Basic Principles

The basic principles governing the School’s educational program and philosophy are the following:

  1. Children are full of abilities, passion and creative thinking. They discover the world through their senses and through interaction.
  2. The educator is a co-organizer and facilitates the child’s learning. He participates, collaborates with the student, facilitates, plans activities, puts questions for the child to delve deeply into learning experiences.
  3. A multi-faceted environment, rich in materials, through beautiful, organized spaces, where everything aims at helping children learn.
  4. Children are encouraged to express how they understand the world around them through different symbolic languages like painting, sculpture, theater play, dance, movement, mathematics and language.
  5. The parents are considered partners for their children and the parents’ participation is necessary in various aspects of the educational program
  6. The educators become children watchers and, as they work with them, record and collect data like photos, notes, video and conversations. In this way they pose questions that enhance their child’s way of thinking and encourage their creativity.

Educational method

“It does not matter so much whether a product is produced in the end and how it will look. What is more important is the route leading to it, because this is where education stems from”. (Karl Frey)

Based on the principles of experiential learning through play (play-based education) and having the children themselves at the center of the educational process, their questions, their needs and interests, we create every day an educational program that helps children discover the world that surrounds them, understand it through play and learn how to learn.

Through the project method (project-based learning), i. e. the in-depth investigation of a topic, the children’s critical thinking is cultivated. When children work in small groups they investigate, apply knowledge and skills, make decisions and choose throughout the work. Their interest is fully activated and focused and, in this way, they create their own links with all that surrounds them, reaching their own conclusions and in a framework that makes sense for them, knowledge becomes experiential.

Educational Program

  • Greek language program
    The children, through a daily program formed by the educators of the class, carry out activities aiming at cultivating basic skills like social, kinetic, linguistic ones etc.
  • English language program
    The children learn and gradually conquer the use and structure of the second language as they come into daily contact with an English-speaking educator.
  • Expression through Arts
    The arts are a basic way of expression for pre-school age children and that is why their program includes daily activities with movement, dance, music, visual arts and theater play.
  • Cooking Experiences
    The children discover through the senses the world of taste, the colors of fruits and vegetables, calculating the quantities of materials and having fun through the dialogue of tastes and aromas.
  • Lending/Exchange library
    At the Littles Library, books, fairy tales and stories come alive. With the program of the lending / exchange library children cultivate love of reading and responsibility.
  • Technology
    Children become familiar with technology. With the help of the school equipment – interactive boards, projector, camera, slides projector- technology becomes a tool in the hands of children aiming at research and discovery.
  • Time for experiments
    Children experiment with different materials, observe and make assumptions.
  • Gardening
    • Children design, cultivate and take care of the school vegetable garden.
    • They choose and get to know the aromatic herbs of our garden.
  • Trips into Nature
    The children regularly visit forests, parks, wetlands, with the purpose of learning to appreciate nature and to enjoy its benefits.
  • Educational visits
    • Museums
    • Theater performances
    • Cultural exhibitions

Nutrition

The child’s all-round development also includes its diet. At Littles we eat “as we do at home”. We enjoy home-cooked food with fresh and biological ingredients according to the rules of the Mediterranean diet under the guidance of the nutritionist.

At Littles’ Atelier of Taste, we learn:

  • The nutritional value of cooking ingredients
  • The importance of preparation and the company at the lunch table