[Cocone Education] Philosophy and Practice of Establishing MIRAI Kindergarten

※This article is machine translated.

Cocone Corporation, the founding parent company of International Montessori Mirai Kindergarten, began by creating English learning applications for web browsers and smartphones.

Cocone Corporation thought that it could contribute not only to language education but also to enriching the future of children, who will create the future of the world.

We want our children to be able to use language and play an active role in the international society, and to be able to use AI, rather than being controlled by it, in a society that is becoming more familiar with artificial intelligence/AI. We have decided to incorporate our strengths in English education and computer science into our curriculum.
In addition to this, our education is based on a combination of Montessori education, which we hope will draw out children’s individuality and unlimited potential, and help them to become autonomous and diverse individuals.
It is often said that ” Montessori nurtures geniuses, ” and the basis for this belief is the conviction ” children are born geniuses. Therefore, in Montessori classrooms, the idea is that the teacher does not teach the child anything, but rather the teacher is committed to supporting the child in releasing and developing his or her potential.

It is up to the children to decide which teaching tools they will use. The teacher is part of the environment that helps the children to explore something of their own volition, both by setting up the classroom environment and by telling them how to use the tools.
Families have probably noticed that children have ” propensity to explore things that interest them ” For example, there are situations where they are forever pulling tissue paper out of a box of tissue paper. This is your child trying to understand the tactile sensation of the paper by feeling it with his/her fingertips and repeatedly pulling it out with respect to its softness and the degree of force with which it is pulled out.
Here we can already recognize the signs of your child’s inquisitiveness.
In a Montessori classroom, your child will be provided with an environment where he or she can ” explore ” whatever he or she likes.
In the classroom, students can repeat what they are interested in, not what someone else tells them to do, without worrying about what anyone else is doing. Through this, students acquire ” the autonomy to choose what they want to do ” Then, by exploring the object and making it their own, they experience success, gain self-confidence, and develop a sense of self-esteem.

Students will ” develop the ability to ” focus” on their own areas of interest. This ability to concentrate will be demonstrated in English classes, computer science, and other classes that are held during the other half of the day.
This Montessori approach of ” supporting the child’s potential ” is also applied to English classes in Mirai Kindergarten.
Teachers focus on creating an environment where children actively want to use English to communicate with their teachers, rather than teaching them something.

The subject of education ” Mirai Kindergarten is truly ” child.
Children raised in Montessori learn to explore areas of interest on their own.
Being independent, self-reliant, and self-confident will be a very important factor for children who will live in an unpredictable future.

Mirai Kinder Curtain aims to nurture the ability to live in the future through Montessori education, to acquire English language skills as a weapon to play an active role in the international community, and to acquire programming thinking through computer science. Simply put, programming thinking is the ability to think logically, to give precise instructions to an object, and to move it around.
In computer science at Mirai Kindergarten, students will learn how to draw, give instructions to a caterpillar-shaped robot, create a robot using Lego bricks, and control it with a program, all while having fun.
What we value in this computer science class, as in Montessori, is the experience of thinking, devising, and exploring for oneself, never the superficial teaching of a particular skill.
These are the core curriculum of Mirai Kindergarten. In addition, we also offer an extensive ” body, literature, and arts ” program, which are important in the early years of a child’s life.
Childhood is a time when the brain stretches its neural pathways and performs basic brain construction.
It is very important to be physically active as well as intellectually active during this period.
For this reason, we invite specialized teachers for physical education and dance, and also incorporate art and music classes every week.

Mirai Kindergarten is celebrating its sixth term in 2022. The Montessori philosophy of valuing the child’s sensitive period and supporting the expansion of the child’s potential permeates the school’s English classes and other classes. We take time to respect children’s ” individuality ” mainly in the Montessori classes, and in the English classes, we communicate in ” teams” “” groups ” to foster communication skills not only in a linguistic sense, but also in a social sense.
Mirai Kindergarten offers a Japanese-English environment, Montessori education that respects the individual, bilingual education that emphasizes social development and enjoyable communication in a group environment, and a structure of vertically divided classes for different ages and horizontally divided classes according to developmental needs, all of which approach the unlimited potential of children. We approach children’s infinite possibilities in a vertical and developmentally-appropriate structure.

Text:Ishiwatari Mai
Representative of Cocone Education Corporation, operator of International Montessori Mirai Kindergarten
Director, CLO (Chief Legal Officer), Attorney at Law, Cocone Corporation