Pre-Kindergarten Curriculum

We believe that young children learn through active play. Our classroom cabinets and shelves are stocked with a rich array of materials and hands-on manipulatives-art supplies, books, blocks, puzzles, paints, puppets, dolls, dishes, dress-up clothes, trucks, and trains, to mention just a few-that beckon students to observe, touch, experiment, imagine, and create.

Teacher-initiated and self-directed activities let students satisfy their curiosity, exercise their creativity, and construct their own learning. The children work individually as well as in small groups or as a class. They learn to communicate clearly with their teachers and with each other as well as to share responsibility and to build cooperation and teamwork.

We teach mathematics using Mathematics Their Way (Addison Wesley). Through games with familiar objects, the children learn counting, matching, sorting, ordering, comparing, patterning, and graphing. They also learn to apply these skills in real-life activities like graphing a daily weather chart and counting calendar days or money.

Our science curriculum is the Full Option Science System, which emphasizes activities that allow the children to observe and experiment with the natural phenomena in their world. Our explorations in life science, earth science, and physical science include studies of animals and plants, sea life, and space. The children grow plants and observe and record their growth; they observe and record changes in weather and seasons; they study tide-pool animals and marine mammals at the Monterey Bay Aquarium; and they count, classify and compare items in our classroom collections of rocks, shells, and leaves.

Our language arts instruction is a balance of reading and writing. We expect that students will have learned their letters prior to enrollment, and our first work in the classroom is pre-phonics: The children recognize and make rhymes; recognize and manipulate compound words; distinguish individual syllables; recognize words that begin with the same sound; recognize individual sounds within a word; and make new words by changing beginning, middle, or ending sounds. Always modeling our own enthusiasm for books and reading, we help students to understand the relationship between printed and spoken words.

In January, we begin to write. The children create journals that they will write in daily, perhaps individual words or simple sentences. Through this process, they learn that print has meaning and that they can write something that others will understand.

Once a week, students attend music and physical education classes and visit the library to check out books and to hear stories read by the Lower School librarian.

A vital component of our curriculum focuses on spirituality. We help the children to become confident in their relationship with God. Prayer becomes an important part of the children's day at school, stressing personal communication with God, gratitude for God's gifts to them and their families, and faith in God's love for them and for the entire world. Once a week, we visit the Rosary Chapel to reinforce these values.

Our teachers pay close attention to each child's social development. To foster self-reliance, the children are given opportunities to solve problems and to make appropriate decisions throughout the school day. To encourage self-regulation, activities are designed to promote caring, helping, and sharing.