Orono Montessori School offers the young child a program with a wide variety of learning experiences utilizing the Montessori approach to education. The materials are specially designed to help little muscles develop coordination, helping the child gain independence and self-esteem. Special attention is given to the development of expressive and comprehensive language skills.

The focus of the infant environment is on fostering basic trust in the child and following the child’s natural growth pattern. The prepared environment is characterized by order, simplicity, and beauty which meet the needs of the child. The children learn concentration, order, sequence, and skills adapted to their culture with practical life. Activities are designed to promote the development of social skills, emotional growth, and physical coordination as well as cognitive preparation for future intellectual and academic endeavors.

This program serves infants in a small and intimate group by trained staff persons with a ratio of 1:4, and operates five days a week Monday through Friday from 7:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m.

Orono Montessori School offers preschoolers a warm environment conducive to learning and growing using the Montessori approach to education.  In our preschool, the children are free to explore their environment and develop physically, socially, and academically in activities and learning centers which allow for success. The primary goal of our program is to help each child reach his/her full potential in all areas of life.

Our classrooms are filled with a rich variety of specially designed materials for the children to use in reading, writing, mathematics, science, geography practical life, and sensorial development. 

The preschoolers are given many more choices than a traditional environment could provide, as we place a high value on children’s ability to make constructive choices, exercise self-control, and work independently of adults.

The program serves preschoolers with a ratio of 1:10, and operates five days a week Monday through Friday from 7:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m.

Orono Montessori kindergarten differs greatly from the kind of traditional kindergarten available in most public and private schools. A child who has been with the Montessori program as a four-year-old is ready for much more than is generally offered in a traditional kindergarten, particularly in the areas of math, reading, language, as well as in science, geography and other cultural areas. Parents who have sent their children to Montessori schools as three- and four-year-olds, and then transferred them to traditional kindergartens often report that the children have become bored and their progress, especially in math and reading, has dwindled or stopped. Our Montessori Kindergarten children also have the important advantage of remaining with children of mixed ages. Mixing ages provide the kindergartners with abundant opportunities to develop leadership skills and responsibility and give the children great social diversity. This is the “leadership year.”

The Orono Montessori School kindergarten program is part of our total Montessori program. Our classroom is a “living room” for the children, filled with a rich variety of specially-designed materials for use in every area: reading, writing, mathematics, science, geography, practical life, and sensorial development. One of the most important aspects of the program is teaching the child how to learn, which builds naturally on the foundation laid during the years before. The Montessori Kindergarten is part of the total Montessori program and it builds naturally on the foundation the child has laid during the years before. It is during this Kindergarten year that all of the children’s minds work of the hand and brain, working in unison and empowered by the sensitive periods and absorbent mind, come together in full integration of personality.

The program will serve kindergartners with a ratio of 1:10, and operates five days a week, Monday through Friday, from 7:00 A.M. to 6:00 P.M.