Early Childhood Curriculum

The Shaker Lane Integrated pre-school and early childhood program emphasizes a language play based curriculum. Nursery is ages 3 and 4 and pre-kindergarten is ages 4 and 5. What are children really learning when they play at centers?
Block Center:
Building towers, garages, houses and other structures help children learn early math and science concepts such as numbers, size, weight, gravity, shapes, balance and symmetry.
social and emotional skills develop as children share and cooperate with materials.
Dramatic Play Center:
When children pretend in a risk free environment, they develop flexible thinking, learn to create beyond the here and now, stretch their imaginations and use new words and word combinations.

Through play, children develop inter-personal skills, particularly cooperation and conflict resolution.

Dramatic play encourages children to think abstractly, which is an important pre-reading skill. Children come to understand that words represent ideas. Play offers opportunities to develop fine motor skills and creative abilities.

Art & Writing Centers:
Playdough, finger painting, drawing, cutting and gluing foster the development of eye-hand coordination which gives children practice in early writing skills. As children begin to draw representational objects, they are using symbols to represent something else. This is an important reading readiness skill. "Scribbling" or pretend writing is an important emergent writing skill.
Games and Small Manipulative Center:
Activities like puzzles, pegboards, stringing beads, and Legos® help to develop fine motor skills, eye-hand coordination and foster many math related skills. Task completion supports the development of independence, lays the foundation for good study habits and improves self-esteem. As an old Chinese proverb states:

I hear and I forget,
I see, and I remember,
I do, and I understand.

Play is the most efficient, powerful and productive way for young children to learn. Play provides the ultimate curriculum for social, physical and cognitive advancement. Additionally, for some children, support services such as speech therapy, occupational therapy and physical therapy are provided and integrated into the program under the guidelines of "Chapter 766".
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