As preschool teachers, we provide children with a foundation to their educational journey. We must follow the California Kindergarten Readiness Guidelines to ensure each child is having the same opportunity. One of our state’s largest problems is that children are not ready for Kindergarten socially or academically. Sure a huge part of preschool is to learn social interaction but there must be educational guidelines. We assess each child and share the information with parents so that they are always on the same page. We send out daily report cards that say their mood, what they enjoyed, what they ate/drank, toileting, reminders, and a do not forget section. We strive to keep communication as clear as possible even if we need to call parents after work. Being El Dorado Hills, we deal with a diverse population and must accommodate and be sensitive to all children. There are so many ways we can teach concepts. I believe that we should teach to children’s interests but we need to have a curriculum in place and follow it.

 

            At Adventureland Daycare and Preschool, our biggest compliment we receive is how detailed we are. Whether it is learning each child, our curriculum, newsletters, policies, or how we interact. Every month, I design a curriculum that includes learning letters, numbers, shapes, sight words, writing, Spanish, geography, and an array of developmental experiences. I want children to enjoy what they are learning and challenge them so that they retain the information.

 

           Young minds are like sponges and need to be nourished in different ways. Each child learns differently and we need to provide experiences for them to do so. We start our day off with our circle time songs and move onto our circle time calendar. We go over calendar concepts, weather, specific vocabulary words, questions, and the season. We learn a lot of those concepts in Spanish as well. We learn about climate and what to wear during certain weather. Then we move onto our educational posters on the wall. We have shape, number, color, and map posters. The children are really into learning about our world so we go over geography everyday. They know their continents, country, and state. Currently they are learning more details about each continent such as climate, animals that live there, and what countries are there. After we go over our posters we go over a variety of educational flashcards. We also go over sight words on our board including everyone’s name.

 

           Then we move onto the lesson of the day that ties into our monthly theme. For example our September theme was Life Cycles and on certain days we learned about the lifecycle of a chick. I read stories, set up activities, and we played with life cycle models. By the end of the lesson the children knew the steps in order of the chick’s life cycle and they could even recite and model it on their own. After our daily activity we move onto arts and crafts time where the children create art pertaining to the daily lesson. After we practice writing letters and working in our workbooks and on worksheets.

 

           We believe that children learn best through hands on experiences and so we try to provide as many experiences as possible. Instead of just showing them a picture of the life cycle of a chicken we actually hatch chicks right at daycare. Same with when we learn about the life cycle of a butterfly! We buy the caterpillars and set up a habitat and watch them grow. When we did Farm Month we went to a ranch and got a pony ride. Bringing concepts full circle helps them retain information better. When we were learning about the life cycle of a pumpkin we went to the pumpkin patch after and picked out pumpkins. Once we arrived back they were so excited to carve them and dig out the seeds and guts. They used gross motor skills to carry their little pumpkins around and fine motor to separate the pumpkin seeds from the “guts” so that we could roast the seeds.

 

          Usually I have sensory bins set up for the children to explore so that they can strengthen their hand muscles. Parents may wonder why we spend so much time playing this way but this enhances their fine motor skills to help them write. For the month of November we are learning about occupations and transportation so we have a sensory bin filled with rice and transportation vehicles. We also do lacing cards and bead lacing to practice fine motor. To practice hand-eye coordination we do all sorts of puzzles and tong activities. We have cute tong activities from Lakeshore Learning where children have to use tongs to transfer bananas to a monkey’s mouth, a bone to a dog’s mouth, and a carrot to a bunny’s mouth. They get so excited and proud when they complete each one. We let them explore a lot with colored dough and we have activity worksheets. They do a lot of painting and we always sponge paint the letter, shape, and numbers of the month. We always make sure to practice concepts in a variety of ways so that children truly grasp our teachings and that is what makes Adventureland so unique. Please click on the “Experiences we Provide” tab under the “About” tab to learn more about educational experiences.