Our Preschool Goals
At Brookfield Preschool, we strive to "feed the brain" through fun activities which give children the great start they need to be successful in elementary school and beyond. We provide challenge, while encouraging creativity and curiosity. Most of all, we want the learning to be fun, so that they will be hungry for more! Our Preschool goals follow the Core Knowledge sequence o
f preschool goals, including the following areas:
Language Development
A well-developed vocabulary and strong ability to use language impacts nearly every aspect of a child’s future development. Words and the way we use them to express and relate ideas provide the filter through which we perceive, understand, and analyze our world and our experiences. Language is a means of personal and interpersonal communication and a means to organize, relate, and analyze information. Language is a way to comprehend others and our world and to express our feelings and thoughts. It helps us to narrate, predict, and imagine. Children are most receptive to language development before the age of six years, so it is incumbent upon us as parents and caretakers to provide as many experiences as we can to develop their abilities. This includes the development of oral language and a solid preparation for written language skills. Our goals include:
Understand and use verbal and nonverbal features of communication
Understand and use language to think: Organize, relate, and analyze information
Understand and use increasingly varied and complex vocabulary and syntax
Develop memorization skills
Develop a sense of rhyme and rhythm
Use appropriate gestures when listening to nursery rhymes, poems, fingerplays, and songs
Listen to and participate in stories read aloud
Develop a notion of “story schema”
Demonstrate an awareness of book and print organization
Develop an awareness of written matter in everyday surroundings and its many uses
Develop phonemic awareness
Develop the fine motor skills and strokes used in writing
Mathematical Reasoning and Number Sense
Through examination and manipulation of familiar objects, students begin to recognize similarities and differences, classify objects and shapes, recognize and create patterns or sequences, make comparisons, and use simple measurement skills. They develop an understanding of one to one correspondence and of addition and subtraction as “putting together” and “taking away.” They move from concrete experience to symbolic numbering and using mathematical language. Our goals include:
Sort and classify objects or pictures of objects
Duplicate and continue linear patterns
Perceive and recognize shapes
Use simple measurement skills to seriate objects by sizes, length, height, size, volume, mass, or temperature
Quantify groups of objects
Compare written numerals to 100
Develop an understanding of addition and subtraction
Identify money
Orientation in Time and Space
The development of an inner sense of time and place is essential for personal autonomy and social integration, as well as for future instruction in history, geography, and geometry. These concepts help a child to organize him/herself, monitor behavior, and accomplish tasks. Our goals include:
Understand and Use the language of time
Establish reference points in time
Demonstrate an awareness of the passage of time and of periods of time
Understand and use the language of space
Establish reference points in actual and represented space
Use simple maps of familiar environments
Demonstrate an understanding of basic geographic concepts
Scientific Reasoning and the Physical World
Opportunities for systematic observation and hands-on investigation of both the living and the material world introduce children to a systematic way of looking at, describing, and explaining the world around them and then to making predictions based on these observations. The children are encouraged to represent those findings in words, drawings, displays, and photos, so that science becomes a way to “tell the story about how nature works.” Our goals include:
Demonstrate an initial understanding of the living world
Demonstrate an initial understanding of elements of the material world
Use various tools and objects to construct and create
Music
Many studies have now shown the tremendous effect that music has on a child’s cognitive abilities. Experiences in listening to and making music provide opportunities to practice oral language skills, to use and expand concept development, and to focus attention on discriminating differences in sounds, which in turn facilitates the phonemic awareness necessary for reading. Group musical experiences offer the opportunity to practice social and performance skills. Our goals include:
Listen to and discriminate differences in sound
Imitate and produce sounds
Listen to and sing songs
Listen to and move to music of different styles and periods
Visual Arts
The use of various media and techniques provides rich opportunities for sensory exploration and manipulation, as well as for the development of fine motor skills and graphic representation, a precursor to writing. A guided examination of various works of art provides practice in focusing attention on visual detail and in discriminating visual differences. Such discussions also afford rich opportunities for language development and for the appreciation of how artists can represent objects, people, and actions in different ways. Our goals include:
Attend to visual detail of objects and images
Think about style and feeling
Explore and create, using various art forms, media, and techniques
Movement & Coordination
Movement activities help to develop one’s body image and capabilities and enhance the concepts of time, space, and language. They also provide opportunities for social development when carried out with others. Our goals include:
Refine physical attention and relaxation
Refine gross motor skills
Refine eye-hand and eye-foot coordination skill. Play group games
Use the body expressively
Autonomy and Social Skills
In order to be ready to learn in a group setting, children must learn to function both independently and within the social setting of a class group. Through a variety of preschool experiences, interpersonal skills essential to interacting appropriately with others are fostered. The children learn to delay or defer immediate desires, when necessary, and to assume responsibility for their own actions. Our goals include:
Establish a sense of self and personal responsibility
Function and work constructively in a group setting, using appropriate social skills
Work Habits
Good work habits are a foundation for the manner in which children will later approach academic work. They are established, step by step, through the experiences children encounter and the expectations they develop in directed activities and play at the preschool level. Through gentle guidance, they develop positive approaches toward their activities. Our goals include:
Identify materials and steps needed to carry out an activity
Develop independent work habits
Develop memory skills
Develop persistence when dealing with a task
Evaluate and correct one’s own work
Critical Thinking
Those who can think critically are much more likely to succeed and to be able to adapt to whatever comes along in their future lives. While some people seem to have a built-in knack for critical thinking, this is a skill which can be developed. Our goals include:
Evaluate and correct one’s own work
Develop classification skills which can enhance problem solving
Understand the basics of cause and effect, action and consequences
Use basic organized analysis to solve age-appropriate problems
Draw conclusions based on evidence
