This course prepares students to offer children a basic foundation in five cultural subjects: music, science, geography, history, and art. In the Montessori classroom, the cultural subjects are not divided because they overlap in so many different ways. In reviewing basic ideas and in experiencing the concepts in a form that is age-appropriate for preschool children in day care and Head Start settings, students develop a foundation of skills upon which they can expand to broaden the child's understanding of the world that surrounds them. The music component is a fundamental introduction to the elements of music, to basic ideas and activities of listening, movement, call and response, echo rhythms, and ways of developing young children's voices. In the science component, children begin with basic concepts of physical and geological science with magnification, prisms, magnets, volcanoes, rocks, etc. Botany and zoology, plants and animals, follow. Students construct an exploration journal that highlights observation skills. The geography component begins with the understanding of spatial relationships and expands to include globes, maps, people, cultures, and the world, both local and global. In the history component for the pre-school child, the emphasis in history is on the development of an understanding of time. Only then can children begin to develop a concept of the history of the earth and its people. The art component fills an important role in children's ability to visualize and conceptualize their ideas about the world. The emphasis is in encouraging classroom teachers to teach techniques and not outcomes. Students create five albums, one in each area of study, that illustrate the correct use of materials in developmentally appropriate activities.

In the intern year, students attend eight workshops (six hours each) that focus on Family and Community. Also included is twelve hours of work with children with challenging behaviors. Upon completion of this course, students will be able to identify the primary components of the Family and Community Partnership that federally funded early childhood programs are expected and mandated to maintain.  Each workshop explores and defines one or several elements of this partnership from parent orientation through transition of children into public school. Students identify the various instruments used, complete the documentation, critique the application in their own program, evaluate and reflect upon the strengths and weaknesses, and propose ways in which their own program could be improved.

This course introduces students to the materials for Practical Life and Sensorial areas. Students learn to utilize materials familiar to the child's own environment to help the child in the development of an increased attention span, self-discipline, gross and fine motor skills, and a sense of independence; share in the skills of grace and courtesy and care of the environment that aid the child in developing a sense of cooperation and community; explore the sensory materials which isolate each sense and aid the child in sensory discrimination through matching, grading, sorting and other manipulative exercises of order and construction; arrange, maintain, and present these materials within the classroom and adjust presentations to fit the stages of development of children. In addition, students create materials that are age appropriate and serve the developing skills of their children;  illustrate their presentations in an organized album for each area and write essays that summarize concepts and philosophy of the Montessori Method which are applicable to the practical life and sensorial areas. There are nine hours of supervised practice with student partners along with six hours of oral presentation.

Major topics include: infant and toddler development; emotional, physical, cognitive, and social landmarks; milestones of development; observation techniques; suggested materials for developmentally appropriate activities; theories of development; the child in the family; exceptional children; toddlerhood: physical, cognitive and emotional development; preschoolers: physical, cognitive, social, and emotional development; play; moral development; self-identify and sex roles; Montessori philosophy and method.

The curriculum addresses how to engage children in developmentally appropriate ways with individual, small group, and whole group instruction and emphasizes how to manage the transition between activities. Language Arts: pre-writing exercises, language patterning sequence, visual discrimination, initial sounds, phonetic sounds, phonograms, grammar games, literature and poetry for young children; Math: 0 to 10 materials, teens, tens, and hundreds, decimal system, operations of addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division, and introduction to fractions; Science: health, nutrition, human body, solar system, rocks, plants, and animals; Social Studies: sensorial perception of the concept of time, basic human needs, vastness of history, sensorial age appropriate experience with maps, flags, landforms, habitats and cultures, child's body awareness and relationship to the world; Art: materials and media, i.e., crayon, pencil drawing, clay, water color, sculpture, etc.; Music and Movement: listening, following directions, appreciation, recognition, group participation in songs, movement games, instrument making, etc.