The curriculum for the 18 months and 2 ½ year olds age group is a fun curriculum and less structured than other age groups. These programs focus on social skills and transitioning children from home to school. These young children are taught socialization and general life skills via play and discovery. The focus is on social skills such as: getting along with other children, learning how to share and take turns, how to treat friends and adults with respect and kindness, how to follow group rules and expectations and learning basic routines. The children are exposed to colors, shapes, numbers, alphabet sounds and a variety of other basic academic skills that are the foundation for their life long education.
The teachers in the 2 ½ age group will work with parents to potty train the children. Most if not all children will leave this age group full potty trained; this is critical to our program since the children cannot enroll in the 3 year old program unless they are fully potty trained.
The 3 and 4 year olds curriculum continue to support the development of social skills and basic routines but also begin to address early literacy (reading) and early numeracy (math) skills as well as exposure to content such as writing, science, and social studies. The focus becomes more academic but is still taught and supported via discovery and play. The 4 year old program, in particular, prepares students to enter kindergarten and is guided by the State Prekindergarten guidelines.
The children in the 2 ½, 3 and 4 year olds programs attend “Chapel” once a month. Chapel is a 15-20 minute worship celebration that is intended to prepare children for understanding and participation in Sunday mass in the future. The children participate in prayer, a reading and mini-discussion of a Bible story and song. The lessons taught during worship class that month are highlighted at Chapel. The children who celebrated a birthday that month are honored and celebrated at this time as well. It is a beautiful service and parents are always welcomed to attend.
Field trips are brought to the preschool in lieu of the school transporting children on field trips. We get a visit from the dentist and the firemen just to name a few. The only exception is a visit to Zach Theatre for the 3 and 4 year olds; a local community theatre. We also have a parade during our Fall Festival which takes place around Halloween time and a Texas Day parade to kick off the spring season. There are several fun, community building activities throughout the school year.