Kindergarten Curriculum

The Kindergarten class had an exciting year, full of the mysteries of insects, the senses, and early math and literacy skills. Throughout the year the program blended with the Primary program (ages 6-7), culminating with the joint restaurant study and project.

The Kindergarten curriculum is built around the seven domains in the Work Sampling development guidelines: Personal and Social Development, Language and Literacy, Mathematical Thinking, Scientific Thinking, Social Studies, The Arts, and Physical Development. Below is a summary of the curriculum through this particular lens.

Personal and Social Development
Personal and social development form the backbone of the Kindergarten program. One of the goals of this domain is to develop in the student a comfort level that demonstrates self-confidence, initiative, self-direction, and self-control in a variety of activities and responsibilities within the classroom. Transitions, use of materials, clean-up, circle, sharing routines, and self-help skills all allow the child to practice and progress in these areas.

Another goal is to determine a particular child's approach to learning and to capitalize on his/her strengths. This allows us to offer opportunities for him/her to take risks with new work areas to acquire flexible attitudes, to experiment with new ideas, and to stretch imaginative and creative possibilities within that work area. We stress independence with these tasks with teacher encouragement and supervision. When faced with frustration, such as having to choose a work center different than desired, all these skills come into use.

The last goal in this domain, and certainly the most challenging one for the children, is interaction with other children and adults, and conflict resolution within those interactions. Throughout the Kindergarten day, children have opportunities to cooperatively play with many different combinations of children in a wide variety of mixed-age groups. We encourage children to develop strategies for partnerships, whether indoors, outdoors, in directed or undirected activities. They participate in group circles, learning to listen, share, and follow group rules; play quiet choice games in small groups, and attend whole school activities like weekly All-School Sing and performances.

The emphasis we place on respect and active listening to other students and adults permeates all social situations school-wide. We encourage the children to seek adult help when needed to resolve conflict, to use words to describe their feelings, to practice self-control in heated conflicts, and to initiate resolution through alternate strategies and compromise. The entire staff participates in this process as our goal is to encourage empathy and caring for others through both our own actions and words. The overall atmosphere we strive to create is one of physical and emotional safety in all parts of the school experience.

Language and Literacy
Language and literacy development is integrated throughout the Kindergarten curriculum in an ongoing and lively way. The goals to develop and experience listening, speaking, appreciation of literature, prereading and reading, and writing skills were addressed through circle discussions and activities, group instructions, conflict resolution, and read-aloud book presentations. Sharing at circle on a weekly basis gave the children a forum to practice speaking clearly; use new vocabulary; retell stories or experiences; express appreciation, interest, doubt, confusion, or confidence; and to ask questions in meaningful ways.

Students had exposure to much literature, through teacher read alouds and a rotating classroom collection. In addition, many prereading and reading activities were based on "Letter of the Week" activities. We labeled objects the children brought in on a daily basis during sharing time and displayed them in the letter museum, which provided a rich source of ideas and initiation into the development of an emerging sight vocabulary.

"Message of the Day" provided another daily literary opportunity. The message primarily used common red (non-phonetic) sight words of everyday language which gave students a steady exposure to the association of the spoken and written word. The class had a lot of fun this year playing with Dot's signature on the message board-she became Dot, Lot, Tot, etc. many weeks!

There was also time through the year for structured language activities. Students played group games of phonemic awareness, did independent reading using the blue and red book series for the non-readers and primary readers for the emergent or competent reader, and read to the preschoolers several times to build confidence. Similarly, writing activities included practicing the formation of upper and lower case letters, copying words to illustrate initial sounds, and writing in journals using independent spelling. And, of course, many writing projects involved student artwork or projects with captions and stories dictated to teachers.

Mathematical Thinking
This domain includes patterns and relationships, number concepts and operations, geometry and spatial relations, measurement, probability, and statistics. Mathematical thinking is an integral part of so much of Kindergarten play--blocks, computer games, sand and water table, quiet choices, and small group discussion. At this level exploration is a major learning mode. We also do some formal introduction of pattern blocks, Stern's math blocks, patterning, sorting (bears, buttons, shells, etc.), body rhythms, multiple building materials (legos, discs, connectors, pipeworks, workbench), and card and board games.
Throughout the year students practiced math skills in our routine for the 100 days of school . They charted the days of school, predicted patterns, used bundled popsicle sticks to represent the number of days, and had lengthy discussions about numbers.

During a typical day, many other math skills were woven into the curriculum. The children got lots of practice counting through our daily attendance, charting the days of school, the story of numbers poster, and math games. In addition, patterning games (using shape, color and quantity concepts) and weather measurements were done at circle and students practiced direction and positional concepts during movement classes. Finally, the children had many opportunities to question and discuss with others the schedule of the day, the approximate time, and even and odd numbers as mathematical problems naturally arose.

Scientific Thinking
Scientific thinking at all levels encourages students to observe, investigate, question, predict, explain, and form conclusions. There were many opportunities during the insect study and the study of our senses, and during restaurant, to extend the scientific thinking of the students.

Students used their observational skills in our class study of insects. They compared different insects using magnifying glasses and microscopes and identified similarities that defined an insect. The students used their creative juices and made their own insects, complete with 3-D models and life stories. The children maintained their interest in and desire to identify insects found in the classroom, on the snow, or at home right into spring.

