School marks 10th anniversary with garden
[attach]4406[/attach]Maria Montessori, developer of the educational philosophy behind Montessori schools, placed a lot of focus on sensorial learning. Surely she would have a felt a sense of pride in Montessori Jewish Day School’s latest project.
In commemoration of its 10th anniversary, the elementary school near Bathurst Street and Sheppard Avenue opened a sensorial garden where students will be able to grow potatoes, corn, peas and more in four different gardening beds.
The idea for the garden came after a group of parents decided to beautify the school grounds said parent Valerie Weiss, who is also head of the garden and playground committee.
“It ties in to a lot of the research that Maria Montessori did in terms of how children learn and how they develop,” Weiss said during the May 31 unveiling. “We thought a garden is an ideal space to create to tap into what she considered was 11 senses not just five senses.”
And as grows the garden, which will be expanded in the fall, so grows the school. This year, the facility added grade 7 and it plans to expand to include grade 8 starting in the fall.
“We just thought that it was just a really nice way to say the school is growing,” Weiss said.
Funding for the project was raised by the parents, while donations of soil and seed came from various gardening stores. According to Weiss, the second phase of the project will begin next fall.
