Early Years at Lagoa
Dedicated teachers provide a nurturing and truly bilingual education for children aged three to five. We help young students to learn independently and to connect what they absorb here with life outside of school. Fostering this enthusiasm early will establish a strong foundation for your child’s future education.
Each classroom is managed by a highly trained teacher and a full-time teaching assistant; both are fluent in English and Portuguese. The education systems in Portugal and England require that children are guided to develop skills such as reading and writing, along with competencies like confidence and resilience, to prepare them for an increasingly globalised world.
We take a project-based learning approach, ensuring learning is happy, experimental, fun, and exciting while promoting literacy, Mathematics, and expressive arts.
Children are encouraged and guided to learn through inquiry and the proven power of play.
A wide variety of activities and experiences help build confidence and expand children’s social development, speech, language, and fine and gross motor skills. Pre-school students enjoy weekly Forest School lessons as part of our Outdoor Learning Programme, complementing what they learn in class.
Teaching is bilingual with English and Portuguese lessons. Each classroom is managed by a highly trained teacher and a full-time teaching assistant, ensuring students are taught in both fluent English and Portuguese.
Early Years curriculum
In Portugal, there is an increasing awareness of the importance of Pre-School for students' personal and academic success, as well as in the overall development of the national educational system. Pre-School is considered the first step toward a solid education.
Our bilingual Portuguese/English curriculum is based on the Portuguese requirements for bilingual schools, “Programa Escolas Bililingues em Inglês” (PEBI) and the Early Learning Goals (ELGs) from the UK.
When the children are 5 years old, they should be ready to move into Year 1 of the English/International Primary Section of the school or to the “five-years-old class,” leading to the “1º Ano” of the Portuguese/National Section (starting at the age of six).