Preschool Program
You have chosen an amazing, nurturing, loving, and welcoming environment for your child. At Shepherd, we are committed to quality care and learning. Our students are exposed to experiences that promote fundamental skills in the following areas: Social-Emotional, Math, Science, Art, Language, Music and Movement, and Dramatic Play. These fundamental learning experiences promote academic skills that will enhance their next steps in education.
At Shepherd of the Valley Preschool, we believe in learning through play and fostering each child’s unique qualities and potential. Our program is developmentally appropriate for each concept building upon the last. Literacy is infused into all aspects of the curriculum to reinforce learning. We use hands-on learning activities providing a balance of important pre-kindergarten skill experiences for young children. Through active learning, your child is exposed to a variety of skills, which will enhance their social abilities and develop a love for learning.
Our program promotes and enhances the following domains in children’s learning:
Social Emotional:
Social-emotional learning is key to every child’s ability to manage feelings and to interact successfully with others.
The children will begin to:
- Learn to share and cooperate
- Play in a group setting and work with each other
- Learn to manage own feelings as well as identify others feelings
- Learn responsibility
- To interact with other adults as it is important for school success
- Gain empathy and caring for their peers
- Demonstrate self-regulation and self-awareness
- Maintain and make lasting friendships
Religion:
Preschoolers will learn the basic concepts of religion: Kindness to others, love of God, God’s Creations, and the life of Jesus.
Students will:
- Listen to Bible stories
- Recognize that we are all God’s creation
- Learn about God’s love
- Learn to be thankful
- Say grace at snack time
- Learn about the life of Jesus
- Attend chapel every Wednesday morning
Creative Arts:
Children will participate in activities in the area of art, music and movement, and dramatic play. These areas will promote imagination and creativity.
Children will begin to:
- Create paintings, drawings, and sculptures
- Use a variety of materials: tempera paint, watercolors, crayons, markers, art chalk, clay, play dough
- Experiment with mixing colors
- Learn traditional and new songs to enhance their learning
- Participate in music and movement
- Dramatize stories and act out situations
- Use different instruments
Language:
Preschoolers are exposed to the alphabet, the sound of each letter, print, and letter formation. Children learn that print has meaning; they recognize and begin to write their own name, they are introduced to stories, are able to retell familiar stories, and also start to make up stories of their own. We introduce nursery rhymes to familiarize the children with rhyming, vocabulary and story structure.
The students will learn to:
- Identify some upper and lower case letter and the sounds of each individual letter
- Write and identify their own name
- Correct pencil grip
- Retell familiar stories
- Dictate words to tell about stories and experiences
- State personal information (name, age, school name, city, state, country)
- Phonological awareness
- Literacy interest
Mathematics:
Children learn math skills through hands-on activities, games, songs, and calendar. Concepts include numbers, shapes, sorting, patterning, and one-to-one correspondence.
The children will begin to:
- Identify numerals 1-10
- Counting to 10
- One-to-one correspondence
- Recognize and repeat simple patterns
- Identify sizes
- Recognize simple shapes
- Explore graphs
- More or less
- Explore money
- Use measurement
Science:
Science in preschool is built on children’s natural curiosity and tendency to actively explore, experiment, and discover the nature of things in their everyday life.
Children will learn to:
- Compare and contrast
- Record information (mentally)
- Explore and describe new information
- Classify objects or materials
- Observe
- Investigate and predict outcomes
- Measure
- Use observation tools
- Discover habitats
- Identify physical properties
- Explore the life cycle
In our preschool program, we follow NAEYC (National Association for the Education of Young Children) guidelines, and we provide fun early learning experiences. Our preschool is a place where every child is given the opportunity to embrace their strengths and learn Christian values and life skills.