Montessori on the Farm

For grown-ups

The parent and caregiver course

A year of friendly half-day Saturday workshops teaching you how to bring Montessori cosmic education home for your six to twelve year old. Thirty-two workshops across the four seasons. Add the ones you would like to the basket, and it works out your best price. No teaching background needed, just an interest in how children learn.

How pricing works

Add as many as you like, the basket finds your best price

Each half-day session (about four hours, with tea and kōrero afterwards) is $60. Add more and the price per session drops automatically: $255 for any five, $385 for any eight (a season’s worth), and $1,340 for the whole year. A second adult from your whānau is half price and comes to the same sessions.

Already part of the hub? Whānau with a child enrolled full time get 40% off. Log in to your whānau portal to book with your discount applied automatically.

The programme

Choose your Saturdays

The whole of the second plane (ages six to twelve), at a parenting level. Every session stands on its own. Dates for each season are being set now; book your places and we will confirm the Saturdays as they are scheduled.

Spring

Foundations and the great stories
The Big Picture
Who your six to twelve year old now is, and what cosmic education is.
The Five Great Lessons
Why we teach through great stories, and the five that open all of learning.
The Universe
The First Great Lesson: the story of how everything began.
The Coming of Life
The Second Great Lesson: the long unfolding of living things.
The Coming of Human Beings
The Third Great Lesson: the three gifts, and what people are for.
The Story of Writing
The Fourth Great Lesson, and how reading and writing really grow.
The Story of Numbers
The Fifth Great Lesson: mathematics as a human adventure.
Telling the Stories, and Preparing Your Home
The storyteller’s craft, and a home set up to follow it.

Summer

The living world
The Night Sky
Astronomy up close: our star, the planets, and the seasons.
The Restless Earth
Volcanoes, mountains and the moving plates that built our valley.
Air, Water and Weather
The water cycle, wind and rain as the workers of the world.
The Timeline of Life
Deep time made graspable, from the first sea creatures to us.
Classifying Living Things
The great groups of life, and the joy of sorting.
Plants and the Garden
How plants live and grow, met in the garden.
Animals and the Farm
How animals live and are grouped, met in the paddock.
The Child as Naturalist
Observing, drawing, naming and caring for living things.

Autumn

The human story
The Needs of People
The fundamental needs shared by every people, in every age.
Timelines of History
Deep time and the great eras, laid out to walk through.
The Story of Civilisations
Great human stories: settlements, writing, trade and ideas.
Your Child’s Place in Time
Family history and your child’s own life as a timeline.
How Reading and Writing Grow
Supporting literacy at home through richness, not pressure.
Numbers Made Concrete
Montessori maths in the hand: beads, rods and understanding.
Fractions and Geometry
Parts of a whole, and the shapes and patterns all around us.
Bringing Culture Home
Research, projects, and going out to museums, experts and places.

Winter

The whole child, and you
Who You Are in This
Your changed role, from teacher at the front to guide.
Observation
The core skill: watching well, and letting it guide you.
The Prepared Home
A home where a child can be independent, on any budget.
Freedom, Responsibility and Rhythm
Real freedom within limits, and a year without a timetable.
The Moral and Social Child
Fairness, big feelings, grace and courtesy, and belonging.
Art, Music and Beauty
Making, listening and learning to truly see.
Science and Real Work
Finding out by doing, and the real work the older child craves.
The Road Ahead
Celebrating the year, and a first look at adolescence.
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