Preschool and Kindergarten Schedule

Please note: The Preschool and Kindergarten children are grouped together in the morning. They are split in the afternoon when Preschool becomes more of a daycare situation with napping and quiet independent play. In the afternoon Kindergartners work on specific Kindergarten academics including reading, handwriting, and math.

7:00-8:00 8:00-8:30 8:30-9:00 9:00-9:55 9:55-10:20 10:20-10:40 10:50-11:45 11:45-12:30 12:30-1:00 1:00-1:10 1:10-3:30 1:10-3:30 3:45-6:00

Morning Extended Hours Signing in Devotion Listening to Stories Music Movement Active Learning Clean-up and Snack Recess Bible History Lesson Centers Lunch Recess Devotion Story Preschoolers Rest Time Quiet Activities Kindergartners Bible History Project Reading Instruction Handwriting Math Kindermusik® Study Hall Afternoon Extended Hours

Explanation of the Schedule

Morning extended hours During this time, children of all age levels, preschool-grade 8, are combined. For older children, this will be a time to study or read. Younger children participate in supervised free play. Please see the Early Childhood Center Handbook, page 8 and 15 for further information.

Signing In The first thing students do when they come in the morning is “sign in.” Each child finds his name on the sign in paper and then either traces it or writes his name as best he can. In the “Listening to stories” section more is said about why even this little job of “signing in” is part of our curriculum.

Devotion Each week the children learn a Psalm refrain taken from the worship liturgy used in our church service. The refrains are such verses as “Blessed are they who hope, who hope in the Lord” or “Your Word is a lamp to my feet and a light for my path.” Putting these verses to music is very effective in planting Scripture in the child’s brain. It’s not uncommon for the kids to spontaneously start singing these verses at various parts of the day.

Listening to Stories There’s quite a lot to say about this which will be helpful in understanding why reading stories to children is so important. As far as academic education is concerned, a major emphasis at this early childhood level is promoting the child’s “emergent literacy.” The word literacy often refers to reading and writing ability. The ability to read is very interrelated with the entire area of language—that is, speaking and listening, reading and writing are all intertwined. From infancy and continuing throughout early childhood, language ability has been developing. For ages 3-6 the child’s language development is called “emergent literacy.” At this Preschool/Kindergarten stage children’s emergent literacy takes the form of unconventional reading and writing. That is, a child “reads” a story to himself by retelling the story—not really reading the words; and he “writes” things down in scribbles and scrawls. This emergent reading seems to facilitate the child’s ability to learn conventional reading later on, so we want to promote and encourage this type of activity. The way we do this is by doing lots and lots with language—conversation, labeling things throughout the room, having fun with language using rhymes and songs, telling stories, and so forth and so on! Our story reading in the morning is part of this whole scheme. Now, back to the specifics of listening to stories. Books are chosen carefully according to the children’s likes and interests. One type of book that has been particularly useful in promoting emergent literacy is predictable books. These books contain repetitive language and/or predictable plots. Predictable books are the sort of stories children can easily become involved with and can naturally “read” independently because the flow of the language cues what comes next. We typically have stories based on a theme and I read each story several times through the week. The goal is to have the students involved in telling/reading the story by the end of the week. These are the books children tend to pick out to go back to and “read” on their own. This whole process supports the child’s emergent literacy. As the year goes along we naturally get more focused on some specific words and sounds. This links up to the “signing in” first thing in the morning. The sounds and letters the children start to pick up on first are the ones they associate with their own name and the names of other students in class. These are the letters to which I draw the children’s attention while the children are listening to stories, and then we build from there. So while listening to stories may look like it’s just for fun—and it’s important that it is fun so as to maintain the children’s interest and enthusiasm—the purpose is far more than fun. It’s building the child’s language skills which is fundamental to success in reading and writing.

Music Emergent literacy is also promoted through songs that go along with the story theme.  The music easily leads into and is often combined with the next part of the program—movement.

Movement During movement time we work with basic movements, body awareness including balance and directionality, and muscle strength. We encourage the children to try moving in new ways building their confidence with practice.

Active Learning Active Learning is the less structured part of the children’s Preschool/Kindergarten experience—it’s what seems to be “just play time,” but, from an Early Childhood educator’s point of view, it is considered “active learning.” During this Active Learning time of the day, the child chooses how he will spend his time—playing with cars, building with blocks, painting, playing with a specific person, listening to a story. Through what appears to be “just playing” the child is gaining much knowledge about how things in the world work—anywhere from concrete understanding like how to construct a ramp for toy cars to solidifying the concept of one-to-one correspondence as the child works out having the right number of plates for a pretend picnic. And this is the setting where the rubber meets the road in social relationships such as how to work out sharing a car, who goes first in a game, or who’s going to be what character in dramatic play.

Clean-up and Snack During the active learning time children go from one activity to another. For the most part we leave the clean up to the end when we all help each other get things put away. Snacks might be typical like fruit and cheese or something a little different like corn on the cob. Whatever it is, snacks are healthy—nothing overly sugary. Sometimes the snack reinforces a letter or concept we’re working on—grapes for letter G, a tea party for letter T, or circle and square crackers when we’re working with these geometric shapes.

Recess This is a great chance for the Preschool and Kindergarten kids to interact with the rest of the school children. We are grateful for this aspect of our school because both the older and younger children benefit from playing together. It gives the older children an opportunity to be considerate and helpful, and the younger children have good role models to look up to.

Bible History Lesson After having the opportunity to play early on, the children are ready to sit and focus. After recess the children listen to a Bible lesson. We spend an entire week on each lesson—Old Testament lessons for most of the first semester; Jesus‘s birth and life from December through the end of the school year. Early in the week the Bible History lesson is told in a simple story form. Later in the week sometimes props or a flannel board are used. Work includes a memory verse that reinforces a concept for the lesson.  A detailed copy of the Bible History lesson is sent home the day the lesson is introduced each week.  Homework for your child is listening to you read the story and going over the memory work. Preschoolers are not drilled on the memory verse, but many become quite familiar with it to the point of memorization just by being exposed to it throughout the week. Kindergartners are specifically asked to say the verses. We continue to review the memory verses through the school year.

Centers In a continuation of the more structured part of the Preschool/Kindergarten day children are split up into groups of two or three and spend 10-15 minutes in each of three Learning Centers. The Learning Centers focus on a variety of skills specifically geared to promote fine motor, math concepts, exploring scientific principles, or experiencing a variety of art mediums. Active learning is still going on, but the materials the children will be working with are limited and the goals more defined.

— Half-day Preschoolers Leave —

— Preschool Day Continued —

— Kindergarten Day Continued —

— Preschool and Kindergarten Ends —