Holy Spirit 3 Year Preschool

Play is essential for optimal learning to occur and is, therefore, extremely important for children to do.  Children use play to explore their world and the people in it.  Play offers opportunities to make choices, manipulate objects, express curiosity, and solve problems.  Through our learning centers, the 3 Year Preschool Program provides a variety of activities and materials each day to stimulate the children’s interests and development.  Listed below are the centers in our program and the skills typically developed in these areas: 

·         In the Art Center, children experiment with drawing, writing, cutting tools, and various materials. Through creative expression the children learn pre-literacy skills, following directions, properties of substances, manipulation of various materials and tools, and much more.  It’s a great place to build their self esteem.

·         The Block Center helps develop fine motor skills, visual perception, and coordination.  In this center the children learn pretend play, planning and concept development, principles of construction, patterning, and more.

·         The children explore their emotions, increase their vocabulary, and discover the world around them in the Dramatic Play Center.  In addition, they use creativity, resolve conflicts, role play, develop social skills, learn self-help skills, and improve both their receptive and expressive language.  It’s also fun!

·         Cooking Projects provide numerous opportunities for young children to communicate with others and learn about the nutritional benefits of foods.  Through cooking, they are introduced to basic math facts and develop a sense of independence.  The children also learn how to use simple utensils, perform activities in sequential order, practice different food preparations, and they are able to observe foods in different forms.  

·         At the Library Center, the children listen to and participate in stories, develop pre-literacy and literacy skills, and improve their vocabulary.  The children love exploring all facets of books while practicing self-expression, following directions, and discovering sound-symbol relationships.  This is a very important center for early readers.

·         The hands on math and science tools at the Table Toys (Manipulatives) Center don’t even seem like learning tools!  Here the children develop cognitive and language skills, they learn about living and non-living things, and they discover information about quantity and quality and measurement relationships. Here again they take turns to learn about properties of substances, and number, letter, and shape recognition and matching.

·         Each week we will introduce the children to a letter and the sound the letter makes to teach Phonemic Awareness.  We would ask that you take a minute at home and help your child find items that start with the weekly letter to bring in to share during circle time.    

·         In the preschool Religion curriculum, we lead three-year-old children to know and love the God who made them.  The main goal of the program is to prepare the children to become committed Catholics who comprehend and live by the truths of our faith.  This goal is achieved through daily prayer, developmentally appropriate play, sensory experiences, manipulative activities, Bible stories, poems and songs.  The classroom centers change weekly according to the religious lesson.   This wonderful program helps children understand how important they are in the sight of God and to each of us.  

·        The children learn valuable Computer Skills playing educational games on the computers.  The games the preschoolers participate in teach them to recognize shapes, patterns and colors.  They also learn about patterns, which is an important math concept.