Learning plan

Inquiry- based learning and experiential learning

Children constantly have new ideas and ask questions. They act like little researchers with an unquenchable desire for research and discovery. With their natural curiosity as a motivational driving force, the entire school becomes a laboratory where the most exciting experiments are conducted based on children’s questions and their excitement. These experiments create new pathways of learning.

Having as a purpose that what they lean will become an experience, children are actively involved in activities that they either suggest themselves or are promoted by teachers (facilitators), based on their preferences. Our tools for an experiential learning are games and the project method.

Game, for children, is a way of understanding the world. They learn at their own pace, take initiative, collaborate, exchange ideas and experiences, solve problems and reach conclusions. They derive joy, they have fun, and by having all their senses activated, they receive multiple stimuli, process them and gradually build knowledge.

Using the Project method we deepen the knowledge: the approach is interdisciplinary, which helps in discovery of the new ways and sources of learning. Children go through meaningful experiences: by being engaged in a variety of expressive games and by interacting in larger and smaller groups as well as working individually.

Educational Plan

Through constantly renewed learning methods children cultivate their basic skills: they are daily exposed to a bilingual (Greek and English) environment, mathematics, technology and natural sciences. Art, in all its forms, has a dominant role in children’s daily life, offering them a wide range of different stimuli and ways of expression. Through games in nature, such as gardening, various sports activities, nutritious diet and cooking, we aim to instill in children the importance and benefits of a healthy lifestyle that aims at well-being and happiness. The educational visits to different institutions and excursions organized by the school aim to enrich their experiences.

NURSERY

This is the age when children have the first contact with a structured environment in which they will need to coexist with their peers, each having their own desires and needs.

Encouragement and positive attitude of the teachers (facilitators) will help children to adjust smoothly and will strengthen their sense of self-esteem. The main educational goals that need to be fulfilled at this age are emotional balance and the cultivation of social skills.

At this stage of development, children discover and define themselves in relation to space and to others. Their five senses are the main channels through which they process the information they receive from the environment and through which they learn.

At Microdromio the children will find rich stimuli to explore, use their abilities and develop them further, express themselves freely, learn through individual and group games, cultivate their imagination and creativity while, at the same time, they acquire knowledge from what impresses them that, in turn, becomes an experience.

KINDERGARTEN

At this stage in children’s development, knowledge is introduced in a more organized and coordinated way. More importantly, children are encouraged to learn how to discover knowledge itself.

The learning experiences are based on their personal interests, used by teachers (facilitators) in an exploratory and experiential approach of learning.

Children are asked to collaborate effectively in small groups: to argue, to develop their critical thinking skills, to make assumptions and draw conclusions and, then, to assess them. They invent the ways of solving challenges and problems that develop their ingenuity. These essential tools, acquired in the kindergarten, they will need throughout their school years, and in their adult lives as well.

At this age it is important for children to learn how to manage their emotions and develop their social behavior through the cultivation of empathy. At our school we especially focus on teaching children to recognize, accept and manage their emotions, as well as to understand and respect the feelings of others, so that they can build successful interpersonal relationships.