Academic Model
Our methodology comes from Spain, after being a benchmark for years in the implementation of innovative and alternative forms of teaching, it finally arrives to Mexico by the hand of a professional team with extensive training and experience in emotional education.
All subjects are worked in a transversal and our methodology is alive, adapting to the new realities of today's world and children
Reading
Children begin to write a lot time before they have the ability to read. A greater brain maturation is necessary than for writing, for this reason children can form words that they are not yet able to read.
What we know as writing is the analysis of the different sounds of words. Reading itself is the synthesis of the sounds of words, it is a process of much greater complexity.
Letter knowledge is acquired in a practical and purposeful way, for example when they have to be the class secretary and learn their friends' letters in order to record their attendance.
We will continue advancing with the mechanical reading that is carried out with materials elaborated by the guides and are usually cards and objects with their names. The children must read the card and in turn associate it with the object. All this is done through the game. Within these materials we will find small books for them and according to their progress they will find similar material but with spelling difficulties (cz, x, qu, j, g, etc.).
The next stage deals with the function of words and consists of several activities where children realize how important the placement of each word is in a sentence and how by combining the composition of them, the meaning of the sentence can be totally changed. phrase. We learn to work with the article, adverb, verb, adjective, conjunctions and prepositions.
We will continue with what we call the study of words, through which through classification and reading activities they learn in a natural and logical way the singular-plural, masculine-feminine, suffixes and prefixes, homographs, homophones and compound words.
Finally, we arrive at the whole reading, which is when children understand what they are reading, both the emotional part, the meaning of what is read and finally what the author wanted to convey.
Science
Escuela Viva is profoundly ecological in its entirety. We start with the youngest until we achieve active awareness of the existence of the seasons, to continue in Primary and Secondary with the learning of the complex relationships between the stars, animals and plants. The goal is to come to understand that analytical and holistic thinking contribute differently to the total understanding of living processes. The science syllabus is worked across the different ages and is organically related to the curriculum throughout all grades, and subconsciously nurtures the sense of unity within the whole.
To give just a few examples, during the year the different festivals of Spring, Summer, etc. they make the rhythms of the Earth, the Sun and the Moon integrally part of the child's consciousness. The care the guides have for the order and beauty in the surroundings of the Garden and the Orchard will feed of respect and precision their investigations in nature in the following stages. The artistic activities, the verses, the stories and the stories develop the imaginative faculties; without all of them, the fundamentals of the scientific method are useless and the holistic quality of thought necessary to understand the immensity of the living world is weakened.
Throughout this process we will learn Physics, Biology, Chemistry, Nutrition, Astronomy always in a practical and transversal way.
.At Escuela Viva we do not try to display a large amount of natural science content in a schedule, but to take into account: What is best for the development process of our children? What role can the natural sciences have in helping our young people discover themselves and their understanding of the world? The students are not there for the matter; rather, the matter is there for them.
Writing
We teach writing without deadlines or obligations. We take into account the psychological, physiological, emotional and environmental factors that determine sufficient maturity to start writing among other factors. At Escuela Viva we try to recreate and rediscover the character and qualities that in the past had spellings and phonemes.
In ancient times, human beings expressed their emotions and their reactions to an object, person or action by describing it through vowels. We can still observe this principle in exclamations.
At Escuela Viva we like to teach vowels as letters that carry emotions, because each of the vowels corresponds to a different emotion.
The consonants have their origin in the imitation of activities, processes and objects of nature and the environment.
In our school the guides they have to invent their own images from the letter and create a story or story to introduce it. For example, if we talk about older children who have reading and writing problems, we will ask the child to help us find these images and create the story.
In this way we achieve unity between the symbol, its sound and its quality through an image and we give the child the possibility of learning the letters in a simpler and more interactive way.
Math
Mathematics is order, sequence, logic, and the extrapolation of truth. Children have a "mathematical mind" and that inner drive to understand the environment around them. Therefore, we can say that children have an innate attraction to mathematics. The minds of our little ones are brimming with energy that pushes them to manipulate, absorb, repeat, sequence, order, abstract and classify using the math material used in Escuela Viva. In this way and in a much more practical way, we help the child to acquire greater depth in their mathematical knowledge. Our exercises in the subject of mathematics offer children the necessary keys to guide them towards a greater exploration and maturation of their mathematical mind. The way in which the sensory material is arranged allows them to complete intellectual cycles that promote their independence and freedom.
We work with materials of a manipulative and multisensory nature, to ensure that children stimulate different parts of the brain. With these materials we seek to connect the left and right hemisphere of the brain to achieve a truly comprehensive. For example, with the use of geometric shapes we stimulate both hemispheres of the brain; of which the left one is in charge of the processing of abstract concepts when handling and the right to handle spaces and , while self-correcting through trial and error.
Geography and History
The axis of the teaching of Geography and History is to start in the known world and proceed to the outside and unknown world before returning again to what they already know. It is your journey of discovery.
Geography is the subject that invites children to "put their feet on the ground" and thus prepare them for terrestrial maturity. In the early years of primary school, children have a relatively dreamy awareness of the world as a single whole. The process of learning about their environment leads them to more differentiated and awake. History helps us to give temporal perception and put thought in time and place.
For Escuela Viva it is of great importance to unite this learning with spiritual, intellectual and physical development through direct experimentation of what is covered. Children learn about the world but in a way in which feelings are linked to the respective knowledge.
They must understand the Earth as a natural space with specific vital rhythms that surround human beings, but which has also undergone various changes in its history due to economic and cultural activity.
When approaching the time, the attention is focused on space and time. In this way a new horizon of more concrete knowledge is opened. Children are taught the immediate environment, such as their home, town, municipality and state, at first, to then continue with the study of the country in which they live to finally expand knowledge towards the continents, in their geographical-spatial and historical-temporal development, up to the present moment. With this way of working their relationship with the world will be transformed into a sense of belonging both spatially and socially.
Physical education
In the first place, we focus on Physical Education from the respect for the global development of each child.
To carry it out, it is absolutely necessary to have environments specially prepared for children. One of our principles is to give children the possibility of being free and choosing what activity to do.
Enjoying this freedom gives the little one not only motivation, but also: it makes him part of his own learning process, without being aware of it.
All the activity is carried out in a controlled space, in which all its elements are safe for the use of children. The guide is an observer in this method, dedicated mainly to reviewing and intervening only in case the child requests it.
Within the definition of Physical Education, we distinguish 4 types that we describe below:
Muscular: that which we perform with the help of devices.
Free: the one that can be done without the help of devices.
Educational: focused on teaching useful activities for children.
Respiratory: focused on strengthening the child's breathing through various exercises. Our methodology proposes physical education as a very important part of the overall education of the child and as a fundamental tool to develop useful skills for everyday issues. Sport is one of the most important aspects in human life. That is why we must ensure that children are not oblivious to their practice and that it be used as a tool to promote their psychophysical development. It is important to highlight the importance of sport becoming a teaching tool where cooperation is above competition.