With affections and safely, I explore my surroundings and awaken to the world.

Papião is a family orientated school, which encourages a closer relationship with families, providing a direct daily contact between parents and the class teacher or the classroom assistant, thus helping the adaptation and involvement of children and providing them the necessary security to explore and grow up happy and confident. Our activity plan includes a set of initiatives that appeal to the participation of families, namely through their regular presence in various activities and events.

With regards to Nursery, Papião follows the HighScope approach, which identifies and develops the strengths, interests, and abilities of each child, and where the emphasis is placed on active learning, the result of the child´s intentional action on his surroundings: materials, space, others. We believe that children build their own learning through action and involvement with the physical and human environment.

The planning of activities in nursery is coherent and thoughtful to contribute to the sensory, psychomotor, and cognitive development of each child, resulting in a diversity of sensory and motor experiences inside and outside the classroom. Our pedagogical project is centered on the child – aiming at their global development, and on the involvement of parents, as important educational partners in promoting the development and learning of their children.

Our pedagogical practice is based on fundamental principles, which include the organisation of a comfortable and facilitating environment, the quality of interactions with the adults in the classroom, the careful planning of activities, and the respect for the children needs to experiment, explore, and communicate freely.

As main aspects of nursery, we value:

• Affectionate and reassuring adult-child interactions;
• Welcoming environment, quiet and comfortable, tailored for the child;
• Respect for each child and their pace of development and learning;
• Dynamic, Innovative, and diversified activities;
• Active and individualised learning;
• School-Family relationships.

Together, we grow up happy and curious, motivated to always learn more.

In our Preschool Pedagogical project, we expect the organisation of learning environments that aim at the global and harmonious development of each child, in the cognitive, social, cultural, physical, and emotional aspects. Through free experimentation and orientated pedagogical activities, children will acquire more confidence, adopting problem-solving strategies, developing social skills, and learning to self-adjust their own behaviour, becoming autonomous and responsible.

Learning takes place in an organised and safe place, with diversified and rich resources, in a playful and dynamic way. The role of the adult is to guide the children, support them in building their understanding of the world, encouraging active engagement of individuals, materials, and ideas; aspects such as creativity, reasoning, curiosity, motivation, and critical sense are greatly enhanced. Our adults respect the differences and leaning rhythms of each child, using different strategies so that all children can be successful. Our educational practices encourage self-esteem, cooperation, mutual help, responsibility, and autonomy.

We privilege the close connection with families and we work daily to build a relationship of trust and proximity, to meet each child´s individuality. Our activity plan includes a set of initiatives that appeal to the active participation of families, mainly through their presence in various activities and events, which values the students’ journey and commitment and strengthen the school-family relationship.

We follow the Portuguese Curriculum Guidelines for Preschool Education, addressing the content areas – Personal and Social Training, Expression and Communication and Knowledge of the World – in a transversal, integrated and global way, enriching them with specific curricular activities of our educational project, such as daily English (from the age of three), Physical Education and Judo.

As principal aspects of our Preschool, we value:

• Social Interactions – adults and peers – stimulating and reassuring;
• Organised and welcoming physical places, with various and good quality equipment and resources;
• The child is the center of our educational process;
• Significant and differentiated learning, respecting individuality;
• Dynamic, Innovative, and diversified activities;
• Involvement of families and connection to the community.

Educating autonomous, responsible, and entrepreneurial students today, we build the future.

In Primary School, we invest in a solid and innovative project, guided by the commitment to an individualised and quality academic journey for each of our students, and which respects and values their characteristics and their specific needs. Due to the inherent attributes of our premises and team, our students learn in a happy, welcoming, and safe environment – typical of family orientated schools – but with ambitious goals and innovative practices, which accompany the current global educational challenges. We follow a constructivist pedagogical model, where interaction and communication are fundamental aspects for learning, and where these and the students are at the center of the educational process. We value and integrate our students´ previous knowledge, life experiences and interests into our planning. The teacher works as a guide who helps students to progress their development, with the aim of mastering knowledge in a more autonomous and conscious way. The close relation environment between teacher and students, and between students, facilitates and conducts the learning to be carried out. Moments of sharing, exhibition, debate, and confrontation of ideas are encouraged, which allows students to con-construct knowledge, in a significant learning process. Our students learn in an organised and peaceful environment, interacting with peers and teachers, through different methodologies that complement each other with quality materials, resources, and equipment, namely digital. The rigorous planning of activities and the valorisation of a continuous assessment of learning, makes possible the close monitoring of the students and the guarantee of the development of their maximum potential. There is an active participation of students in the dynamics of the class and the school, namely in events and parties that involve moments of presentation to the school community, in carrying out school visits and outings in the community (knowledge and exploration of cultural and natural heritage), in the educational integration of technologies and development of digital skills, in experimental science activities and on social impact projects, among many other initiatives carried out in a school context or in the community. Our students are encouraged to be curious, to enjoy investigating, learning and studying, assuming autonomy and responsibility on their school journey, which they always try to overcome. Our Educational project provides for the planning of activities and the carrying out of projects that cover the areas of competence provided for in the Profile of Students Leaving Compulsory Schooling, however, we enrich our curriculum with specific knowledge, skills and attitudes that we consider relevant in training of our students: high level of English proficiency, digital skills, socio-emotional skills, environmental and sustainability education, health education (food and sports), and education for citizenship and social impact.