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Preschool (3-4y.o.)

Our preschool program emphasizes the most important aspects of early childhood development:

1. Fine and Gross Motor Skills

Fine and Gross Motor SkillsYoung children master both the gross motor skills, like coordination of hands and feet, and the fine motor skills. We engage them in a range of activities to help with both.

  • Dancing/Gymnastic/Yoga 
  • Large playground / back yard gives children space to run around and jump, as well as  ride around on bicycles 
  • Inside the classrooms, fine motor skills are used  ever-changing selection of art and creative activities, in paper shredding and gluing projects, coloring and painting using various media, play dough and kinetic sand, moving alphabet, and musical numbers to which children clap, move their fingers, and stomp their feet

2. Language Development

Language to children is more than expression of thoughts and feelings – it is a means of making sense of the world around them. 

Our reading program is based on a strong foundation of phonics. Developmentally appropriate activities allow children to build their own understanding of how sounds are represented by symbols, and these symbols are joined together to form words. Along with learning sounds children simultaneously learn to hold a pencil and control its use. We have many games and toys to help children get an early jump on cultivating their language skills:

  • Puzzles with pictures and movable alphabet help teaching different sounds and forming words 
  • Singing and music exercises help developing articulation 
  • Storytelling combines listening with imagination and participation, as children can put together pictures showing the events in the story.
  • Reciting poems help learning sounds and increasing attention span
  • Reading books smooth the transition from sounds to syllables for beginning reader

3. STEAM

Our activities introduce simple science to children from their earliest age:

  • Gardening & Botany for preschoolers: watering and observations of plants and flowers growth, planting and harvesting our vegetables are combined with hands-on experiments
  • Cooking class
  • Animals & Insects, Life cycles – supported by zoology enrichment program
  • Creative Math‘ consists of hands-on materials, life applications, and understanding of concepts rather than memorizing products. Children love to organize and categorize, explore patterns in the world around them. Concrete materials are used to introduce mathematical concepts. Children build their abstract mathematical reasoning skills on these early concrete experiences. They learn how a numeral represents an amount. They manipulate objects to see concretely operations like addition and subtraction. Children unlock the world of mathematics with ease at WHCA
  • Cultural geography 
  • Solar system for preschoolers

 

4. Social Development

Social AwarenessOur approach creates experiences for children in both large and small groups, giving them many opportunities to communicate, to interact, and to learn and play together

Children who have the ability to relate successfully to others, through skills such as empathy & perspective-talking, taking turns, sharing with others, following rules and respecting others are able to develop better friendships and are less likely to be bullied when they go to elementary and middle school. 

 

 

5. Emotional Awareness

Emotions The inner feelings largely affect the way children interact with the outside world. We approach with LOVE by

  • Raising self-esteem and creating opportunities for the child to socialize through play with others
  • Helping children to find the source of their negative emotions if any. 
  • Supporting and encouraging arts, music, and literary expressions

"Children are the best hope for the future."
- John F. Kennedy
West Hollywood Children's Academy