What Will My Child Learn?

The Montessori primary school curriculum sequence is carefully designed to build a foundation of skills that will help your child be successful in the upper grades. Every student’s educational journey is unique. If your child is enrolled full-time, they will have more learning opportunities to cover the full curriculum. If your child attends part-time, they will cover the curriculum sequence in the same order but will not move through it as quickly and may not cover the entire sequence before first grade.

Math

• During the first year of preschool at Nahunta Hall, your child will learn to count to 10. We teach our preschool students to count to 10 in American Sign Language. They will learn to recognize that quantities can be represented by numbers and they will begin to recognize and name the numerals 0-9. Primary students learn to compare groups of objects to identify which group has more and which group has less. They also begin to perform basic addition and subtraction using objects.

• During the second year of preschool at Nahunta Hall, your child will learn to represent numbers to 999 using groups of tens and ones. They will increase their fluency and understanding of addition and subtraction. Primary students begin working with integers and fractions. They will also begin telling time to the hour.

• In kindergarten, your child will learn addition of 3 digit numbers with regrouping. They will deepen their understanding of equivalent factions. They will also begin their study of multiplication.

Reading

• During their first year of preschool, students learn the mechanics of reading— holding a book, following the print on a page from left to right and understanding that the words on a page carry the meaning (and usually match the pictures). They play listening games and begin to sound out words aurally.

• In their second year of preschool, students learn the sounds made by all the letters in the alphabet. They spell short words and read simple books.

• Kindergarten students play rhyming games, learn about the sounds made by combinations of letters and read longer books. They begin to explain what they are reading and they compose their own stories.

Many parents want to know, “Will my child learn to read in preschool?” At Nahunta Hall, we honor every child’s individual needs and progress. That means that some children will learn to read earlier than other children. Our focus is on helping each child learn to read as soon as they are ready without pressuring them to perform to external expectations.

Handwriting

• Preschool students begin handwriting by practicing their fine motor skills and learning to hold a pencil correctly. They learn to finger spell the alphabet in American Sign Language.

• By the end of their second year of preschool, students will recognize and form the capital letters. They can write their first name and can write short words when given a model.

• In kindergarten, our students begin cursive practice of the lower case letters.