the prekindergarten program
Interest Areas
St. Anne’s School Interest Areas form the organizing structures for social, cognitive, gross and fine motor skills and literacy learning and development.
At the Sensory and Discovery Tables: Sensory and Discovery Tables provide invitations for exploration and learning that tap into all learning domains. Students work on fine motor skill development as they manipulate small items. Learners practice pro-social skills, determining use of the items in or on the table, making decisions, taking turns, and sharing. Students develop literacy skills by recording lists based on the objects at the tables and cognitive skills as they work through problems based on the materials, count or sort objects, or pour and measure items at the tables. Examples of intriguing items at our Sensory Tables include: rocks and stones, corn cobs, magnets, paper clips, water, colored rice, sand, beads, and recycling materials. Our Discovery table includes many natural items, fish tanks, hermit crabs, class pets, science-related items, or cooking items.
In the Art Studio: The art studio is a place filled with materials that children can enjoy on a purely sensory level. Here children can create and represent their ideas in visual form. On a table or the floor, an easel or a workbench, children draw, paint, knead, cut, glue and put together unique products of their own choosing. Sometimes they explore materials and enjoy the process. At other times, they create designs or make something that represents a real object. Art is a natural vehicle and fundamental language for children to express feelings. Children draw, paint, and sculpt what they know. As they translate their ideas and feelings into art, they use important thinking skills to plan, organize, select media, and represent their impressions. Work in the art studio allows students to develop their fine motor skills through the small muscle movements they use to tear paper, use scissors and manipulate media.
Dramatic Play: Dramatic play is central to children’s healthy development and learning. To engage in dramatic play, children have to negotiate roles, agree on a topic and cooperate. They recreate life experiences, assume roles and make decisions. Research shows that children who engage in dramatic play tend to demonstrate more empathy toward others because they have tried out being someone else for a while! Children also develop small muscle skills when they button and snap dress-up clothes or cook. Whey they pretend, children create pictures in their minds about past experiences and situations they imagine – thus promoting abstract thinking. When they set the table or “purchase food” they explore math concepts and problem solving. To engage others in dramatic play, children use language to explain what they’re doing and ask and answer questions. They also use reading and writing skills when engaging in dramatic play.
Structures: Blocks are standard equipment in the Prekindergarten classroom at St. Anne’s School. Wooden blocks naturally appeal to young children because they fell good to touch, are symmetrical, and invite open-ended explorations. When children construct, create and represent their experiences with blocks, they grow in every area of development. Children learn to exchange ideas by negotiating for materials they want to use, determining how many individuals can work safely on one project, caring for materials, and following rules for building. As children learn to experience the world around them, they form mental pictures of what they see. Playing with blocks gives them an opportunity to recreate pictures in concrete form, which is key to their cognitive development. Through block play, children explore additional fundamental cognitive concepts such as logical thinking, size, shape, number, order, length, patterns, and weight. Children develop language skills through discussion and interaction with others and by describing their structures and components of the structures. While vocabulary is built verbally, children often begin labeling their structures, developing their writing skills and the understanding that print carries their messages.
Reading, Listening, Message and Writing Centers: Opportunities for language learning are critical for the young child, and they are plentiful throughout the school day in every room. As learners “read” the morning message, hear stories read aloud every day, look through books on their own, listen to story tapes, retell familiar stories to friends, and make up their own stories and writing, they develop phonological awareness, comprehension skills, vocabulary, and many fundamental skills necessary for writing. Through talking, singing, listening and playing, our students build vocabulary and refine their language skills. We place books in different interest areas to engage children’s interest in print. We write signs, model writing and encourage students to post their contributions throughout the room to encourage writing skills. We also set up specific, inviting spaces in the room where children can develop the motivation, interest and dispositions necessary for literacy development. Students who come to the program with reading skills are encouraged to further their abilities by engaging in shared and independent reading and writing tasks. Teachers read big books, encourage young readers to read familiar text to others, offer resources and tools in interest areas to promote literacy development, and, through the course of a typical morning, engage students in fun activities and games that promote phonetic learning.