The main goals of our curriculum are to help children develop a positive image of themselves, their school, their peers and adults. We do a number of activities throughout the year to emphasize each child's own special sense of worth. We stress understanding, sharing and cooperation throughout the entire curriculum.

Your child's initial school experience should be a pleasant and fun one. For most children, this is their first experience away from their parents. While some are shy and afraid, others are outgoing and precocious. Most are eager to learn and explore the world of school. All children have individual personalities, differing in background, maturity and abilities. To promote the maximum total development of each child, we try to provide a program that includes a wide variety of learning experiences. And though the daily activities differ according to the level of ability and maturity, the main goals remain the same.

THE GENERAL GOALS OF OUR CURRICULUM
Your child will be guided toward:
•Separating from mother/father (care provider) without severe stress, learning to adapt to new surroundings, teachers and peers

•Enjoying school: Look forward to school and learn routines readily

•Valuing: Show self pride in body, clothes, work and personal characteristics

•Growing in confidence: Learning to succeed at tasks, and to participate willingly in most activities, even new ones

•Using manners and hygiene appropriate to age: Saying please, thank you and excuse me, dressing and undressing self when using the restroom, washing hands after using the restroom and before eating

•Learning how to express feelings appropriately, especially verbally with other children and adults

•Seeking out peers for play, group and one-on-one interactions; to reduce dependency on adults; to use teachers and adults as “resource people”

•Developing language skills: Vocalization, vocabulary (indicating wants and needs), carrying out commands, increasing use of language for expression, sentence structure and usage (appropriate for age), pronunciation (appropriate for age), and enjoying good literature, rhymes, songs and finger plays, learns to recognize letters of the alphabet and recognizes own name

•Developing motor coordination, both large muscle and small (fine) muscle control.

•Developing music, visual arts, movement, dance and creative drama.

•Developing problem solving ability; to increase variety of techniques used to cope with stress.

•Developing peer relationships including waiting for turns, sitting in a group, participating in teacher directed tasks and finishing tasks.

•Developing fantasy play and imagination; use of dramatic role play such as dress-up, play dough, and blocks. (Separate fantasy from reality.)

•Developing cognitive skills (pre-academic and conceptual thinking) in all curriculum subject areas.

SUBJECT AREAS
•LANGUAGE ARTS
Listening and speaking skills, creative dramatics, puppets and flannel figures and finger plays

•LITERATURE
Books, tapes, flannel stories and poetry

•READING READINESS
Cutting with scissors, left to right sequence, eye-hand coordination, ordering and sequencing of events and large and small motor development

•MATH
Counting 1 to 10, one to one relationships, classifying, sorting, ordering, grouping and patterning, recognizing shapes and colors

•SCIENCE
Explore new materials (magnets, magnifying glass), sensory skills, cooking and exploring the world around us

•ART
Paint, textures, colors, cutting, gluing and pasting, and developing creativity

•MUSIC
Singing, instruments, rhythm records and tapes and developing an appreciation of music

•P.E. - MOTOR-PERCEPTION
Group games, dance, large and small muscle activities, position (over, under, behind, in front of, etc.); also, special units and activities will be presented on all the major holidays