OUR MISSION
With a priority on time in nature and attention to social-emotional wellbeing, our mission is to offer our gulf coast families a high-fidelity Montessori education where children grow into creative, self-directed, and curious humans.
“The child is truly a miraculous being, and this should be felt deeply by the educator.”
– Maria Montessori
OUR VISION
Our campus is quickly expanding. We started 5 years ago with two studios in a single building on a beautiful, live oak filled property. We have since acquired the building immediately to our west, and we’ll soon have another exciting announcement to share.
Growth takes time, resources, and most importantly patience. We are on our way towards creating a world class campus in our little town of Gulf Breeze.
A big thanks to B&A Architectural Group for designing our future 5,600 SF addition to our main building!
OUR CORE VALUES
Radical Transparency – We share openly and honestly in all communication and never purposefully withhold information.
Friendliness – We extend grace and courtesy to everyone in the community.
Wholeness – We seek alignment across all programs in our speech, written word, practices, materials, schedules, curriculum, policies and procedures.
Personal Responsibility – We take responsibility for our relationships, roles, responsibilities, choices, and outcomes.
Strong Systems – We build strong systems and continually refine and adjust them when we feel a gap between where we are and where we could be.
Honest Talk – We talk to one another, not about one another.
Our philosophy
We are committed to the child-centered approach
We cater to children’s natural curiosity and developmental stages; everything about our programs is child-led. Most of our work and lessons are given individually and in small groups. One will likely hear children’s voices, not adults, in our studios.
We offer freedom within limits
Our children are free to choose activities within a structured environment. This encourages independence and self-regulation as young children learn to make choices and explore their interests. We enforce ground rules with love and compassion; when mistakes are made, we are friendly with error and ensure there is learning in the repair.
We use beautiful Montessori materials
Each child-led space is filled with specially designed Montessori materials that are hands-on, sensory-rich, and sequentially structured to support the child’s learning and development across various domains and curriculum areas.
We are intentional about our prepared environment
Our studios are organized to promote order, repetition, mastery, and appreciation of beauty. Each space is carefully curated to stimulate exploration, concentration, and a sense of calm. Furniture is child-sized, and materials are made of wood, metal, fabric, and other natural materials.
We adhere to mixed-age groupings
Mixed-age groups allow younger children to observe and learn from older peers, and older children reinforce their learning by helping younger ones.
We honor the role of the guide
Our Montessori-trained guides facilitate and collaborate rather than instruct. They observe each child closely, provide individualized lessons based on developmental readiness, and encourage independence and problem-solving skills.
We trust and respect children
Each child is an individual with unique needs, strengths, and interests. Our programs aim to nurture each child’s innate desire to learn and grow at their own pace. Earlier and typical is not better.
We see our adult community as partners, not patrons
We hope for strong partnerships with parents and provide opportunities for parent education, observation, and involvement in their child’s learning journey.
We embrace the whole child
Ultimately, an early childhood Montessori program aims to foster the child’s holistic development—spiritual, cognitive, social, emotional, and physical—laying a foundation for lifelong learning and a positive attitude towards education.
We value time outdoors in nature
Our children get ample unstructured outdoor time, and we are proud of our wild outdoor space under live oaks. We run, climb, jump, build, organize loose parts, care for bunnies, ride bikes and scooters, play in water hoses, plant in gardens, and splash in the rain. Fresh air, dirt, living creatures, space to roam, and healthy risk-taking are a part of each school day.
A Message From Our founders
Welcome to GBMS! We are a small, private Montessori school for families who want something unique. You’ll find no little desks or teachers lecturing children here; we are partners during long periods of uninterrupted work and play. This year your children will continue to spin in the rain, climb trees, dig holes, water vegetables, choose didactic materials with agency, concentrate without interruption, speak freely, process ups and downs, nap hard, show friendliness toward error, and best of all, trust and love each other as a bonded community, unified and liberated in a child-centered space free from coercion and stress.
We are a proud IMC Member School and while we may be small, we have big plans. From the beginning, our vision was a multi-classroom school by the sea, under the oaks, where Montessori and Nature guide each day. Our young ones move and explore under the watchful eye of conscientious practitioners. Our inclination is to protect and honor rather than hover and meddle. The default on this campus is curiosity. Our adults observe carefully and act on each small moment of the day with grace, clarity, consistency and goodwill. And yes, we love academics and get excited when our four year olds are squaring numbers and reading!
GBMS is a wonderful place for families, too! Current parents describe the feeling of belonging and ease, where we all share in the joys, and sometimes frustrations, of modern day parenting and educating. During our 2018 start-up-phase, (yes we opened right before that pesky pandemic) this was a grass-roots build-it-yourself endeavor and that ethos remains. We are a laid-back, tight knit group, relying on habits like transparency, friendliness, and personal responsibility to keep us together and move us forward.
For those of you returning as well as the newest among us, thank you for your trust and partnership this year!
– James & Kellie Schulte
