Curriculum
The philosophy behind our curriculum is that young children learn best by doing. Learning isn't just repeating what someone else says; it requires active thinking and experimenting to find out how things work and to learn firsthand about the world we live in.
The Importance of Play
In their early years, children explore the world around them by using all their senses. In using real materials, such as blocks, children learn about sizes, shapes, and colors. In time, they learn to use one object to stand for another. This is the beginning of symbolic thinking. For example, they might pretend a stick is an airplane or a block is a hamburger. Gradually children become better able to use abstract symbols like words to describe their thoughts and feelings. They learn to "read" pictures that are symbols of real people, places, and things. This exciting development in symbolic thinking takes place during the preschool years as children play. Play provides the foundation for academic learning. It is the preparation children need before they learn highly abstract symbols such as letters and numbers. Play enables us to achieve the key goals of our early childhood curriculum. Play is the work of young children.
Our Curriculum Goals
The most important goal of our early childhood curriculum is to help children become enthusiastic learners. This means encouraging children to be active and creative explorers who are not afraid to try out their ideas and to think their own thoughts. Our goal is to help children become independent, self-confident, inquisitive learners. We're teaching them how to learn, not just in preschool, but all through their lives. We're allowing them to learn at their own pace and in the ways that are best for them. We're giving them good habits and attitudes, particularly a positive sense of themselves, which will make a difference throughout their lives.
Our curriculum identifies goals in all areas of development:
- Social: to help children feel comfortable in school, trust their new environment, make friends, and feel they are a part of the group
- Emotional: to help children experience pride and self-confidence, develop independence and self-control, and have a positive attitude toward life
- Cognitive: to help children become confident learners by letting them try out their own ideas and experience success, and by helping them acquire learning skills such as the ability to solve problems, ask questions, and use words to describe their ideas, observations, and feelings
- Physical: to help children increase their large and small motor skills and feel confident about what their bodies can do
We accomplish these goals and give your child a successful start in school through the activities we plan, the way we organize the environment and select toys and materials, and how we plan the daily schedule and talk with children.
