vision, values + principles

Vision

Our vision for Bueno Market is to build a platform to make Montessori accessible and do-able for all families. 

We've thoughtfully designed how-to resources for you to use along side our aesthetically beautiful educational materials inspired by Montessori principles. Our coaching combines AMI Certified Montessori teaching experience, and Montessori-at-home parenting wisdom to support your specific at-home learning and routine goals within your environment. Consulting allows us to apply these principles and systems to projects of a broader scale. 

Values

1. Thoughtfulness. Design into every product the ability to unpack it, introduce it to the child, and place it on a spot on the your shelf for immediate use. We want to help make it easier to create your prepared environment. 

2. Produce Locally and Sustainably. Our products are currently 70% produced in Ontario, Canada, 10% in Quebec, Canada, and the remaining products are with a sustainable source from the UK. It is our goal to support Canadian craftsmanship and materials by sourcing materials for and producting 100% of our products locally by 2024.

Principles 

We have high expectations. There is no current gold standard upon which products for children are evaluated against. There is no guarantee to meet high educational, social, or environmental standards. We believe that there is an objective good example to set when it comes to raising our children. We believe that the objects and content that we expose our children to should be evaluated to ensure they are providing our children with access to the right types of materials and modelling of behaviour to follow. 

Raising amazing humans is in our reach. All content and products created for or shared by us follow these principals:

Build the brain:
Encourage sustained focus, increased emotional regulation, and heightened mindfulness.

Nurture Normalization:
In Montessori terms; love of work, concentration, self-discipline, and sociability

Respect and build on current abilities:
Observe, plan for skill building, and recognize progress.

Follow the child:
As Maria Montessori did; with patience, a prepared environment, and by respecting and celebrating the unique contributions each child is making to their community.  

Work with sensitive periods/developmental leaps:
Learn them, recognize them and provide opportunities for repetition and problem solving during these windows of opportunity. 

Grow the sense of self:
Encourage independence, respect individuality, nurture a growth mindset. 

Operate sustainably:
For all inputs; the earth, your time, your energy, your emotions

Bond with nature:
When possible connect back to the story of our universe and within that our earth, plant and animal life. 

Honour the past and respect the future:
Self, humans, the world, the universe.

Discourage consumerism and overconsumption:
Focus on being more and needing less*

Promote reality, imagination and then fantasy**:
Build a strong foundation in reality, give room for important imaginative play, and reserve fantasy until the brain can distinguish between fiction and reality.  

Celebrate diversity and inclusion: 
Be shaped by the beauty and depth of life, across time and place.

Be a model:
Of good manners***, eating and drinking healthy + whole foods, respectful interactions, and appropriate uses of objects

These standards have helped guide us in the way we interact with children and the materials and content we invite into our environment that form so much of their world. It has provided a solid ground upon which to stand when we come across poor examples of this behaviour or product design in or outside of our environment, allowing us to have productive discussions and develop a deeper understanding of what is "good" for us. 

It is our hope that we can work with and educate product designers and makers, shops, and families on these standards. We imagine a future where these principals are prioritized when creating products and content for children and families. 

* Thank you to the Pine Project for these words.

** For children in the first plane of development - the absorbent mind. Once children have developed into the second phase, where the learn through reasoning, and explore their imagination and develop logic, they have enough of a base in reality to begin exploring fantasy. 

***We understand and welcome the cultural nuances of manners. This makes for a richer discussion when introducing them to children as the manners appropriate for our house, for school, for other close friend and family households, for the broader community, and worldwide.