Lance Around Orlando

Would You Kiss Sir Gus?

The Montessori School of Celebration celebrated its 10 year anniversary at their annual International Festival in downtown Celebration on Saturday. 

Younger Students Singing

The school was founded by a group of parents from the Celebration community. They selected Karen Simon and Helen DeVere of the Orlando Montessori Teacher Education Institute to own and run the school while the parents assisted in securing a building to house the school.  After outgrowing the original two classroom school-house in the downtown business district, a larger school building was constructed in South Village right next to Heritage Hall and the community pool and ball fields.

Over the past 10 years, many parents have testified to the incredible education their children receive at the Montessori School of Celebration. The school has expanded from its original two classrooms of two and a half to five year olds to its current structure that houses those classrooms plus a kindergarten, lower elementary, upper elementary and an adolescent and high school program.

Through a special arrangement with Valencia Community College, qualified older students will be able to dual enroll at Valencia and receive college credit as they complete their high school education.

It Takes Weeks to Research the Countries and Design the Booths

One of the highlights of the year is the school’s International Festival. Students spend several weeks researching a specific country and creating a booth filled with information, displays, artwork, activities and even foods to sample from the chosen country.  This festival featured the countries of Sweden, Argentina, Canada, Morocco and The Netherlands.   

This year the children squealed with delight as the Moroccan booth featured a live camel. By placing a carrot in your mouth and then feeding it to the camel, you were given a sticker that read “I’ve been kissed by Sir Gus.”  The camel was sponsored by the Bahia Shriners Orlando.   

Taiko Drumming

During the festival, various school and community groups perform on stage. There is Taiko Drumming, gymnastics, singing and more. Between presentations, children get a passport and travel to the different country booths to get it stamped. There are also some bounce houses and food available.   

After the presentations, all the students of the school got together on stage, sang the school’s “gathering song” and then sang Happy Birthday to the school in honor of its 10th anniversary.   

There was not a dry eye among the founders of the school as the children sang.   

Hundreds of People of All Ages Attend the Annual International Festival

If you are in Celebration on Tuesday February 9th or Tuesday February 16th from 9:30am to 11:30am the Montessori School will be having an open house.  The school will be in session and you can observe the students participating in the traditional Montessori educational environment.   

If you’ve never seen a Montessori classroom, I guarantee it will be something you will never forget.   

Montessori School of Celebration
901 Begonia Road
Celebration, FL 34747
407.566.1561
www.MontessoriCelebration.com
info@MontessoriCelebration.com

This entry was posted on February 7, 2010 at 4:26 pm and is filed under Local Info. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.