{"id":467,"date":"2016-02-03T22:10:42","date_gmt":"2016-02-03T22:10:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/?p=467"},"modified":"2017-05-23T19:31:01","modified_gmt":"2017-05-23T19:31:01","slug":"discovering-and-challenging-the-giftedness-in-your-vpk-child","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/2016\/02\/03\/discovering-and-challenging-the-giftedness-in-your-vpk-child\/","title":{"rendered":"Discovering and Challenging the Giftedness in Your VPK Child"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Cynthia Thomas<\/em>
\nEvery parent delights in the achievements of their child. They know that selecting a great Voluntary Prekindergarten (VPK) Education Program is the beginning of their child\u2019s success in school. Yet, the task of finding a program that allows a child to soar while still encompassing the joys of childhood \u2013 such as daily music, art and outdoor fun \u2013 is not an easy one.<\/p>\n

A Montessori school is one answer to this parental quest, seeking to find the giftedness in each student through a curriculum that will challenge them. One child may be learning to count to ten while another has taken out the golden chain and is skip counting by tens to 1000. Montessori lessons are focused on the individual needs of each student.<\/p>\n

Maria Montessori, M.D., founder of the Montessori method of education, saw children as having the innate ability to absorb the immense knowledge found in their environment. She developed a scientifically proven method preparing specially designed materials that encourage the young child to touch and experience, thus grasping knowledge within the material. The method of sequential material which builds one concept onto the next creates a strong academic foundation.<\/p>\n

The concept of mixed age groups, mirroring society, allows the academically accelerated child to stay socially connected with peers while advancing academically. Academically accelerated children are a great Wt for Montessori. What other pre-school program allows children the opportunity to expand beyond basic VPK standards to curriculum that is found in kindergarten and 1st grade? These learning opportunities found in a Montessori classroom are presented in a developmentally appropriate way, suitable for a 4-year-old child.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
MONTESSORI<\/strong><\/td>\nTRADITIONAL<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Reading<\/strong>
\nKnows the sounds of the alphabet letters
\nBlends sounds into three letter words
\nReads three letter word books
\nWrites a sentence with the movable alphabet<\/td>\n		Recognizes lower and upper case
\nRecognizes some letter sounds
\nWrites his name<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Math<\/strong>
\nFoundation for working with decimal system
\nAdds and subtracts (units, tens, hundreds, thousands)
\nCounts by 1\u2019s to 100, multiplies and divides with use of
\nhands-on Montessori materials<\/td>\n		Matches object to numeral 10
\nAdds and subtracts (units, tens, hundreds, thousands)
\nCounts by 1\u2019s to 30 with help<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Geometry<\/strong>
\nIdentifies different kinds of triangles (isosceles, acute, scalene, etc.)
\nIdentifies polygons
\nIdentifies curvilinear shapes<\/td>\n		Identifies circle, triangle and square
\nSorts additional shapes<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Geography<\/strong>
\nIdentifies land and water on globe
\nIdentifies continents
\nIdentifies most states using maps
\nIdentifies countries on different continents
\nWorks with flags of the world
\nLearns parts of a flag
\nIdentifies land forms<\/td>\n		Identifies the globe as a model
\nLearns name of city where she lives
\nRecognizes American flag<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Cynthia Thomas Every parent delights in the achievements of their child. They know that selecting a great Voluntary Prekindergarten (VPK) Education Program is the beginning of their child\u2019s success in school. Yet, the task of finding a program that allows a child to soar while still encompassing the joys of childhood \u2013 such as […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":468,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_cbd_carousel_blocks":"[]","footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[40,44,43,42,41,39],"class_list":["post-467","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-education","tag-child","tag-devlopment","tag-early","tag-education","tag-learning","tag-vpk"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/467","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=467"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/467\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":585,"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/467\/revisions\/585"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/468"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=467"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=467"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=467"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}