About The NewGate School

NewGate is an international, coeducational, non-sectarian, college preparatory Montessori school. Montessori is inherently based on respect for the individual student, respect for all the people of the world, and respect for all forms of life. Before students can take advantage of a challenging education, they have to discover their own innate abilities. They need to develop a strong sense of independence, self-confidence, and self-discipline.

 

A Stimulating Environment for Learning

NewGate is designed to be a home away from home. Our Montessori classrooms tend to fascinate both children and their parents. They are bright, warm, and inviting, filled with plants, animals, art, music, and books. There are interest centers filled with intriguing learning materials, fascinating mathematical models, maps, charts, fossils, historical artifacts, computers, scientific apparatus, a small natural-science museum, and animals that the children are raising.

Montessori classrooms are carefully prepared environments for learning and discovery. A great deal of care and attention has been given to creating a learning environment that will reinforce the children’s independence and intellectual development.

You will not find rows of desks in a Montessori classroom, nor typically will there be a blackboard or smart-board where children are expected to focus their attention as a group. They are bright, airy rooms decorated with plants, art, and students' own creations. Everywhere you will find intriguing learning materials, fascinating mathematical and geometrical models, maps, charts, fossils, historical artifacts, computers, and scientific apparatus. The rooms are set up to facilitate student discussion and stimulate collaborative learning. The rooms are set up to facilitate student discussion and stimulate collaborative learning. One glance and it is clear that children feel comfortable and safe.

Our students will typically be found scattered around the classroom, working alone or with one or two others. They tend to become so involved in their work that visitors are immediately struck by the peaceful atmosphere.

It may take a moment to spot the teachers within our classrooms. They will be found working with one or two children at a time, advising, presenting a new lesson, or quietly observing the class at work.

At each age level, the physical classroom environment and the holistic program is designed around the changing developmental needs and personalities of the growing child

Our Elementary classes are learning laboratories. Students are guided through a rich and challenging curriculum, working both individually and in small groups.

Our Secondary  students are leaders and role models for our younger students. In addition to our research-oriented curriculum, their program challenges them to become active in projects throughout the school and the community at large. NewGate-Field School students, via the Internet, have access to the world!

 

 

 

Out of the Classroom, Into the Gardens, Forest, and Fields

Children love to be out-of-doors, to wander about, to climb trees, to pick flowers or berries, or to play with a dog. They enjoy working in the garden or feeding small farm animals. Years ago, this sort of contact with nature was taken for granted; today, however, when so many families live in apartment complexes or neighborhoods almost totally cut off from the world of nature, Montessori schools have the rare opportunity to provide a missing ingredient that is essential for the development of the child’s personality.

Montessori classes work on small gardens in which flowers and vegetables are grown.  Likewise, classes have classroom pets and sometimes even share some responsibility for the care of small farm animals.

Classes go out for meandering 'nature' walks on a regular basis in every season. Learning to dress appropriately and clean the mud off one's boots is an important element of practical life.

Students are encouraged to learn the names of all the local trees, flowers, birds, and animals that they see. They learn to recognize familiar trees by their leaves, bark, and seeds. By looking at animal tracks, they can determine which animals live in the area.

Back in the classroom, they pursue their investigations using a wide variety of charts and displays, 'research'materials, and reference books. Students collect specimens and bring them back to the classroom for identification, labeling, and display in the nature 'center' or 'museum.'  They collect leaves, which can be pressed or preserved as leaf skeletons. They learn the botanical names for the different leaf shapes.

Students study the local wild and domestic flowers, comparing different species and counting petals, and stamens. In the fall they look for fruits, nuts, and berries, noticing how they are distributed and what animals look to them as food. Caterpillars are brought back to the classroom and kept in terrariums so that the children can see the chrysalis that they form and the moth or butterfly that emerges. In the spring, they hatch frog eggs and watch them turn into tadpoles before releasing them in the pond. Incubators allow them to hatch baby chicks and witness one more miracle of life.

