| FIRST FOCUS : Social and Emotional Development |
Our planning reflects our assessment of the children's social competence; whether they separate easily from parent(s), are able to form relationships with the adults at the preschool and with their peers, and whether they are confident, and happy and eager to learn.
Aims
They are specifically designed to reflect this focus by encouraging children to relax and begin to relate to us and to each other. As we esteem the children as important, worthwhile and precious, they learn to esteem each other in the same way.
- To provide a loving, caring, supportive and relaxed environment indoors and outdoors that encourages development of their potential.
- To provide an environment where children can be children; they are encouraged to play freely with natural materials such as sand, water and mud.
- To extend children at their own pace; we encourage but do not force intellectual achievement.
- We allow children freedom of choice in the use of materials and equipment.
- We provide a multitude of creative media to help children express feelings, thoughts, tensions and imagination. We emphasise creativity before accuracy and conformity, believing this is a real key to psycho-social growth. In this way the process is valued over the product.
We teach responsibility for the care of equipment by encouraging children to participate in tidy-up and packing away sessions. |
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SECOND FOCUS : Physical Development
Aims |
| To provide a range of activities to strengthen and foster development of gross motor and fine motor muscles. Gross motor and fine motor skill and competence is foundational to the fostering of feelings of self-confidence, the development of self esteem and steady intellectual growth. |
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| THIRD FOCUS: Cognitive Development |
A good preschool programme and environment will always foster the cognitive development of children. As the children relax and become secure at preschool, cognitive development accelerates and they learn all manner of exciting things about the natural world.
Aims
To observe the children's level and depth of understanding and plan to extend it. The Arndu staff make observations and use check lists to note children's achievements and progress. Focusing on the children in this organised way ensures that learning is specific and child oriented. We use a portfolio system to monitor and document children's development. This system allows for information to be shared between the child's home and family environments.
Parents can make appointments with their child's teachers for the exchange of information, or to discuss progress, or concerns and anxieties.
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| FOURTH FOCUS: Communication Development |
| This involves the development of both receptive and expressive communication skills. Opportunities exist throughout the day for children to practise and extend their communication abilities. The program is designed to foster many skills including conversational skills, vocabulary acquisition, turn-taking, adapting to the audience and retelling information. |
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| FIFTH FOCUS: Spiritual Development |
We do not aim to teach the children a programme of Christian instruction. However, we freely share our understanding of God with the children each day. At lunch time, when we thank Him for our food, we may also talk to Him about our day, about being happy, feeling sad, needing to be kind and learning exciting new things. Sometimes, we pray for children and family members who are sick.
We teach the children about Easter and Christmas from a Biblical perspective. We do not teach against the 'Easter bunny' or 'Santa Claus' but we do not pro-actively use them in our celebration.
St Paul's has an Arndu Family Service once a term. Arndu is invited to participate by singing or performing an item in the service. You are always welcome at this service but there is no obligation to attend. |
