received a Pā Harakeke Tohu Manawa Ora | Healthy Heart Award from the Heart Foundation for the amazing things we do here at Harewood Road Montessori to promote healthy food and physical activity. We are helping our tamariki to have healthy habits and healthy hearts for life.
Our inhouse cook provides freshly made meals for children each day using our Nourish menus and recipes, based on the New Zealand Heart Foundation Tohu Manawa Ora | Healthy Heart Award for Early Learning Centres. We believe that through nourishing food, children are fueled to thrive physically and mentally, whilst enjoying the benefits of coming together and connecting as a group at mealtimes.
Teachers also do regular baking with the children, which provides them opportunities to engage and learn a range of food preparations skills and fine motor movements such as pouring, sifting, spooning. It is a great hands on sensory experience for children to develop independence through self-help skills, practice simple maths as they measure and count quantities.
The Montessori Method
The Montessori method is a child focused educational approach that follows the natural development of the child. It takes the view that children are naturally eager to learn and capable of absorbing a tremendous amount of knowledge through experiences in their environment. Our Montessori preschool is a special environment for children. They are free to choose their own work, follow their own interests and move freely from one activity to another. There is a structure to the day but freedom within those boundaries. The role of the teacher in the classroom is to follow the child and carefully guide them based on what they observe, the classroom is always prepared by the teacher and ready for the children to begin their day. It is ordered, tidy and calm with many different areas for children to learn: by themselves, in pairs, in small or large groups, on the mat or at a table.
The Curriculum
Essential to the Montessori Method is the Montessori curriculum which is child centred and incorporates learning outcomes tailored to each child’s development needs and interests.
The Montessori curriculum covers five key learning areas; Practical Life, Sensorial, Language, Mathematics and Culture. We also teach children about Geography, History, Science, Art and Creativity, Social Skills, Music and Dance, interweaving Te Whariki New Zealand’s Early childhood curriculum as part of our programme. We aim to deliver a holistic educational programme that is unique and develops a happy well-rounded child who is well prepared for the next step in their learning journey.
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