During the study of the senses, the children had the chance to listen, smell, feel, taste and see things, and try and predict what they were. They thoroughly enjoyed these activities and with the help of the volunteer Marlboro student, Krista, they were able to make their own challenge feelie bags, tapes and smelling containers as an extension of these investigations.

Science also made its way into our restaurant study and outdoor time. During the restaurant study, there were measurement experiences, mixing and combining of ingredients, and all the speculations about the product of their mini-meals. Frequent hikes behind the school and up local mountains included several visits to the frog pond, allowed hands-on outdoor education, and encouraged healthy exploration of our outdoor world.

Social Studies
This domain introduces the similarities and differences between and among us and the interdependence that we need to build in inclusive ways. A lot of this curriculum happened as we created our own class community and began to get along together. Many group discussions at circle and supervised, child-driven conversations centered on differences among the students. The most popular topic at this age is the difference between boys and girls. It is always a struggle to downplay stereotypes. The emphasis was on stories with leading female or minority characters at least half the time, the use of non gender-specific language, the exposure to pictures and photographs of women and minorities in male dominated professions, the partnering of boys and girls in a variety of play areas, and the use of respect in conflict resolution.

Within the wider social world the children need to form a deeper identification with rules and the way rules guarantee us all rights with responsibility. Allowing children to discuss the reasons and wisdom of rules allows them to internalize the need for adherence to the rules with greater enthusiasm and compliance. We always explained the reasons behind them, emphasizing justice and safety as the guiding principles. Children who are 5 or 6 years of age can relate completely to the need for a secure, fair environment and can progress and develop confidently within those boundaries. They also enjoyed experimenting with all the different facets of leadership and group membership, and it is crucial at these times to guide children toward principles of equality and inclusion.

The hands-on piece of social studies is the exposure the children need to have to the community and the larger world. Field trips as part of the restaurant study, the art program, a local hike, as well as visits by the firefighters and Spanish teacher Elsa Borrero, all contributed to the extension of the students' world. At every opportunity our class used the globe to find geographic destinations of trips individual children may have taken, the origin of a folk tale, or the location of our visitor's home. Having a child who grew up in India added a great deal of meaning to all these activities. Extensions of geographic thinking were encouraged through artwork during restaurant study, and assignments involving maps, and drawings of the interior of restaurants. Blocks and all the building materials and fantasy play involving camping, dress up, nursery, and Kid's Café allow dramatic play to enlarge social concepts and role playing throughout the curriculum.

The Arts
Kindergarten children generally are quite prolific artists! The goal for the children within this domain is for them to use a variety of materials to express their feelings and ideas, explore their creative strengths and expand their experience and mastery in various mediums. We used markers, brushes, fingers, collages, clay, and even bread dough or cooking batter as their expressive media. Letter of the week activities often included clay representations of letters, tracing of shapes of letters, and the forming of letter shapes into drawings, and students had many opportunities for free drawing.

This year there was strong interest in the building materials of discs, connectors, and pattern materials. Students used complicated color and shape patterns as well as extended planned building patterns. This was very artistically inspiring both to the other children and the teachers who were astounded by the complicated nature and artistry the children employed.

We all enjoyed a studio experience at River Gallery Art Studio where the children were able to synthesize a lot of their newfound skills and mastery under the guidance of Barbara Campman Merfeld. There we saw the children and adult art show on display in other studio rooms and had a chance to appreciate and comment on their own work.

Other arts experiences include music and drama. Students had group music, rhythm and dance instruction once a week, as well as daily opportunities to sing in a group at circle, lunch, snack, and at birthday celebrations. The children spontaneously make up chants and silly songs, often in the recess line waiting to go outside. Similarly, story time spontaneously became a dramatic experience periodically through the year. We acted out several favorite books including Three Billy Goats Gruff, the ABC story, or original child-generated stories.

Physical Education
The physical domain is critical to the development of young children. At the Kindergarten level, we focus on the further development of gross and the fine motor development as well as coordination, balance, body control and self-help skills. We had outdoor play time twice a day, which allowed children to move and grow freely in their skill development. We further enhanced and developed their experiences through a systematic movement program which used a variety of objects. Group activities that integrate coordinated body movements such as skipping, galloping, hopping, tiptoeing, walking forward and backward, jumping rope, animal movements, ball handling games, and tag variations were presented regularly. To give the children a great deal of practice at mastery of many different skills we offered them an obstacle course, parachute games, big yellow ball, skills stations (catapult, beanbag toss, balance beam, hopscotch, catch games, scooters, and bouncy balls), rhythm movements, and letter shape activities. Dances were done both in music class and with the Spanish class, and there was plenty of winter sledding and skating this year.

Fine motor activities are also a very important part of the Kindergarten curriculum and were constantly addressed through writing, art, and worktime choice. Sometimes we had specific assignments that required cutting, pasting, taping, stapling, molding, painting and building with small and large objects. Puzzles, board and card games, fantasy dress up, the food preparation and cooking for restaurant, color mixing, puppet making, language projects, and workbench all offered many fine motor challenges to the children as well.

Health and safety issues such as playground, field trip and hiker safety, the dressing of small cuts and bruises, were addressed on a regular basis during appropriate teaching moments, as well as during the visit by the firemen and rescue personnel.

The development of physical skills goes hand-in-hand with children's social and academic development. For this reason it was integrated into the daily routine activities of independent work in the Kindergarten program and a hands-on focus was present in the introduction of all cognitive skills.