Three-year-old classes (specific areas of study include insects; seasons; animals preparing for winter; the science of winter, Our Wonderful Selves – a unit all about growth, friendship, feelings, love and families; dinosaurs; animals; community helpers; and other areas):
- continuing the above goals and objectives
- developing further self-help skills – pouring one’s own beverages at snack, passing plates of food, putting on coats and beginning to zipper by oneself, gathering belongings at the end of the day
- recognizing letters and beginning sight words
- understanding how many each number represents and beginning mathematical concepts, such as spatial relationships through building with blocks; counting with one-to-one correspondence, sorting, weighing, and measuring.
- developing fine motor skills through varied activities; writing one’s name (we also use the Handwriting without Tears program for preschoolers in our three-year-old and pre-kindergarten classes)
- dictating stories about pictures drawn by the children and creating class books
- studying topics of interest and themes offered in class in greater detail, for example, when studying dinosaurs, understanding what extinction means and how we use fossils to learn about dinosaurs
- learning science words through experiments
- following sequences of instruction
- gaining the skills and practice to speak confidently in front of a group
- experiencing music through songs, fingerplays, movement, and instruments
- engaging in dramatic play daily with a variety of props and scenarios (home center; workbench; store, animals, dinosaurs, etc.)
A Typical Three-Year-Old Day
- Arrival; putting away belongings, greetings!
- Free play with selected items for the morning
- Clean-up time; everyone helps
- Morning circle time; with songs, calendar, identifying and singing to helping child of the day
- Handwashing
- Snack – served family-style; children pass plates and milk/water pitchers to one another; begin to pour their own beverages; this is a time to chat while enjoying a meal together
- Free-choice activities and creative art expression; art expression is carried out in small groups so that the teachers can facilitate fine motor development (for example: helping a child learn to use scissors)
- Clean-up time; everyone helps
- Gross motor time (one half hour on the playground; if weather is inclement, one half hour in our large indoor play space0
- Second circle time; singing along with a predictable song and book on CD; learning some sign language; playing a game
- Goodbye song and dismissal
- One day each week, our music teacher instructs the children in songs, musical games, activities, movement, and puppetry for a half hour, so the above schedule is slightly adjusted
- Note that children are taken to the bathroom whenever they need to go and those in diapers are changed when needed.