PRIMARY GOALS OF OUR PRE-KINDERGARTEN PROGRAM


The primary goal is to provide your child with many opportunities for exploration and experimentation. Our activities range from creative movement and physical fitness, to painting with everything from leaves to feathers, strings, cars or marbles. We provide sensory stimulation by offering water, sand, rice, and cornmeal to play in. Our curriculum has a strong basis in literature, and books are read everyday, both in large and small groups or one-on-one. Our classroom is equipped with manipulatives to develop fine motor skills; these include pegboards, building sets, lacing cards, and duplos. Crayons and markers, as well as pencils and scissors, are always available to your child. We spend time outside each day, not only developing gross motor skills by running, climbing, and swinging, but also exploring our environment and observing plants, animals, bugs, and the sky around us. Our cooking projects incorporate math skills, such as measuring, and science concepts, like changing from solid to liquid, with an activity the children really love. Our daily activities are posted on the bulletin board in the hall outside of our classroom.
Developing social skills is an important part of your child’s preschool experience. We strive to provide your child with the tools and confidence it takes to be an effective communicator. We encourage your child to use words to resolve conflicts. We provide support and assistance for your child, as well as act as role models. Your child’s confidence will grow as he/she attempts and successfully accomplishes more activities. We offer the opportunity to practice emerging skills and recognize that repetition and reinforcement are important to your child. We request that you practice self-help skills with your child; these include putting on shoes, jackets, snowpants, boots and mittens, opening lunch boxes and food wrappers, and taking care of their own toileting needs and hand washing after using the bathroom.



THE PRIMARY GOALS OF OUR PRESCHOOL PROGRAM


The primary goal is to provide preschool children with experiences which promote the development of independence, self-esteem, self-confidence and enthusiasm for learning. The primary child’s natural way of investigating and acquiring skills is to involve himself in a variety of experiences. These are essential to success in education. The preschool program fosters physical and social development in an emotionally supportive environment.

SOCIAL EMOTIONAL GOALS

- develop confidence in one’s self and one’s ability
- develop the ability to share and be accepting of others
- develop self-control
- develop positive decision-asking skills
- develop the ability to take directions from others

MOTOR GOALS

- develop large muscle skills such as throwing, skipping, climbing, jumping, hopping

- develop fine motor skills such as cutting, proper pencil grasp, copying, pasting, coloring, tracing

- develop perceptual motor skills such as spatial orientation, the ability to distinguish left and right, up and down, over and under, etc.

SCIENCE/SOCIAL STUDIES GOALS

Introduction to: - weather - seasons
- holidays - senses
- body awareness and health - occupations
- nature, planting, leaf collecting, bug collecting
- safety signs and symbols - fire prevention
- safety: Personal Safety for Preschoolers Program
- nutrition: healthy food choices





THE PRIMARY GOALS OF OUR PRESCHOOL PROGRAM



MATH GOALS

Introduction to: - counting
- number recognition
- classification skills
- sequencing
- measuring
- grouping

READING READINESS GOALS

Introduction to: - the alphabet
- beginning sounds
- printing first name
- good oral language ability
- ability to see differences between shapes and letters
- the colors and color words
- developing good listening skills
- following 2, 3, and 4 step directions
- the care and responsibility for library books
- computer


CONCLUSION

The information provided in this handout is a general guideline and not necessarily conclusive of what each class will be doing on a more detailed level.

Parents, please remember that throughout the year, each child’s development is assessed both formally and informally by his/her classroom teachers. Since children continue to learn and develop at different rates, each child must be carefully evaluated by both parent and teacher to determine if he/she is ready for Kindergarten.