We emphasize the need to treat every living thing with care. Leaves and flowers are never aimlessly picked and thrown away. We gather them only for good purpose, and never over pick any one plant. Fresh wildflowers are either dried, pressed, or placed in a vase with water to preserve them as long as possible. We walk gently upon Earth, taking only what we need.

We consciously work to develop an attitude of stewardship of the Earth within our students: caring for wilderness and pockets of nature within the city or suburb to preserve them for the future. We want them to enjoy the forest and meadows, and leave nothing behind except a pleasant memory or two.  We teach our students not to litter, and, if they see it on the ground, to pick it up and carry it with them until they can throw it away. This is especially true of bottles, broken glass, cans, and plastic bags, which are not only unsightly but also could harm the animals. Typically, after Montessori students have passed, the land will be more free of trash and pollution than before we passed.

We teach our students that we must always have a '"reverence for life;" that we are all Erdkinder—a Dutch term which translated means "Children of the Earth."

We first teach our students to recognize and appreciate the plants and animals that live here in Florida.  Through books, films, and visits to the aquarium, we widen their horizons to look at how life has adapted to all the regions of our planet.

 

Multi-Age/Grade Level Classes

Montessori Classes are made up of a group of about 25 to 30 children covering a two or three-year age span.

Having children of more than one age and grade level together in a room has been a hallmark of the Montessori approach for more than 100 years.

The levels in an authentic Montessori school correspond to the developmental stages of childhood: Infant (birth through 18 months); Toddler (18 months to age 3); Early Childhood (age 3 to 6); Lower Elementary (age 6 to 8), which is sometimes combined with Upper Elementary (age 9 to 11); and the Upper School, which is divided into two Houses (Cycle 1 = age 12 to 15); and (Cycle 2 = age 15 to 18). At each level, the program and curriculum are logical and highly consistent extensions of what has come before.        

A normal Montessori class is made up of 25 to 35 children, evenly divided, boys and girls, among the three age levels. With the strong Montessori emphasis on international education, most Montessori schools both seek and attract a multi-ethnic and international student body. Montessori classes are taught by a certified Montessori educator teaching with one or more assistants or by two Montessori teachers.

By consciously bringing children together in a group large enough that it will allow for two-thirds of the children to return every year, the school environment promotes continuity and the development of a very different level of relationship between children and their peers, as well as between children and their teacher guides. Classes tend to be fairly stable communities, with only the oldest third moving on to the next level each year. 

Many pre-schools are proud of their very small group sizes, sometimes as low as five children to one adult, and parents often wonder why Montessori classes are so much larger.

Schools that place children together into small groups assume that the teacher is the source of instruction, a very limited resource. They reason that as the number of children decreases, the time that teachers have to spend with each child increases. Ideally, we would have a one-on-one tutorial situation.

However, the best teacher of a three-year-old is often another child who is just a little bit older and has mastered a skill. This process is good for both the tutor and the younger child. In this situation, the teacher is not the primary focus.

A larger group size puts the focus less on the adult and encourages children to learn from each other. By having enough children in each age group, all students will find others at their developmental level. At the same time, it makes Montessori schools economically more effective, and allows us to attract teachers with far greater training and experience.

Some parents worry that by having younger children in the same class as older ones, one group or the other will be short-changed. They fear that the younger children will absorb the teachers’ time and attention, or that the importance of covering the kindergarten curriculum for the five-year-olds will prevent them from giving the three and four-year-olds the emotional support and stimulation that they need. Experienced educators generally believe that these concerns are misguided and can't imagine teaching in any other way.

There are several distinct advantages to the Montessori classroom model.

• Anyone who spends time in a well run and established Montessori class will notice that the children are typically quite independent and self-disciplined. What makes this possible is the simple fact that each teacher guide's class of students doesn't turn over every school year. Children normally enter at age 3 and stay for a full three-year cycle, after which they move to the first year of the Montessori 6-9 year-old class. With two-thirds of the students returning each September, the classroom culture is surprisingly stable.

• Each child has her own learning style. Some need one-on-one attention, others are extraordinarily independent. Some children are visual learners and they learn best by seeing things; others are auditory learners and they learn best when someone explains things out loud. There are a wide range of learning styles which the Montessori lessons cover well.

