DAILY SCHEDULES
While activities differ slightly by age, a general overview of our daily classroom routines include:
Morning Work
Children are enthusiastically greeted at the door and quickly incorporated into an organized table activity and free play combination. Morning work is often a practice/review time for phonemic, writing and math skills learned over the past months. Children most often complete morning work quickly and move to a free play time before the “official” morning meeting (circle time). This is a wonderful opportunity for independent social development and for teachers talk individually with children as the day begins.
Circle Time
Circle time is an important teaching time during the day. While the children sit together, usually on their “spot” on the carpet, the teacher initiates a conversation about daily topics such as the weather and the calendar. These simple routines become mini math and science lessons as children count the days, review the month and year, the days of the week, the seasons, and upcoming holidays or special events. New themes, letters, numbers, colors and shapes. Circle time almost always involves music as children sing different songs such as the alphabet song, the days of the week song, the months of the year song, the number song, and different nursery rhymes. Many of our classes use Scholastic News magazines as a weekly part of their morning circle routines.
Group Activity
During group activities, children have the opportunity to incorporate what they learned at circle time through a math, science, art or writing activity. They practice new math, writing and phonemic skills, develop fine motor control, and learn how to communicate their ideas and needs effectively. An important part of whole group activities is learning how to stay with a task and follow directions independently.
Learning Centers
Most classrooms utilize rotating learning centers to teach and reinforce that month’s concept and skill focus. Learning centers allow teachers to work with smaller groups of children and tailor the specific center task to child’s developmental level. KinderPrep is fortunate to have “floaters” who often help with teacher-directed activities during center times.
Centers vary depending upon the monthly themes, concepts and skills. Center activities vary widely but often incorporate math manipulatives, journal writing, phonemic awareness, art, listening and responding to stories, puzzles, games, sensory experiences, material investigations, cutting, painting, building and dramatic play.
Some centers allow children to initiate their own play, either alone or with other children; other centers have specific tasks or open-ended projects for the children to complete, usually under teacher direction. Important, too, are the “learning skills” children develop during center time as they learn how to work independently, take turns, share and play cooperatively with others.
Centers vary depending upon the monthly themes, concepts and skills. Center activities vary widely but often incorporate math manipulatives, journal writing, phonemic awareness, art, listening and responding to stories, puzzles, games, sensory experiences, material investigations, cutting, painting, building and dramatic play.
Some centers allow children to initiate their own play, either alone or with other children; other centers have specific tasks or open-ended projects for the children to complete, usually under teacher direction. Important, too, are the “learning skills” children develop during center time as they learn how to work independently, take turns, share and play cooperatively with others.
Story Time
Although teachers often include stories in their morning circle times, most days find the children listening to a story during a specific Story Time. Teachers choose their stories carefully from the best examples of children’s literature, both fiction and non-fiction, and often match the story content to the monthly themes. Story time usually includes identifying the author and illustrator and making predictions about the story from the illustrations. KinderPrep has a number of Big Books that allow teachers to model specific reading skills such as left/right directionality, return sweep and one-to-one word correspondence. Story discussions include questions, reactions to the story and much talk about new vocabulary!
Gross Motor
Children spend time outdoors daily climbing, running, jumping, and playing organized group activities to help children with developing large muscle control, motor coordination, and balance. During inclimate weather, the children spend their gross motor time in our large activity room.
Chapel
The environment and curriculum at KinderPrep are designed to develop the body, mind, and spirit of our children. Weekly chapel sessions and the inclusion of Scripture in teaching reflect our faith-based mission to glorify God in all we do. Chapel times last about 20 minutes once a week and are held in the church’s sanctuary. We begin chapel with a song that calls us to worship, listen to a story either from the Bible or based on Biblical teaching, engage in prayer time, and end with another (and usually quite lively!) praise song. Chapel is a special time that we look forward to every week.
Cooking
Most classes enjoy monthly/weekly lessons that incorporate math, science and language skills into one cooking activity. Preschool teachers can be very creative when it comes to using food to create almost any themed snack, from graham cracker firetrucks to snowmen on sticks to worm and dirt pudding! Teachers often place sign-up sheets outside the classroom a week prior to a cooking activity so parents can help provide ingredients. Cooking creations seldom make it home, except in the child’s tummy, but we do take lots of proud pictures to post on our Hallway Walls of Fame.
Music
Music is incorporated into classroom routines throughout the entire day. This includes singing to develop language skills, movement to develop motor skills and rhythm to develop spatial skills that help with math and science. Studies have shown that children who regularly participate in music have shown dramatic improvements in memory retention skills, eye hand coordination, and spatial temporal reasoning skills.
Snack
Time is set aside each day to allow for a mid-morning snack; snacks are provided by parents. As per state regulations, please be sure to label lunch bags with your child's name and the day's date. Whenever possible, we ask that healthy snacks are sent in with the children. Here at KinderPrep, we try to promote healthy bodies and healthy eating.
Please note: from time to time, there may be an allergy in your child's classroom. Student safety is our number one priority; we will notify parents so they can plan snacks accordingly for the safety of our students.
Please note: from time to time, there may be an allergy in your child's classroom. Student safety is our number one priority; we will notify parents so they can plan snacks accordingly for the safety of our students.
Technology
Starting in September, our 4-year-old, Trans K and Kindergarten classes participate in weekly or bi-weekly lessons on iPads to learn the digital skills that will be crucial as our preschools become 21st century adults. Teachers plan specific activities that include educational software and websites, graphics programs, e-reading, and content gathering from safe, approved websites. Beginning in January, 3-year-old classes begin using the iPads they focus on learning screen navigation while engaging educational software.
