The Ivy curriculum is based on Multiple Intelligences theory (MI) which recognizes that everyone has different strengths and that there is more than one kind of intelligence. This theory was developed by Professor Howard Gardner of Harvard University. He has isolated and identified eight intelligences: linguistic, logical-mathematical, musical, spatial, bodily-kinesthetic, interpersonal, intrapersonal, and naturalist.

MI offers a definition of intelligence based on how intelligence works in the real world. It suggests that learners should have opportunities to engage their eight intelligences as they would in the world outside of the classroom, to solve problems and make products that are of value to their community. For a young child, the problem might be how to share a precious material or how to make a block structure stand upright; the product might be a painting of their family, a story, a song.

Our curriculum is organized such that children’s intelligences are drawn out and used in combination, in authentic ways. It is designed to develop the whole child and to prepare each child for subsequent schooling and for life, with necessary skills, a positive attitude toward learning, and self-confidence as a learner and citizen in the world.

Our teachers use MI theory as a framework for:

• Creating nine Learning Centers (Dramatic Play, Blocks, Manipulatives and Puzzles, Library, Music, Message, Art and Construction, Science, and Sensory)
• Providing a variety of teaching materials that are accessible and safe and foster and promote curiosity and independence
•  Presenting carefully constructed, age appropriate activities that give all children equal opportunities to build skills and gain knowledge across eight learning domains (Personal, Social, Language and Literacy, Mathematical Thinking, Scientific Thinking, Social Studies, The Arts, and Physical Development and Health)
•  Creating meaningful relationships between children, their teachers, and their peers with the understanding that all children develop within the context of social relationship
• Observing children daily as they are engaged in a range of both pre-planned activities and special projects that are developed through discussions with children and are in line with our curriculum goals and objectives
•  Documenting children at work and play to assess their development and identify their individual strengths
• Reflecting on both observations and documentation and using them as a tool for building on children’s strengths

Each day, children have long blocks of time to engage in both teacher-directed and child-initiated activities. The teacher-directed activities are theme-based and constitute month-long projects. Each activity is

designed to build skills and teach knowledge within specific learning domains (i.e. Language and Literacy/Art), trigger specific intelligences (i.e. Linguistic/Spatial), and meet specific curriculum goals and objectives for nursery, pre-kindergarten, or kindergarten (i.e. Respond to a story the teacher has read by retelling, drawing, and/or writing to reflect, make meaning and make connections). The activities take in to account, the fact that young children learn differently than adults. They learn by doing – using real tools to engage in real-world experiences.