The Pre-Kindergarten Program is an academically challenging program for children old enough to enter kindergarten or five by Dec.31st, but who .would benefit from one more year in a nurturing environment. This program gives the children another year to grow socially and emotionally while stimulating their intellectual capabilities.
The Kindergarten Program is designed to develop a love of learning. Each child is challenged academically in both large and small group settings. A low student teacher ratio ensures that every student will realize his or her potential in a warm and supportive environment. The small group also allows for more attention to each child's individual strengths and needs.
Both programs are individually geared to the child's unique abilities. Students are exposed to a range of academics. While each child is challenged, we encourage them to progress at their own pace. The two programs are housed in the same classroom so that the children get the experience of both small teacher/student ratios and larger group exposure. They also receive the opportunity to interact on a daily basis with more than one teacher.
Free Play
The children free to play with a variety of materials. Each week they work as a group to select several free play activities for that week. This process encourages decision-making, sharing, and working within a group. Children are free to work with the chosen materials alone or with friends.
9:10-9:40 Meeting
Language Art
Our approach to language arts combines whole language and phonics. Each child is challenged to their own ability to recognize, write, and identify the sounds in letters and words. Just as you must babble before you talk, you must scribble and draw random shapes before you write letters. You must experiment with random letters while absorbing the concept of words. Activities include journal writing, word games, labeling objects and rhyming. Books are an intricate part of the classroom. Stories and books are worked into every unit of study in order to hear literature, as well as generate discussions. Each year we study an author and compare his or various works, characters and illustrations.
Snack 9:40-10:00
Social Studies
We strive to help the children develop an interest in examining their environment: the weather, birds, water, motion, countries and other cultures. Children learn to recognize and celebrate important people and events through stories, discussions and songs. M/W/F stories about current units.
Math Readiness
Children are introduced to numbers into the double and triple digits they are exposed to counting and how numbers are formed. They work with manipulatives to learn about simple addition, patterning, measuring, comparing quantities, graphing and classifying.
Outdoor Play
This is a chance for the child to develop social skills, and fine and gross motor skills as well as have fun. Our playground has many areas for succeeding with these skills. There are climbing structures, slides, places to be imaginative, bikes, open space for games and sand to play with when the weather permits.
Art and Music
Are integrated throughout our activities to make them fun and to encourage creative development. The children use a variety of mediums for art projects and learn songs that relate to holidays and seasonal units throughout the year as well as various social studies, science and language arts activities.