Play and Learning Station - Your Child's Education

CURRICULUM
Children learn by doing. They learn by playing, experimenting, exploring and testing. Learning is meant to be a natural, joyful experience. Children flourish when the process of discovery is lovingly encouraged and gently reinforced. This is the philosophy behind our curriculum. Our curriculum fosters individual growth by providing numerous opportunities for exploration, manipulation and child-initiated choices. Through our program, children develop critical cognitive skills such as conservation, classification, cause-and-effect, sequencing and logical thinking. Our academically rich curriculum is both age-appropriate and flexible enough to accommodate individual differences in needs, abilities, and interests. Specific activities may vary depending on the school and the age of the children; however, the underlying principles remain the same:

• Children learn through active exploration.
• Children initiate their own learning.
• Learning comes from open-ended experiences.
• Adults are facilitators of children’s learning.

We believe that learning involves much more than just reciting letters and numbers. All children need opportunities to be responsible, to make choices and to be treated with respect. We include activities that encourage the growth of the whole child.

In addition, we also offer an academically enriched pre-kindergarten program called The Pre-Primary Enrichment Program. The goal of this curriculum is to ensure that all children leave our program with the social and cognitive skills essential for success in kindergarten and throughout the primary school years.

Lesson plans that provide further information regarding our program should be posted in all classrooms.

DAILY ACTIVITIES
Although your child’s schedule varies somewhat every day, a general description of activities in a typical day is presented below:

Activity Time: Activities specific to the weekly theme are presented along with basic activities such as puzzles, table manipulatives, dramatic play, blocks, etc.

Group Time: Group times are child-centered, participative sessions. The planned group activities vary in content and include reading, music, movement, fingerplays, discussion, dramatization, games, and experience stories.

Outdoor Time: The playground is an extension of the classroom and Activity Time. Children can participate in an activity of their own choosing. Although each or our play yards is unique, a variety of experiences are available and may include: climbing equipment, swings, bicycles, balls, hoops, sand box, or toys. Indoor materials can be brought outdoors: easels, books, chalk, crayons, dolls, dress up clothes, etc. Inclement weather, special events, or celebrations will occasionally affect the scheduling of outdoor time.

Snacks and Meal Times: Teachers sit with children while they are eating, encouraging and participating in quiet conversation.

Rest Time: Children are given the opportunity to nap or rest each day.

Infant and toddler activities are based on the individual needs of the child. Activity plans for all age groups are posted weekly in each room.

MIXED-AGE GROUPING
Our programs encourage mixed-age grouping of children whenever possible to provide a rich learning environment that recognizes that all children are unique and develop at their own pace and according to their individual interests and abilities. In mixed-age grouping, children who are at least one year apart in age are placed in the same classroom. Our teachers and staff are educated in mixed-age grouping to help ensure it is implemented with the utmost focus on the child’s development and safety. Mixed-age grouping is an effective tool in child development, providing many benefits including:

• Older children learn to be helpful, patient, and tolerant, while developing increased confidence in their skills and abilities.
• Younger children have the opportunity to learn more advanced cognitive and socialization skills from the older children.
• Individual differences in development are more readily accommodated.
• Children are challenged to think through problems in a more creative and flexible way as they observe children of other ages approaching problems differently than they do.

Your director can provide you with additional information regarding mixed-age grouping and can answer any additional questions you may have.

TRANSITION PLAN
When children transition from one class to the next, the school has a transition plan to help them become familiar with the new program, teachers, and children before they officially begin. The transition plan allows flexibility in order for us to best meet the developmental needs of each child. Your child’s teacher or director will provide more details about transitioning when your child will move to another classroom.

Children in our program are considered for transition according to their developmental abilities and maturation levels as well as upon space availability in the next classroom. Our procedures help provide a consistent environment for the children, allowing the teachers to effectively plan age-appropriate learning experiences and encouraging the children to establish long-term social relationships, while allowing the school to regulate the flow of children through the program.

PREVENTIVE DISCIPLINE
We take a preventive approach to discipline that teaches children positive behaviors rather than punishing them for misbehaving. Our goal is to provide children with the opportunity and motivation to make choices, function independently, learn social skills through gentile, encouraging guidance, respect the needs of others, adapt to routines and simple rules, and become responsible group members. Our learning environments are rich and are structured to allow children to pursue their interests and abilities, reducing the occurrence of disciplinary problems arising from boredom or undue restraint.

Preventative discipline improves children’s self-esteem and problem solving skills, and encourages prosocial behavior. This helps our school maintain an atmosphere of warmth and understanding, and helps children develop as individuals and as part of a group.

In extreme situations and as a last resort, separation from the group may be necessary for the benefit of the child and the remainder of the group. Staff utilize this time to help the child regroup before returning to the group, and children are allowed to re-enter the group when the feel ready to do so. Separation is not used with infants and toddlers.

Corporal punishment is absolutely forbidden.