Authentic Montessori
A True Montessori Experience
DMS is an AMI certified school dedicated to providing children 6 weeks to 6+ years old with an environment in which they can develop their human potential to the highest degree. With love and respect, we assist children in growing into happy and well-balanced adults. Decatur Montessori School emphasizes mental as well as academic development of children by following the original principles of Maria Montessori, the founder of the Montessori philosophy of education.
DMS offers personalized Montessori education aimed at fostering independence combined with a sense of community and global awareness.
When a young child enters DMS, he is greeted at the door with a warm handshake and welcoming smile from the teacher. This is considered one of the most significant acts of the day. We make eye contact, call children by name, notice expressions, listen to news from home and ensure that every child begins the day with the feeling that he is an important member of the community. When our teachers ask a simple question to children “how can you help your community or environment today” or “do you notice anyone who needs your help this morning”, a child may discover a plant that needs watering, a shelf that needs dusting, a friend who needs help with shoe lace or zipper or button, a pet who needs feeding, etc. It is all about instilling sense of ‘giving’ that makes a child a self-aware, conscientious person who cares about the community.
We instill among our children self realization, self expression, self construction of personality, and respect for life. Maria Montessori proclaimed: Never give more to the mind than you give to the hand- so that children remain in touch with the ‘real world’.
The cornerstone of the DMS philosophy is ‘observation’ and ‘basic trust’ in the child to reveal himself to us in all his manifestations. The most important period of life is not the age of university studies but the first one, the period from birth to the age of six. For this is the time when man’s intelligence, his greatest implement, and more than that his psychic powers is being formed. DMS expounds and defends the great powers of the child and to help teachers to a new outlook which changes their tasks from drudgery to joy and from repression to collaboration.