Elementary

[Contact the Elementary campus at elementary@lyonsgate.ca | 905-544-3550]

The Lyonsgate Elementary programme offers a continuum built upon the Toddler Community and Casa experiences.

Elementary students are in search of answers, always wanting to know why? and how? with the answers invariably leading to more questions. They are natural investigators of the physical and social worlds around them, inspired to conduct research by their thirst for more knowledge.

The Elementary programme provides education for social development, emotional well-being, physical development, and high academic engagement. A multi-age classroom for students aged 6-12 allows for peer learning and mentorship along with personalized programming from the seven areas of the curriculum:

  • Language (English and French)
  • Math
  • Geometry
  • History
  • Geography
  • Biology
  • Arts (music, visual, dramatic, and physical)

The core subjects are presented using an interdisciplinary approach and hands-on materials that appeal to the child’s imagination. English and French-speaking guides offer a low student-to- teacher ratio, with the opportunity to work in both languages. Exploration of the local community and the utilization of its resources are also key components of the Elementary programme. Experiential education opportunities may include activities such as cooking classes, workshops with local artists and authors, and visits to the planetarium and heritage sites.

As learning is a social process, students are encouraged to collaborate in all areas of work as a means of higher engagement, and to develop self-regulation, leadership, and cooperative skills. In the elementary years, children establish their concepts of social justice and moral behavior. This is supported in the Montessori classroom by guiding students to identify issues, resolve conflicts, and find solutions for themselves. The Elementary programme also nurtures a sense of responsibility both in the classroom and broader community: students are accountable for participating in a variety of academic work, caring for their classroom and school environment, mentoring younger students, and respectful participation in neighbourhood outings.

As a Montessori school, Lyonsgate takes advantage of the benefits of multi-age groupings and adheres to the principle of development at an individual pace; as such, we discourage the classification of children into traditional grade levels. When such purposes necessitate, we say children are in their, for example, second year of Elementary, or that they are, for example, year-five Elementary students (ie. their fifth year in the Elementary programme).

The Elementary programme is made up of connective narratives that provide an inspiring overview as the organizing, integrating “Great Lessons” that span the history of the universe from the big bang theory to the origin of the solar system, earth, and life-forms, to the emergence of human cultures and the rise of civilization. Aided by impressionistic charts and timelines, the child’s study of detail in reference to the Great Lessons leads to awe and respect for the totality of knowledge.

Studies are integrated not only in terms of subject matter but in terms of moral learning as well, resulting in appreciation and respect for life, moral empathy, and a fundamental belief in progress, the contribution of the individual, the universality of the human condition, and the meaning of justice.

(Some content courtesy of the North American Montessori Teachers’ Association)

The Elementary environment reflects new stages of development and offers the following:

  • Integration of the arts, sciences, geography, history, and language that evokes the native imagination and abstraction of the elementary-aged child.
  • Presentation of the formal scientific language of zoology, botany, anthropology, geography, and geology, exposing the child to accurate, organized information and respecting the child’s intelligence and interests.
  • The use of timelines, pictures, charts, and other visual aids to provide a linguistic and visual overview of the first principles of each discipline.
  • Presentation of knowledge as part of a large-scale narrative that unfolds the origins of Earth, life, human communities, and modern history.
  • A mathematics curriculum presented with concrete materials that simultaneously reveal arithmetic, geometric, and algebraic correlations.
  • Emphasis on open-ended research and in-depth study using primary and secondary sources, as well as other materials.
  • Montessori-trained guides who are enlightened generalists able to integrate the teaching of all subjects, not as isolated disciplines, but as part of a whole intellectual tradition.
  • Community Outings to make use of community resources beyond the four walls of the classroom.