At Eden Prairie Montessori, 2018 was certainly a year full of excitement for all our infant-kindergarten programs! We asked our teachers to let us know some of the best points from the past year and we’ve complied them below. We’d love to hear anything that you’d love to share with us too!

Our Nido rooms, “Nido” meaning “nest” in Italian, at Eden Prairie are intentionally created environments for infants that promote contentment and well-rounded development. Here are some of the highlights from 2018!

Our babies have picked up “Please” and “Thank you” in sign language so well! It’s wonderful to see those manners start at such an early age!

While we never force affection, we for sure encourage it! Our little ones
have l earned how to blow kiss and give hugs . We even had a story of one of our little ones blowing kisses to other travelers while in Germany!

The Nido children are also showing compassion for each other – caring when another is sad, giving hugs, giving back a toy they may have taken.

We’ve also noticed them recognize and appreciate their own artwork! They can point out their own pictures and remember where it is!

Our toddler rooms are carefully prepared environments to foster independence, intellectual development and self actualization. For toddlers ages 16 to 36 months, subjects span multiple categories including: sensorial, practical life activities, Language, Pre-math (concrete and conceptual), Science, Geography and Social history, Art, Music, movement, and outdoor / nature time. Here are some highlights from this past year!

Our Toddler room is almost always bursting at the seams, so something is going right there! They talked about good manners all year, including the 3 magical phrases of “Please”, “Thank you”, and “Sorry” . We’ve
been hearing from parents that they are using these at home in their everyday lives!

All those Spanish lessons from Ms. Veronica have really paid off as they are blossoming in their second language. They know their
colors, their days of the week, and love to sing songs in Spanish!

The teachers loved the parent’s participation that we had this past year, including International Reading week , where we had parents come in and read stories in Japanese, French, German, and Spanish!

A “Casa” is a “house” in Italian- Maria Montessori’s native language. Preschool rooms in Montessories are often called Children Houses or Casas. A house or home feel is very much what we try to create with our mixed age classrooms. Here are the big highlights from Casa One!

2018 found 7 new readers in the class!

The adults introduced sewing to the class, and it has taken off ! The children loved to learn to sew a button and trace an outline!

The class did lots of group projects together as well! Highlights were hoping on the slime making train and making ooey-gooey slime! They loved the group cooking projects. Waffles, Apple Pie Bites, Cake Pops, Mac and Cheese, and Friendship cake was worked on and enjoyed by all!

And of course, the biggest highlight for the class was that their peace chain hit the floor!  This was a chain of paper that the children would add to every time they saw a friend preform an act of kindness! They celebrated with an ice cream sundae treat! The chain started over and already has got several links on it!

Ms. Tanna has very much enjoyed building her classroom and making it her own in her first year as the lead teacher! She also introduced sewing to the class and watched it take off. There was even one child who was
so involved in it, that he went from beginning sewing to threading a needle to sewing a button to sewing a line to making different stitches to sewing fabric together to creating a pillow that he took home!

The children grew different plants and watched the seeds sprout! With all the different pets in the classroom, the teachers were able to watch the children take responsibility for caring for the animals and see the children develop favorite pets to care for!

Grace and Courtesy demonstrations paid off in the seeing the children use
polite words and watching the children work together to problem solve!

1. Your child will gain confidence with custom, hands-on learning.

2. Your child can learn at their own pace, awakening their spirit, imagination, and passions.

3. Your child learns cooperation and community with multi-age classrooms.

4. Your child will develop a lifelong love of learning.

5. Your child will learn independence.

6. Your child will develop with the learning style that is best for them.

7. Your child will get a multicultural experience and learn from daily Spanish lessons and a multicultural environment.

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