WIMBERLEY – Prairie Boulmier has served in the Montessori education world for the last 25 years and she is now bringing expertise from her experience to the city of Wimberley.
Born and raised in Laramie, Wyoming, but now splitting her time between South Austin and Wimberley, Boulmier has worn multiple hats in the Montessori system: parent, classroom assistant, grant admin, charter school founder, lead teacher, program director, researcher, author, speaker, trainer, director and teacher education program co-director.
She lived, worked and developed Montessori programs in Africa and Asia for nearly 10 years and assisted newly developing schools in Europe, South America and Australia. Boulmier then moved to Wimberley while developing a Montessori Farm Program in Driftwood and fell in love with the place.
“I'm a long-time Montessorian and I have founded, or helped found, quite a few schools over the years in different parts of the world,” said Boulmier.
She holds an American Montessori Society Early Childhood credential, a Bachelor of Arts in Early Childhood Education and a Master of Education in Montessori Integrative Learning, along with being awarded the 2011 Thesis of the Year Award by the American Montessori Society for “Montessori Education and Learning in Living Systems.”
Now, she is opening Wimberley Children’s House, a Montessori school option for families in the Wimberley community.
“I did talk with the people at the Wimberley Montessori School, which shut down last May, about looking for ways to kind of save that resource for the community and that, unfortunately, didn't work out, but I was approached by a lady named Amber Poole. She runs a little organization called Start-Up Kids Club here in Wimberley and she had an office that she was going to lose because of funding shortages and she asked my partner and I if we knew anyone who could open a Montessori school in her building,” Boulmier explained. “We were those people, so we knew there was a huge need in the area for lots of different kinds of services. There's a lot of homeschooling parents. There's a lot of people who don't want their children in full-time care … So, we took over this building and we've been working on it ever since.”
Montessori education, dating back to its origins in the early 20th century, is based on the philosophy of Dr. Maria Montessori. According to the Association Montessori Internationale (AMI), the education type builds a child’s capability to become a fulfilled and productive adult able to contribute to the world — at home, at work and in their community.
Additionally, the Montessori approach does the following: develops the whole child; teachers guide children through discovery; and the learning environments are designed to fit the specific needs of each child’s stage of development.
The first Montessori school, opened by Maria herself in Rome, Italy, in 1907, was called the Casa dei Bambini — meaning children’s house. As the education approach has reached worldwide, Boulmier went with a more classic name for Wimberley Children’s House.
“It really should feel like a home for children. When they walk in, you see everything’s child-sized and very nurturing and warm,” Boulmier shared.
A typical school day looks different than the traditional classroom, as the Montessori approach is also free choice, Boulmier explained. The children choose, for the most part, what work they do and when/how; while some may say that it’s child-led, Boulmier said she thinks it’s more of a “dance between a well-prepared adult and the environment and the child.”
“Our morning work period strives to be about three hours of uninterrupted work in the classroom and most of that time is free choice. In our curriculum, we have language, mathematics, geography, history, science, art, music, movement and so, all of those types of activities are available to the children, really at any time that they're interested in them,” Boulmier said. “Then, our students actually make their own lunches and snacks, so that's a really big part of our day, just preparing food. We work with Wimberley Valley Dinner Club; they kind of do some of the prep for our food and then, we finish it off here … There’s a rest time for nappers and most of the afternoon we would be spending outdoors, either on our playground or in our -— we call it the forest, our little wild piece of land -— exploring nature.”
There’s various reasons for why families may choose Montessori education, whether it be at Wimberley Children’s House or elsewhere, according to Boulmier. This includes the lack of early childcare options for those who are younger than school age.
“There's this group of homeschoolers who still want support, but don't want their children to be enrolled in a full-time school and then, there's a pretty well-educated group of parents here in the valley, as well, that are looking for something. They tell us during our information sessions that they don't want their children to be forced to sit at a desk,” she said. “They don't want their children doing whole group activities. They don't want their children doing worksheets. They want their children to be free to explore their interests and be secure, competent, well-adjusted people and that's our curriculum. [It] addresses the whole child, rather than just academic.”
Currently, Wimberley Children’s House is going to serve children from ages two and a half or three years old to six years old, while also offering drop-in hourly care and after-school care. The school will also be open on the days when Wimberley ISD is closed.
As of Feb. 21, Wimberley Children's House officially opened with licenses in hand.
Wimberley Children’s House is located at 580 FM 3237, Suite D. To learn more about the school and how to apply for enrollment, visit www.wimberleychildrenshouse.org.
More information about the Montessori education approach can be found at www.montessori-ami.org.