•  The best teachers and very best schools are incredibly flexible. They treat each child as an individual, and customize each and every lesson to fit her needs, personality, and interests. Unfortunately, despite the best intentions, most schools find it almost impossible to put this into day-to-day practice.

•  Since Montessori allows children to progress through the curriculum at their own pace, there is no academic reason to group children according to one grade level.

• In a mixed age class, children can always find peers who are working at their current level. Working in one class for two or three years allows students to develop a strong sense of community with their classmates and teachers. The age range also allows the especially gifted child the stimulation of intellectual peers, without requiring that she skip a grade and feel emotionally out of place.

•  To accommodate the needs of individual learners, Montessori classrooms have to include curriculum to cover the entire span of interests and abilities up through the oldest and most accelerated students in the class. This creates a highly enriched learning environment.

• Montessori classes are organized to encompass a two or three-year age span, which allows younger students to experience the daily stimulation of older role models, who in turn blossom in the responsibilities of leadership. Students not only learn 'with' each other, but 'from' each other.

• In multi-level classrooms, younger children are constantly stimulated by the interesting work in which the older ones are engaged.

• At the same time, in multi-level classrooms older students serve as tutors and role models for the younger ones, which helps them in their own mastery (we learn things best of all when we teach them to someone else) and leaves them with a tremendous sense of pride.

• By working with children for three years, teacher guides get to know them extremely well.

• And, finally, there is a strong sense of continuity in the Montessori class because two-thirds of the children return each September for either their second or third year with the same teacher guide(s).  Most of the children know one another and understand the culture of the class. This makes it much easier to orient new children to the class.

The Montessori Materials: The Road from Concrete to Abstract Thinking

All children and most adults learn best through direct experience and the process of investigation and discovery. Most students do not retain or truly grasp much of what they 'learn' through memorization.

Asking a child to sit back and watch a teacher perform a process or experiment is like asking a one-year-old not to put everything into his mouth. Children need to manipulate and explore everything that catches their interest. Anyone who has lived with children knows that this is true just from daily experience. It’s ironic that most schools today still teach primarily through lecture, textbooks, and workbooks. Most students still spend their days sitting behind a desk praying for the recess bell to ring.

Dr. Montessori recognized that concrete learning apparatus makes learning much more rewarding. The Montessori learning materials are not the method itself; they are simply tools that we use to stimulate the child into logical thought and discovery. The Montessori materials are provocative and simple, each carefully designed to appeal to children at a given level of development. 

An important concept is that for each age level of the Montessori curriculum there is an extensive collection of carefully defined educational materials that are the equivalent of the chapters in a traditional textbook. Each piece of the material isolates and teaches one concept or skill at a time. In developing the materials, Dr. Montessori carefully analyzed the skills and concepts involved in each subject and noted the sequence in which children most easily master them. She then studied how children seemed to be able to most easily grasp abstract concepts, and designed each element to bring the abstract into a clear and concrete form.

The materials are displayed on low, open shelves that are easily accessible to even the youngest children. They are arranged to provide maximum eye-appeal without clutter. Each has a specific place on the shelves, arranged from the upper left-hand corner in sequence to the lower right, following their sequence in the curricula flowchart. The materials are arranged in sequence from the most simple to the most complex and from the most concrete to those that are most abstract. Because of the order with which they are arranged in the environment, children can find precisely what they need whenever they wish.

Each piece of the Montessori materials is designed to allow children to work independently with only the lightest level of introduction and on-going support from the teachers. This is made possible by a built in design element called the Control of Error. This feature makes it possible for Montessori students to determine for themselves if they have done each exercise correctly.

An especially important aspect of the materials is that they can be used repeatedly at different developmental levels. Each material has multiple levels of challenge. Lessons are brief introductions, after which the children repeat the exercise over many days, weeks or months until they attain mastery. Interest leads them to explore variations and extensions inherent within the design of the materials at many levels over the years. For example, the Trinomial Cube, which presents a complex and challenging three-dimensional puzzle to the 5 year old, is used to introduce the elementary child to the algebraic concept of the exponential powers of polynomials.