Preschool

In visual arts, preschool students explore materials and express their thinking and ideas within a shared creative space. Music builds group awareness and a foundation for learning through singing, rhythm, and movement. In woodshop, children engage in individual and collaborative projects that nurture creativity, independence, and care for their community.

Children enter preschool with stories to tell, and the classroom is a place to explore and share them through play, conversation, and creative expression. Through reading and storytelling, they build excitement for language and begin to capture their ideas in many forms. Listening to others’ stories helps deepen understanding, connection, and a sense of belonging.

Skills

• Expressive and receptive language
• Phonemic awareness (rhyming, recognizing sounds in words)
• Beginning to recognize letters
• Concepts of print (holding a book, recognizing that print carries meaning)
• Re-telling and creating stories through drawings, creative movement, drama, and conversations
• Asking and answering questions about stories read aloud
• Using drawings, shapes, and letters to represent thinking

Children build mathematical understanding through hands-on exploration, using materials and play to investigate numbers, patterns, and relationships. Teachers extend their thinking through questions, conversation, and rich classroom experiences. As they sort, count, and describe the world around them, children begin to see themselves as confident, capable mathematicians.

Skills

• Learning number names up to twenty
• Counting with one-to-one correspondence
• Understanding that numbers signify a quantity
• Using “bigger,” “smaller,” and “the same” to describe differences between collections of objects
• Using informal language to describe shapes
• Recognizing when a story involves mathematics

Children’s natural curiosity drives learning, as questions, ideas, and imagination shape classroom experiences. Teachers support this process by nurturing creativity, encouraging exploration, and valuing multiple perspectives. Through collaborative inquiry, children learn that understanding grows through wondering, listening, and discovering together.

Children spend time outdoors each day, exploring the playground and Fir Grove. In wellness classes, they build physical skills, coordination, and confidence through active play. These experiences support their physical, social, and emotional development while fostering cooperation and joy in movement.