Fall 2017 Newsletter- text version

Year 3!

Parents continue to recommend us to family & friends! This year we had many more applicants than we could take. We wish we had more space!

New Research Confirms Benefits of Montessori!

3-to-6-year-olds in public Montessori schools show increased:

-       academic achievement

-       social understanding

-       mastery orientation (perseverance at difficult tasks)

-       enjoyment of school

compared to peers at other public and private schools.  

Typically, low-income children have lower academic performance, and the “income achievement gap” increases over time. However, low-income Montessori students in this study kept pace with higher-income peers, overcoming this “income achievement gap” in their 3 years of Montessori education. (Read more about the new research on our blog, from this summary, or straight from the research publication)

We are encouraged by this affirmation that the Montessori education we provide children in Camden can have a lasting impact on their lives.

We can't do it alone!

Will you partner with us to help a low-income child receive this transformative education?

We need: 190 partners this year 

We have: 53 partners (thank you!)

Partnership is $240/yr (or $20/month)

We gratefully welcome donations of any amount!

To make your tax-deductible contribution:

By Check	Online
Send to: Sacred Heart School 1739 Ferry Ave.  Camden, New Jersey 08104 Please write “Montessori” in your check memo!	Donate by credit card or Paypal via Sacred Heart School’s website When you review your donation click "Add special instructions to the seller" and type “Montessori” in the memo box so that the Montessori program will receive your donation!

If you would like to receive the paper copy of our fall and spring newsletters, send your mailing address to cheryl@montessorisprouts.com

Fall 2017 Newsletter

Is the print too small?  Try the text version

Read more about the new research on our blog, from this summary, or straight from the research publication

If you would like to receive the paper copy of our fall and spring newsletters, send your mailing address to cheryl@montessorisprouts.com

To make your tax-deductible contribution:

By Check	Online
Send to: Sacred Heart School 1739 Ferry Ave.  Camden, New Jersey 08104 Please write “Montessori” in your check memo!	Donate by credit card or Paypal via Sacred Heart School’s website When you review your donation click "Add special instructions to the seller" and type “Montessori” in the memo box so that the Montessori program will receive your donation!

New Research on Montessori Impacts!

We are excited about a new research study published this fall that found Montessori education can have a significant impact on child outcomes - especially for children from low income backgrounds. They compared 3-6 year old children accepted by lottery into public Montessori schools with peers at other schools and found that Montessori students did better on:

- academic achievement

- social cognition

- mastery orientation (persevering at difficult tasks)


- enjoying scholastic activities

It is especially encouraging to us to know that low-income children  showed the greatest gains from a Montessori education. Lead researcher Angeline Lillard explains, “If you look at what happened with low-income control children in non-Montessori schools, relative to the other children, they start low and get lower, doing worse over time,” she said. “If you look at the low-income Montessori children, they are on the upswing, so that by the fourth evaluation, they are not significantly different from the control high-income sample or the Montessori high-income sample.”

The Montessori approach has promising potential to overcome the "income achievement gap" and help all students perform at higher levels academically - while also developing social skills and maintaining enjoyment of school.

We are encouraged by this affirmation that the Montessori education we provide children in Camden truly can have a lasting impact on their lives.

Want to know more? You can read a summary of the research or the full article, published in the journal Frontiers in Psychology.

Preparations for Year 3!

We spend most of August preparing for the coming school year:

We remove all the furniture from the room (most of it carefully stacked into our coatroom/closet!) so the floors can be refinished

Then all the shelves get a through scrubbing and touch-up paint, plus scrubbing the tables & chairs

And finally ready to start arranging the room

We do a home visit with each new student before the year begins, and then have the children and their parents come to the school for orientation a few days before school starts. Both of these events help make the transition to school smoother and less stressful for young children (and their parents!)

Each child gets to ring the bell, then we practice how we "freeze, look, and listen" whenever we hear the bell

We practice thoroughly washing our hands with soap - scrubbing fronts, backs, sides, and between fingers before we rinse

Outdoor Montessori Classroom

We had so much fun on our first day creating an outdoor classroom in the cool, shaded space next to our building!  A mix of familiar materials & furniture from the classroom and new activities just for outdoors kept everyone happily busy for the whole morning.

Woodworking

One of the highlights for many children was practicing some basic wood working skills - hammering and drilling.

Each child first receives a demonstration of hammering (or drilling) technique

Gardening

We repotted lettuce and bell pepper seedlings

Filling the pot with soil

Gently tucking in the seedling

Relocating the replanted seedlings and then watering them

observing and admiring

Food Preparation

This hardworking team made fruit salad as part of the morning snack for everyone (after first scrubbing the table to make sure it was clean for food prep!)

Children worked with a partner to wash hands before snack

Washing dishes after slicing a banana

Other Activities

balance beam and jumping spots

reading area

We also had a water table, cloth washing and a clothesline, and a variety of art activities. 

Looking forward to more beautiful spring days ahead so we can do it again!